mlchad147
- Apr 2
- 6 min read

March 27, 2024–Hong Kong, China (Day One)

Put this one on your bucket list. Hong Kong is a gem, and I’m already convinced that a trip to Asia would not be complete without a stop here. Admittedly, this former British territory is a big, spread out place, and we only saw a fraction of it today. Fortunately we’ll be here tomorrow too, and plan to see more then, but that still won’t be enough, at least for me.

Before I describe our first day here there are two things worth noting. First, what most people think of as Hong Kong is just Hong Kong Island, but pull it up on Google Maps and you’ll see that the island makes up only a small portion of the territory that was a British colony, all of which is properly considered to be Hong Kong. That’s one of the reasons two days here probably won’t feel like enough.

Second, this is a very comfortable city for those from English speaking countries. Because Hong Kong was a British colony until well into the 1990s, everyone here speaks English and all the highway signs are in English and Chinese. American dollars are widely accepted, as are the usual credit cards. Hong Kong may be the most westernized city in East Asia, so it’s not a bad place to get your feet wet if you’re considering a trip to this part of the world.

With that as background, here’s how our first day in China went. The Serenade docked early this morning in Kowloon (local areas within greater Hong Kong have their own names, much as in the US), adjacent to what must be one of the world’s largest cruise terminals. I say this because until the late 1990s it was the terminal for Hong Kong’s international airport, but was repurposed after a new airport was opened away from the harbor and city center.

A long walk through the cavernous facility brought us out to the bus parking area, where we met “Patrick,” our hilarious tour guide for the day. Patrick’s talents are being wasted in his chosen profession, because he would be a first rate stand up comic. I’ll spare you his jokes, other than to relate that every time his tour commentary would include something that might be considered unflattering to the government, he would pause and comically turn to the corner of the bus ceiling and loudly profess his love of China and its system of government. He had the bus in stitches.

Our first stop of the day was at Victoria Peak, which is on Hong Kong Island and has a spectacular view of the city. Getting there was as interesting as being there, because first we had to get to the island from Kowloon, which we did by taking one of the three tunnels under the South China Sea (Patrick asked us to help him examine the tunnel walls for leaks). Then we changed to a tram, which is pulled up the mountain by a very strong cable. The views on the way up were amazing, which is fortunate, because by the time we actually arrived at the summit we had ascended into the low clouds overhanging the city. Patrick took us to the overlook and showed us a photo of what the view would have been on a clear day, which was helpful, and which he also managed to make funny.

There’s more to Victoria Peak than the view, though. There’s a full blown shopping mall up there, and Hong Kong residents often take the tram up just to go shopping. Michele and I were delighted to discover that the mall had a Hershey Chocolate store, complete with Hershey Bar and Reese’s Cup figures out in the promenade. As Hershey residents we were compelled to have our photos taken with them to document the occasion. I also scored a bottle of iced Starbucks at a 7-Eleven before we started back down the mountain.

Happily, we did not take the tram this time, but made the descent by bus, allowing us to stop at an overlook just below the cloud cover to take some photos. Can’t ask for more than that, considering the weather. And speaking of the weather, it was much cooler than what we’ve been used to, with a high in the low 70s. It was cooler than that at the peak, with strong winds, causing most of us to don our jackets. I found the change refreshing, as the tropical heat and humidity at our last few stops was starting to wear me down.

From there, still on the Island, we bused to the waterfront in an area known as Aberdeen, and were dropped off at the site of one of Hong Kong’s former icons, Jumbo. No, not an elephant, but Jumbo was certainly befitting of its name, and was famous as one of the world’s largest floating restaurants. Unfortunately, Covid caused Jumbo’s closure and sale, and sadly it capsized and sank in rough seas as the new owner was towing it away to refit it as a casino.

Jumbo’s former dock is now used by sampans to take tourists like us on harbor tours, and that is what we now did. The sampan ride was fun, and I was mildly amused to see that every sampan I laid eyes on, and there were a lot of them, was ringed by old tires, presumably to prevent impact damage. Made me speculate that their pilots would feel right at home in a NASCAR race. At any rate, our leisurely harbor tour was incident free, and we returned safely to Jumbo’s dock, where I paid silent homage to the great restaurant’s ghost before reboarding the bus.

Our final destination was the Stanley Waterfront Market, in an area of the Island that Patrick called “Caucasiantown” (think Chinatown in a western city), because it is home to many western expats who live and work in Hong Kong. We’ve seen similar markets before on this cruise, but they never fail to be interesting. Invariably they consist of narrow, winding warrens, with lots of little shops selling who knows what. Michele made a couple fun purchases and I just enjoyed poking around and soaking it all in.

Then it was back on the bus and a second time transiting the tunnel under the South China Sea (Patrick asked us to watch for leaks again) back to Kowloon and the ship. As we’re docked here overnight I knew some people were planning to go back out this evening, but we decided to enjoy the city lights from our perch on the ship, watch a cultural show in the ship’s theater, rest up some, and prepare for our second day here tomorrow, when our plan calls for a good deal of walking. I think we made the right call too, because Hong Kong’s skyscrapers put on a nice show after darkness set in, and we spent quite a while out on deck enjoying the city lights.

That’s it for tonight. I still have to pinch myself sometimes when it sinks in that I’m in some amazing place that I never thought in a million years I’d visit. This is one of them. See you tomorrow.