We actually visited Hong Kong at the beginning of our time in China. After one day in Hong Kong, I flew with a large SAS group to the Mainland to hike The Great Wall and to visit The Forbidden City in Beijing and then flew on to rejoin the MV Explorer in Shanghai. When publishing the posting on China I actually forgot to include Hong Kong at the beginning .... woke in the night with that OMG thought!
So here are a few pictures and thoughts about Hong Kong ........
Twenty four hours in Hong Kong: From a golden sunrise as the ship came into Honk Kong Harbor at 5 a.m. to an intense rose sunset and later, the brilliant city lights on the waterfront.
Since the reversion in 1997, Hong Kong is certainly part of China though it remains subtly yet distinctly different. This is a busy international shipping port, a busy international financial center, and a widely cosmopolitan city. Packed with millions of people, it is densely settled but there do remain open regions in the interiors of several islands for hiking, etc.
Our walking tour guide stated "People come to Hong Kong from all over the world to make money." It certainly is a city with great appeal.
Oversized Christmas decorations in an oversized complex of several attached shopping malls along a busy street of international designer stores! Mainland Chinese come to Hong Kong to shop. International travelers shop here. We shopped one of several busy Night Markets which is bargain shopping, not couture.
Traditional architecture, skyscrapers, and palm trees.
Every visitor to Hong Kong takes the breathtaking tram steeply up Victoria Peak for the views of the harbor, Kowloon Island, and the New Territories (which were new 100 years ag0.)
A view from the top of Victoria Peak over toward Kowloon. The MV Explorer is docked
just to the right of center across the water on Kowloon Island.
Only a few decades ago Hong Kong Harbor was crowded with sampans, houseboats, and a large fleet of small, active fishing junks where generations of fishing families lived. The words 'Hong Kong' mean fragrant harbor - named for the sandalwood stockyards by early visitors. During the century of congested fishing junks in the harbor, apparently Hong Kong was anything butfragrant. Most of the remaining boats are now gathered in Aberdeen. A boat ride around this side waterway is a visual contrast with skyscrapers behind fishing vessels.
On a walking tour of Honk Kong Island, a visit to the Buddhist Man Mo Temple. The air was think with incense which is lit in sticks, coils, and LARGE coils which burn up to three weeks.
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