HONG KONG

Tram to Victoria Peak Tram station on Victoria Peak

Tuesday, 25 April. After the buffet breakfast, our group assembled at 8:30 for a bus tour of Hong Kong Island. The bus used the tunnel to reach the island. It dropped us at the funicular railway that took us up Victoria Peak. It was very foggy at the top, even though it was sunny in Kowloon. Later the bus met us near the top and, on the way down, stopped at another overlook where there was a good view without the fog.

Us on Victoria Peak

Jane & Li

View.  Can you find the dragon?

Repulse Bay with shark net

 

The bus next took us to Repulse Bay, where the British first landed in Hong Kong. It was very pretty with a nice beach. There is a shark net around the swimming area, added after two swimmers were killed by sharks. 

The bus continued on to Aberdeen, once a fishing village where most of the residents lived on their small boats in the harbor. Now most of those people have been moved into skyscraper apartment buildings that surround the harbor.

Our group visited one of the apartments. A widow (a former boat-resident) lived there with two adult sons and the wife and 7-year-old child of one of them, a total of five persons in one 300 square-foot room. Makeshift partitions divided it into two tiny bedrooms and a kitchen/living area but really provided no privacy. The 8-foot wide hallway leading to the apartment was dark, dingy, and littered with rubbish. Every new year's day, young toughs terrorize the residents, demanding "protection" money. The shortage of living space in Hong Kong is an insoluble problem. On the plus side, there was a large open-air market in the only open space between the high-rises. 

Aberdeen "fishing village"

Typical apartments

Market amid the high-rises

 Next we went to the waterfront and took a tour of the harbor on a small motorized junk. The "Jumbo" floating restaurant that I remembered was still there, but nothing else was familiar. Like most of Hong Kong, Aberdeen is now covered with skyscrapers. How can they continue to refer to it as a "quaint fishing village"? 

"Jumbo" floating restaurant

Motorized junk for tourists

Captain of the junk, with friend

 Our tour then went to a jewelry factory, a very small operation with a gigantic showroom for tourists. They had a wide variety, and Jane looked at some jade pieces. From there the bus took us back to Kowloon where we went to a dimsum restaurant. It was great, at least as good as the "dumpling banquet" we'd had in Xian.

Afterward the two of us took the Star Ferry to Wanchi on Hong Kong Island, nearest stop to the Fleet Arcade. We were practically the only customers there. We wound up buying more than we expected, including a 5 x 8 silk carpet and several pieces of jade jewelry (not to mention a small suitcase to carry some of our purchases home in). It was a job lugging all that the several blocks to and from the ferry on a warm day. It was nearly 6:00 p.m. when we got back to the hotel. We had to do considerable repacking to get everything ready for the trip back to the land of the big-noses.

Our farewell dinner was at 7:30 in a private dining room in the hotel. It was outstanding. There were nine courses (the luckiest number in China), most of them seafood. Afterward, we all thanked Li and said good-bye to the five of our group who were going on to Bali. We got back to our room about 10:00.