In China now on an ABD and ...

I am enjoying this too. My DD17 is going to HongKong for 4 days in July on her way to a dance conference in Taipei. So I am enjoying the info on Hong Kong.
 
Day 11 of the Adventure

The last day of all of us being together. Kind of sad that the tour is winding down. The Shangrila Kowloon has one of the better buffet breakfasts in my opinion. It could be because I'm Cantonese that I prefer their version of Cantonese breakfast items than the other places. :rotfl: Who knows, eh?

Anyhow, we met the group and Bruce, our local guide, in the lobby at 8 am. While talking with Bruce we discovered he had lived in Welland, Ontario for a little while. Welland is about a 1 hour drive from us and is near Niagara Falls. One was tempted to break into a chorus of "It's a Small World ... " but thankfully, I resisted.

Remember that they drive on the left side in Hong Kong so remember to look in the right direction first before crossing the street. They helpfully paint the direction you should be looking on the street to remind us forgetful tourists.

After going in the tunnel under the harbour, our first stop that morning was Stanley Market. Stanley is another famous Hong Kong Market (along with the Ladies Market and Temple Street) with a whole lot of shops to through. If you're looking for Chinese Rainbow Calligraphy, this is where you get it. It takes the charecters of someones name and assigning them animals and the animals have assigned characteristics like nobility, strength, beauty, energy, etc. If you have a Chinese name, they'll use that to do the artwork but if you're not Chinese, they'll take your name and do it phonetically. For example, I had one of the artists do one for my friend's daughter named "Emma". Phoentically, he said it sounded like E-Ma... Ma, in Chinese is a horse. So he drew a very colourful horse which he said meant her daughter was "Energetic". She's a very energetic 6 year old so it fit her well.

You can also get all manner of clothes, handicrafts, luggage, etc. here. You can still barter her but don't expect it to be like in China. It will not be as cheap as the mainland ... not even close.

And by the way, it was a scorcher. The temperature was around 26 C which isn't bad but the 91% humidity made it very uncomfortable. Those going in the summer are in for a treat. :faint: If you find yourself fading, there are two pharmacies right at the start of the market where the air conditioning is extremely refreshing. If you don't have the nerve to stand inside or pretend you're looking for something, stand by the opening... the cold air coming out of the store will help. :rotfl: The people working in the Watsons pharmacy didn't seem to mind. They had a really neat Winnie the Pooh spinner suitcase too!!!

After that, we hopped onto our bus to go to Peak, also known as Victoria Peak. We had amazing weather. It was a very clear day. The last time I was in Hong Kong, the smog and haze obstructed my view but today, the view was phenomenal. They took us to a observation deck where we took photos and the guides took a group photo. And then we headed to lunch in a restaurant in the Peak Galleria, the mall they built up there.

Lunch was Caesar salad, spinach curry or steak or seafood pasta, tiramisu for desert. Let me just say ... tiramisu... :worship:

We had a bit of time afterwards to wander around and shop if we wanted to...I was shopped out so my dad and I just walked around and got some more photos. We all met at the restaurant entrance so we could go down together in Peak Tram. The tram is a funicular that dates back to the late 1880's. Do not dilly dally when you get into the tram. Sit down quick or you end up with no seat. :rotfl:

When we reached the bottom, our trusty bus was waiting in the parking lot. We got on board and it took us to the dock where we boarded the Star Ferry for our journey from Hong Kong Island back to Kowloon. The ferry is as old as the Peak Tram. And it's one of the most identifing icons of Hong Kong in my opinion. It's also, if you have to pay, one of the cheapest ways to cross Victoria Harbour. If you're over 65, you don't even have to pay.

Back in Kowloon, we walked up onto the waterfront walkway to take photos of the Hong Kong skyline. This was also where we took our last group photo. We were then given a choice, walk back to the hotel by way of the Avenue of the Stars (the waterfront walkway) or take the coach back. It had probably gotten hotter as the day went on so most people took the coach back. I decided to walk back since I wanted to take photos. The walk, if you don't stop, is about 15 minutes long. I loitered and lingered a bit to snap shots and to people watch, watch some people try their hand at fishing, etc etc. By the time I got back, I was soaked with sweat. :rotfl2: but if you're not spending any extra days in Hong Kong, I recommend you walk back to the hotel. As I said earlier, the walkway leads to a bridge that takes you to the second floor of the hotel.

There's free time now ... we were efficient shoppers at Stanley and efficient eaters at lunch so even I was back at the hotel by 3 pm. We had a few hours before assembling for our farewell dinner. I have relatives in Hong Kong so an aunt and uncle visited during our free time. I would recommend, again, if you're not staying extra days, to head out and find Nathan Road. It's the hub bub of Kowloon. Busy busy busy. Just watch out for the dripping air conditioning water.

Dinner was in the hotel and it was so sad to know that the tour was ending in a few hours and we had to say good-bye to everybody. A piece of paper was passed around so we could write down our email addresses. After dinner, the guides presented the slide show of our trip. Hard to believe it was already over when we watched photos of the tea ceremony during the Welcome dinner. We had such good laughs with the photos. The guides went over how the next morning would work. Some families were leaving with Jennae (one family was headed back to Newark with her!!) at 8 am. Others would be leaving later. The cars had all been arranged. Only our family and another couple (Margie100's parents!) were not leaving yet. Our family was moving to another hotel the next day (more about that in the post tour report) but we were told to go ahead and call the hotel porters to get our luggage to the taxi because they had already been tipped. Very nice.

And then it was time to say goodbye to everybody. Much hugging, promises to keep in touch, and our ABD adventure was over.

I wanted to take a photo of some whizzing traffic at night so my brother and I headed out onto that walkway bridge to take photos of the traffic with the Hong Kong skyline. I got my photos and that's when we headed back to the hotel, that's when we discovered they lock up access to the hotel at some point in the evening. :rotfl: We had to walk down and enter the hotel through the bar.

The end of the ABD adventure. I'll write about our next few days here too.
 
The view from our room.
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Stanley Market
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Rainbow Calligraphy
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View from the Peak
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The guides prepare to take the group photo
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View from the Peak
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Star Ferry
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My family with the guides
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Avenue of the Stars
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Bruce Lee statue
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Night traffic (it was actually kind of slow that night!)
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I am currently reading your post. Its very helpful as we will be going on the same trip in June. We are also traveling on Air Canada. Were the luggage weight limits for Chinese domestic airlines different from Air Canada? Do you recall how much luggage you brought and the weight for each? I have also read other posts that recommend bringing extra luggage for items purchased. Would extra luggage just get checked in for a fee on the domestic carriers?
 


I am currently reading your post. Its very helpful as we will be going on the same trip in June. We are also traveling on Air Canada. Were the luggage weight limits for Chinese domestic airlines different from Air Canada? Do you recall how much luggage you brought and the weight for each? I have also read other posts that recommend bringing extra luggage for items purchased. Would extra luggage just get checked in for a fee on the domestic carriers?

The weight limits are different from Air Canada or any other international flight. First the airlines you'll be going on are:

China Southern Airlines
Air China
Shanghai Airlines
Dragonair

The biggest difference is carry on in my opinion. Your carry on is only supposed to be 5 kg. Again, a lot of times we never check in ourselves so we never see the ticket agent to get our carry on weighed. Only two times did we see them... in Beijing and in Shanghai. The only time it was threatened was Shanghai.

Checked baggage is supposed to be 20 kg. I believe Air Canada allows 23 kg (for economy passengers). Now, checked baggage IS weighed and I know that we were overweight in Shanghai since I was standing there when it was weighed. One of ours weighed 27 kg. Somehow, the Mouse paid for it or made the charge go away. I cannot guarantee that this happens all the time but one of our guides said, at the farewell dinner, that when we go home that we all had to do the checking in ourselves and there would be no Mouse to help us with overweight bags.

ABD also says you're restricted to one checked bag but the guides kept reminding us that if we had added a bag during the trip to tell them so they could add it to the baggage count. I know of one lady who added a second bag and as far as I know, she wasn't charged extra for it for the China flights. Remember though that Air Canada's going to charge you for that second bag.

I don't know about bringing extra luggage. If you're sure you're going to need it, I guess you could bring it but like I said, AC's going to charge you that coming and going. You could just buy lugggage in China if you need it ... there's a few markets on the trip where you can buy some luggage rather cheaply. One after the Li River cruise and a few markets in Hong Kong.

I liked our AC flight by the way. We flew economy on the way back from Hong Kong (no upgrade ... rats) and it was actually quite fine. The seats and pitch were very ok.
 
Day 12 (first day of post Adventure) :rotfl:

We had breakfast at the Shangrila but we weren't staying at this hotel for the next 3 days. We loved the hotel but it is a bit pricey for 3 additional nights so after breakfast the porters jammed all of our luggage into one taxi (3 in the trunk with a bungeed lid and one in the compartment with us .... kind of a tight fit) and we drove about 5 minutes to the Golden Mile Holiday Inn on Nathan Road. Nathan Road is the hubbub of Hong Kong. You'll find all kinds of stuff selling on that road.

Anyway, podcast listeners will remember Pete talking about how mildewy hotels like to mask the smell of mildew with an overabundance of scent. Alas, this Holiday Inn does just that. Everywhere in the hotel was this overwhelming perfumy smell. The Holiday Inn is one of the oldest hotels in HK and as such has some of the bigger rooms in Kowloon (not as big as the Shangrila though). I remember staying at this hotel in 1977!! Well, alas, moving from the Shangrila to this hotel was such a let down. :lmao: But we knew it would be ...but the smells...oh the smells. Anyway... the price was right.... My brother and I cashed in a ton of Priority Rewards points and got 2 rooms for 3 nights for free. Guess we can't complain too much, eh? The Shangrila was about $400 per post night... that would have been almost enough for a North American ABD tour! LOL (The Holiday Inn itself was kind of pricey if we hadn't had used points ... hotels in Hong Kong are crazy!)

We went walking around Kowloon Park after checking in. It's a little walk from the hotel. It's a very nice park that has all kinds of water birds, an aviary, turtles. It was still about 94% humidity so while the walk was nice, we were all melting. We decided to start heading back to the hotel by way of air conditioned malls or stores. If you walk near the entrance of a store, the cold air will help. :rotfl: I stopped in one store (the AC is sooooo compelling) and ended up buying a pair of shoes! Oooops!

We were going to meet family for dinner so it was already too late for lunch. While my mom went back to the hotel, my brother, dad and I decided to find a particular place for an afternoon snack. A friend of mine had told me about this cafe on Cameron Road (not too far from the hotel). We found it .... the Charlie Brown Cafe! Peanuts characters everywhere in this cafe. We had a little nosh there while enjoying all the Peanuts memorabilia and figures.

That evening our family met with our Hong Kong family (aunts, uncles, cousins, cousin's kids) and we had a huge banquet at a restaurant close to the hotel. Alas, I shouldn't have had the Charlie Brown snack and I was sooooo tired that I could barely eat. Ah well. Afterwards, we head back to the hotel to rest up... HK Disneyland awaits!

Day 12 (second day of post Adventure)

The next day, my dad, mom and I headed off to the subway (right next to the hotel) to go to Disneyland. My brother had made plans to meet some friends so he didn't come with us. It is extremely easy to get to Disneyland by way of the subway or as they call it the MTR. You go to a machine to buy your ticket. It asks you where you want to go and you just touch the place on the interactive map. It tells you how much it'll cost for the one way ticket and then you tap out how many tickets you want. There's a choice to buy "concession" tickets which are tickets for seniors and kids (I think kids... seniors for sure). Once you get the ticket you just follow the signs to the train, hop on for the right direction and off you go.

The subway station we started at is actually the same station as if you were leaving from the Shangrila. So, if you want to get to Disneyland, you have to change trains twice. From Tsim Tsa Tsui (not Tsim Tsa Tsui EAST....walk a bit over to the other one) take the Tsuen Wan train to Lai King where you then change trains and take the Tung Chung train. Change trains at Sunny Bay for the Disneyland Resort train. You can't miss the DL train ... it has Mickey Mouse heads EVERYWHERE.

We got to Disneyland about an hour after it opened. It was crowded and it was also a Friday so I don't understand why so many children were out of school. It wasn't a holiday so ... :confused3. Anyway, the first place we headed to was It's a Small World because I had never seen it with the Disney characters in it. It's actually quite cute and fun trying to spot them. And I don't care what anybody says, I actually like this ride.

It was then off to Toy Story Land. Interesting place. :rotfl2: We decided we were going to ride the Slinky dog ride. Yikes...the line took forever. It was kind of like Dumbo. Just before you board the ride, the give you a bone (instead of a feather) and after you sit down, they take the bone back. The ride lasted barely 1 minute if even. Oh well...

Tip: bring an umbrella ... even if it's not going to rain. It's shade.... and everybody had an umbrella for shade. We brought ours and it helped. My dad brought that huge fan he got at the white elephant in Guilin. :rotfl:

We went to find a place to eat ... somewhere with air conditioning. We ended back on Main Street and ate in a restaurant there. Can't remember the name but I had a huge burger and my dad had a pasta. My mom had chicken wings and a peach soda. The food was ok but the air conditioning was heaven. :rotfl2:

We saw the Disneyland band march out, play a few sets and then played Happy Birthday to somebody. She got photos with them afterwards. We walked around a bit more but didn't ride anything else because we wanted to get ready for the parade. We went into the shops and bought some stuff (like I need more Disney stuff) and then sat on the curb to wait for the parade. Finding a shady spot on the curb is important and scarce ... but we manged to find a spot.

The parade is called Flights of Fantasy and is led by Dumbo. It was a very nice parade...unique since I hadn't seen it before. After the parade, we did some more shopping :thumbsup2 and then we decided to leave. It was just too hot and we were wiped. So back onto the train (during rush hour :scared1:). Well, we could have timed that better. Oh well.

Nobody was particularly hungry that night so we ate snacks in the hotel's concierge lounge and then bought a few more snacks at the 7-11 across the street. haha... so much for Hong Kong cuisine.

Day 13 (third day of post Adventure)

Didn't have much planned. Remember that we have been to HK before so we were just wandering around. We went to Ocean Terminal which is a huge shopping mall. We wandered around there and around the harbour for most of the day. Saw a nice looking cruise ship at the terminal. I would wish that someday I'll see the Magic or Wonder sitting there. :)

Evening dinner was a little hole in the wall noodle place. The noodles were great the ambience ... well, it takes some getting used to. ahhahaha

Back to the hotel to pack. I always bring a portable hand held luggage scale with me so we were measuring our bags to the exact gram. We got all of our luggage to just below 23 kg. We were no longer overweight! Woohoo!

Day 14 (fourth day of post Adventure)

It's off to the airport. Again, we managed to fit into one taxi. The lid was bungeed with our luggage hanging out. I hate that but the taxis are all prepared for it .. they have multiple bungees in the trunks. ha. It was a Sunday so traffic wasn't horrendous and we got to the airport in good time and not too expensive a fare. Can't for the life of me remember what the fare was though. They charge a fee for each bag in the trunk though...so you'll need to remember that.

As soon as you pass through security at the airport, there's a Hong Kong Disneyland store staring you in the face and it sits in the food court. I managed to still shop in there (got a Vinylmation dragon!) and there's tons of shopping at the airport. We had a bite to eat and then headed off to the gate. We had to get on a train to get to the gate -- the same way as when we arrived in HK with ABD.

And off we went ... back to Toronto. And so endeth the Adventure. Photos of the last days to follow. :wave2:
 


Windows on the subway train to Disneyland
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I love the Mickey hand holds on the train
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Look...see how popular Duffy is? LOL
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:wave2:
 
Oh, wanted to add something... before I left on the trip, I downloaded an app to my iPhone. It's called "Learn Chinese". I thought I might be able to pick up some Mandarin before I left (boy, that was a pipe dream, the language is too dependent on tones for me to learn it). While I didn't actually learn Chinese, it's a neat app because it has various phrases that may be useful and when you tap on it, it says it out loud. So even if you can't say it, the iPhone does. This became important on at least 2 occasions: once when looking for the toilet and once when trying to determine if something was pork or chicken. :rotfl:

It's a free app by Codegent Ltd. (For a price, you can add more phrases but I don't think it's worth it.)
 
Thanks for your great report - brought back many happy memories of our 2010 China ABD. Our group loved Bobby and how he kept talking about 'spicy girls from Sichuan province'!
 
Thanks for your great report - brought back many happy memories of our 2010 China ABD. Our group loved Bobby and how he kept talking about 'spicy girls from Sichuan province'!

Oh yes!!!! The spicy girls and the henpecked husbands!! LOL. Bobby was great!
 
What a wonderful trip report! Thank you so much for sharing. This ABD was not on my Wish List but after reading about your adventure, I'm changing my mind. It really sounds fabulous!
 
Beautiful pictures!

We have only traveled to China during the winter or spring months. I'm dreading the June/July heat!
 
Hey, pxlbarrel, please post a link to your great Trip Report on the Sticky over on the ABD board! I definitely want people to be able to find it!

Sayhello
 

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