HONG KONG!!!!!

18 December 2013-

It's time for a quick get-away.  Many of our friends have left for either their home country or a tropical vacation to exotic Asian countries for the Christmas break.  We're kind of getting itchy to leave but with Christmas RIGHT around the corner I really don't want an extended trip.

Where to go that's close by, slightly warmer than Tianjin, and feels like you're in the Western world????

HONG KONG!!!!

Know what's even better about going to Hong Kong?  I've got a wonderful friend (we've known each other since high school!!?!) who lives there with her family.  

And you know what else is in Hong Kong????  (well, I'm sure there are loads of things in HK but this one is a biggie)

Hong Kong Disneyland!

So…let me bring you up to speed on what's going to happen on this trip (as there will be a bunch of jumping & hopping around): we told the girls that we'd take them to Disneyland as their Christmas gift from us.  Funny, it didn't quite elicit the excited response we were hoping of getting but whatever.  LOL!  Regardless, they were happy to go.  (ahem…apparently nothing will ever compare to Michigan's Adventure)

Sadly, Mark doesn't have any extra vacation days left so the girls and I will travel alone to Hong Kong on Wednesday and then he'll meet up with us on Friday evening.  

So, Wednesday comes along and guess what?  The day before it SNOWED and now the roads and flights are all messed up.  Our flight to ShenZhen was cancelled.  Are you asking yourself why we're flying to ShenZhen as opposed to HongKong directly?  Well, ShenZhen is a city in mainland China which is very close to HK and there supposedly shuttles/trains/busses that will take you from one city to the other AND flying to and from ShenZhen was quite a bit cheaper than HK.  However, we learned that you do get what you pay for….next time we fly to HK we'll fly in and out of there instead of messing with the complicated route to ShenZhen.  

Anyhoo….with our flight canceled what the heck were we going to do?  I asked the ladies at the front counter to help us figure out how to get to Hong Kong. I'm so grateful those ladies came through for us – we had a lot of hoops to jump through but if they hadn't helped us I'm certain we would have gotten lost in the crowd of hundreds of Chinese nationals trying to rebook their canceled flights as well.  Not sure what or how they did it but they pulled it off for us to hurry up and get on a flight directly to Hong Kong (it was waiting for us!).  Woo Hoooo!!!  Thank you!!!

We made it to Hong Kong! The city is full of tall buildings:

 

Not sure what it is about these signs that I find so amusing but I just had to take a photo of them:

 

 

 After the train ride and the hotel shuttle ride we're at our hotel: Hotel Icon.

I requested harbour view rooms….perhaps you can see why????

 

 That's quite the view!

 

and here's the view from the windows in the hallway:

 

The girls have requested one thing for dinner tonight…sushi.  And guess what????  We found JUST THE PLACE within a short walk of the hotel lobby (the hotel receptionist at the front desk suggested we try this sushi place).  Happy girls= happy mommy.  Pretty simple math when you think about it! This sushi restaurant had one of those conveyor belts that go round and round and you can grab plates off of it.  The plates are color-coded for different prices.

 After a brief walk around the hotel we headed back to the hotel for some settling down.  The girls set up a Spa for their toys (Ava brought Shasta and Annika brought Big Bear).

How about we check out some other parts of the hotel?  Here's the lobby: 

 

Check out that wall of live plants!!!  How cool is that???

And…what is up with this chair????

 

It's called The Green Chair and it's decorated with FROSTING.  Whaaaaaaat?????

Ooooooo!!!!!!  It's getting dark and the buildings are starting to show off their pretty lighting displays:

 

The girls and I are interested in getting something to eat but we're not super hungry….plus I don't want to spend the small fortune it'd cost to eat at the buffet (as lovely as it looked).  So we've opted to get meals from the poolside cafe.

 

Whew!  We're ready for bed…we're missing Mark but we're exhausted from the full day of traveling.  Tomorrow we'll get to meet up with my friend from high school and her family!!!!

*****************************************************************

Morning!

My view for my morning jog on the treadmill in the hotel's gym:

 

Not a bad view if you have to run inside on a treadmill, eh?  Actually the sunshine almost made the room unbearably hot.  

The girls are finally awake!  Time to hit the breakfast buffet!

 

Lots of yummy treats…plus I always love getting made-to-order omelets.  We had one snafu with breakfast.  All three of us got up to get some yogurt and the waiters assumed we'd left and cleared our table.  By the time we came back to our table they'd seated another family!  HEY!  I wasn't even finished with my coffee!!!!!  Thank goodness they promptly realized the boo boo and got us seated again (and I got another coffee).  Talk about fast service!

***

Today we're slowly making our way over to the top of Victoria Peak.  Debbie suggested that we take the Star Ferry across the water….did you know that Hong Kong includes over 260 islands???  I had no idea that there were so many islands!  

And yes, this is China but yet it's not China.  The influence left behind by the English is still prevalent (and very refreshing for us mainland China expat residents!).  They use a different currency, they drive on the left-hand side of the road, and it's generally cleaner here than on the mainland.

***

 

Waiting for the ferry to pick us up:

 

On the ferry…that was an extremely SHORT ride.  Funny…I thought it'd be a much longer ride.  I think it lasted less than 10 minutes to get to the other side!

 

We found the bus line that was recommended to us.  Better yet – it's a double decker bus. Naturally the girls went straight to the top floor of it!  Now, I *think* this bus ride will take us to the bottom of where we need to catch the Peak Tram that will take us to the top of Victoria Peak.

Lovely view from the bus ride…you can see that Hong Kong is quite hilly!

 

Well, we've figured out that the bus ride actually took us to the top of the peak.  LOL!  We're going to walk around here at the top and wait to meet up with Debbie and her son (she's a librarian at an international school here in HK) after she gets off work.and more photos from the top….

Annika's turn to take a photo of Ava and me:

 

Ah, there's the Peak Tram we thought we were going to ride up:

 

So exciting!!!  Debbie and her son, Declan, are heading up the hill to meet us!!!!

We're going to ride the Peak Tram down the mountain and meet up with Debbie's husband, Doug, and go out to dinner.   

Ava, Annika and Declan as we're heading down the mountain on a very steep tram ride:

 

An excellent Thai dinner with Debbie, Declan and Doug!  Thank you for joining us!!!! 

 Time to head back to the hotel…tomorrow we'll have the entire day to spend in Hong Kong before making our way over to Disneyland…while patiently waiting for Mark to join us in the evening!!!!

At Debbie's and Doug's suggestion the girls and I are going to visit the Hong Kong Science Museum:

Ready to visit some dinos????

Or how about dino poo????  Am I the only one that finds this sign funny??

Play with a velociraptor you say???  um….Okay.  Sure.  Why not?

Ava playing with the animatronic velociraptor:

 

And now it's Annika's turn:

and here the girls are operating the controls for an animatronic T-rex …

 

A farting Triceratops???? Seriously????????

and here is said farting Triceratops:

and even more about Guts and Poo:

Lots of optical illusions to boggle and stretch your mind:

I LOVED these illustrations; it's an optical illusion that involves a cylindrical mirror.  Can you see the face in the cylinder?  Can you see it in the drawing?  Pretty neat, huh?

The museum had LOTS of hands on activities for the kids.  Which was lots of fun for us….and….the huge groups of school kids that also decided that today was a good day for field trip to the museum.  Thank goodness this museum is big enough for all of us to enjoy it!

 Annika in the middle of making a giant bubble:

Wow!  Look at the enormous dinosaurs in front of the museum:

 

 

 Cool Stegosaurus:

Let's take a walk down the Avenue of Stars - 

Check out the Bruce Lee statue:

Watching the boats in the harbour:

Time to head back, check out of our hotel and move our little family to the Hollywood Hotel in Disneyland via the Metro:

 

Can you tell where this Metro train is heading??????

We're going to Disney!!!!

 

Welcome to the Hollywood Hotel in Disneyland!!!

 

The girls will always find their own way of making fun…like rolling down a grassy hill behind the hotel:

Taking a stroll on the walk close the hotel:

A Christmas tree….a real, live tree!  And it smells perfect. Just like a Christmas tree should:

Check out this amazing cake….yes, it's a cake:

 We've had a full day and I think we'll eat dinner at the buffet at the hotel instead of heading into the big city …even though the buffet costs an arm and a leg person.  

🙂  Sometimes the easy option is the way to go…. plus, check out the beautiful food displays in the buffet:

And crab legs!!!!  It's been a few years since I've had king crab:

 Can you guess what Ava is eating based on what's smeared all over her mouth? 

Of course they had an amazing ice cream bar set up for the kids.  Maybe should work on getting the ice cream and the chocolate into her mouth as opposed to close to it!!!!  LOL

and….

Where's Mickey Mouse, you say????

Here is Chef Mickey:

Ava was too afraid to have her photo taken with Mickey.  Can you imagine that? Well, to be honest – I don't think the girls have once ever seen Mickey Mouse or any of the other Disney characters.  So, it's no surprise she ran away from the giant, weird looking mouse!!!!

Mark finally made it ….very, very late.  He flew into ShenZhen and via a long three-hour bus ride made it to Hong Kong.  Yay!  We've got Daddy again. 

It's Saturday and today we're heading to……

DISNEYLAND!!!!!!!!
We got our tickets (thankfully at the hotel)!!!  Debbie, Doug and Declan are going to join us today.

Hurry, hurry, hurry!  Let's hurry off and get on our first ride…Grizzly Mountain!

That ride was so much fun we raced around and did it again!  

Mystic Manor…I'm not familiar with the characters associated with Mystic Point but I can tell you that the ride inside was fun and had us laughing so hard!

Toyland:

 Can you guess the movie that Toyland characters come from?

 Space Mountain!!!  Another thrilling ride:

 My high school friend, Debbie, and me:

 Playing "musical instruments" on Tarzan's island:

Annika doing one of the things she loves doing….climbing! 

The girls waiting for their cotton candy.  Can you believe it took more than ten…or maybe even twenty minutes for them to get their balls of sugar fluff? The person running the machine kept making a batch but because it wasn't quite perfect she tossed it away!!!  I have no idea how many batches she went through before the girls finally got theirs!!!!

 The long awaited cotton candy:

Annika, Ava, Mark, Declan and Debbie (Doug is just beyond the photo):

  

 

 

What's happening on Main Street????

Ah!  A PARADE!  There's a parade coming!

Disneyland…we had a surprisingly fun time!  (I was fully prepared to not enjoy Disney as I'm not a big fan of theme parks or rides)

 

What's for dinner?  How about sushi????  It's (perhaps obviously?) our favorite.  Debbie, Doug and Declan found a sushi restaurant with us…but sadly it was too crowded for us to all sit together.  

Check out the reindeer on the building:

 

The restaurant was located in a giant mall which also had a few bookstores.  (it took us a while to find both the restaurant and then the bookstores as the mall maps were ummm…a bit confusing).  Know what they had in the bookstores???  Books – in ENGLISH!!!!  Why yes, we did buy a bunch of books.  Why do you ask?

The girls reading their new books on the ride back to the hotel.

The Hollywood Hotel all lit up at night:

It's Sunday morning!  We just had breakfast in the breakfast buffet (and we bumped into expat friends from Tianjin!) and now it's time to check out and make our way to ShenZhen to catch our flight back to Tianjin. 

 We're grateful to Debbie for coming along with us to ShenZhen – it was quite the long journey getting there which included a long ride on the Metro and then a surprisingly *long* taxi ride (we had no idea the airport was THAT far away from the end of the Metro line!!!).  

Many, many thanks to Debbie, Doug and Declan for spending time with us!  We really had a lot of fun!