Aberdeen and Victoria's Peak

We made breakfast at the guesthouse before heading out for the day. We took a bus to get to Aberdeen, an area on the southern side of the island, known for being a fishing area. Our drop off was a bit further away than we expected, but it gave us a chance to walk around the area a little bit. I saw a bakery and stepped inside and we got an egg tart and another kind of pie thing to try. We continued on to the water's edge and walked along the boardwalk there. Some old ladies saw us and started saying "Sampon? Tour? Sampon Tour!" Our plan was to ride on a Sampon anyway (an old-fashioned fishing boat) so we decided we might as well! Mike paid the ladies and they told us to follow them and set us at the end of a small pier and had us wait. We wondered for a second if they just took our money and ran, but the ladies kept coming back and checking on us. We had our egg tarts and they were pretty good-a nice snack. Then the sampon arrived and some other foreigners got off. They were from Europe but didn't speak much English because we tried to ask about the legitimacy of the tour. Well, we decided we'd just go for it. The tour wasn't too exciting, but it was fun to be out on the boat in the water. Basically the tour included the main floating restaurant in the area, "Jumbo" and seeing all of the boats tied up in the harbor area.

Sampons on the water in Aberdeen

Aberdeen

Made some new friends

The old ladies Mike just gave money to...

Our snacks! I liked the coconut bread on the right

Our sampon driver

On the boat!

Jumbo restaurant

Land Ho?

After our sampon tour, we walked around and saw the fish market. We tried to go in, buy there was so much water we didn't want to get our feet wet and didn't brave it. My mission was to find a magnet and we passed a small souvenir shop connected with the fishing association there. The woman inside was very friendly and helpful. She also gave us a suggestion of where to have lunch. Instead of returning to Jumbo for a likely overpriced meal, we went to a restaurant connected to the fish market. One of the waiters was very helpful and spoke English well to suggest and recommend things for Mike. Mike ended up ordering some shrimp and scallops. I got a noodle dish-no seafood for me!

My non-seafood lunch

We finished lunch and then headed to the center of the city by bus. Mike ran out of cash and we took a detour to go to a bank to try and get some stuff straightened out, except it was closed. Next on our list was another kind of walking tour and going to see the world's longest escalators (except it wasn't one long escalator but a series of escalators) which was kind of fun and a neat way to see some of the neighborhoods. Then we walked to find the tram to go up to Victoria's Peak. On the way we passed the zoo and stopped in there (free!). There weren't too many varieties of animals; a few monkeys, a raccoon!, and birds. It was still kind of cool to see for free. We continued on and made it to the tram place, but man-alive, the line was impossibly long! We did some fast research and found a bus that we could take instead to the top of the peak.

Walking around central area

I'm on the world's longest escalator!

Skyline

Some critters hanging out at the zoo

Pretty fountain and grounds at the zoo

Upon reaching the top, we went into the shopping mall there. First we grabbed a green tea ice cream cone from Mc Donalds and looked around inside. Then we went outside to look at the view and watch the sunset. It was quite a view! After the sunset, we took a taxi to a neighborhood known for being "hip" and looked for a place to eat. We picked Smokey Joe's BBQ and ordered sandwiches and fries. It was pretty good, but kind of pricey! After dinner, we walked around a bit and tried to do some shopping, but didn't really see anything in our price range. There are tons of designer stores--you could see two Tiffany's stores from one focal point! Absolutely crazy.

Our ice cream stop at the golden arches

We finally found a trolley to ride! (Just a display)

A weird balloon exhibit 

View from Victoria's Peak!

Beautiful sunset

Our BBQ dinner-pretty delicious but super pricey!

We took a trolley back to our guesthouse and that was fun to ride.

Daredevil snap of our trolley before it started up again

Dragon's Back Hiking

Today we set off to go hiking Dragon's Back. We did some research on how to get there and a bus to take. We found the bus stop and waited in line when some guy starts talking to us and gesturing to another smaller bus. I followed him to the smaller bus and we asked the driver "Dragon's Back?" He waved us on and we had to pay cash instead of using our Octopus card. At first we were kind of skeptical, but once we started driving and got up higher, I realized that there were no other bigger buses and they must have to use these smaller ones in that area.

We got off at our bus stop and started the hike. It was very beautiful! The weather was cool, windy and sunny. Decent hiking weather. We climbed and made it to the top of the peak-the dragon's back! The descent trail was supposed to kind of wind around down and end at Big Wave Bay a bit north of where we were. But along the way, Mike spotted another trail that was kind of "covered" in that the trees and branches overhung the trail and it looked kind of cool and mysterious. So we ventured onto that trail and were taken on a bit more of a "wild" hike. The trail was closer together and definitely not used as much, but it was still clear and marked. I think in theory it was a bit of a short cut, but because we had to push our way through branches at times, it slowed us down a bit. We finally made it down and then did a little bit more walking to find our way to Big Wave Bay. We walked along the beach and collected beach glass and shells. We did a bit of exploring and found some stairs. We thought we'd check it out and see where it lead to. But the stairs never ended. They kept going and going and we kept following and following, figuring it had to reach "the top" soon! We took a short breather and I realized that that was the descent trail if we had stayed on the other trail. So we headed back down and decided to look for lunch. There were only 2 restaurants in the small area so we picked one and shared a sandwich and noodles.

Our little adventure bus

Proof we're on the way to Dragons Back!

A view after a short time hiking

Mike and me on our hike

Looking down on another side

Dragons back behind me!

We made it to the top!

Celebrating with an ice cream after our descent

Big Wave Bay

Big wave Bay

After hiking, we took a small bus back to our hostel and took a rest before venturing out again. We looked up another kind of local place to eat and picked a restaurant that had earned 1 Michelin star. The service wasn't that great and I thought my congee (rice porridge soup) was just okay. When we finished dinner, we walked around a little bit and got some snacks to have on the patio of our guesthouse.

Ho Hung Kee was a bit of a let down

Cool staircase

Happy New Year!

Watching the fireworks display in Hong Kong was a great way to ring in 2015. I believe I'll be calling 2015 the year of travel, as I am currently in another country and have 2 other trips in the wings and another 3 countries tentatively planned.

After the fireworks, we walked back to our hostel and called it a night!

For our first day in Hong Kong we decided we would just go exploring a bit. First we took the subway to the "mainland" part. There we went in search of a particular restaurant in a mall complex to have a Cantonese breakfast. We finally found it and realized it was a little bit out of our budget range. We walked around in the mall and settled on another dimsum restaurant instead. Mike and I ordered 4 or 5 different kinds of dimsum (dumplings) to try. After our brunch, we then did a walking tour on our own (using TripAdvisor) to go through all the different kinds of markets. We saw a fruit/veggie market, jade market, bird market, flower market and goldfish market. We also passed a park with a temple inside so we stopped there as well. The bird market was pretty cool-tons and tons of birds and birdcages hanging up.

Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

Round 4

Some fruits in the market

Fireworks for sale

IT'S SO FLUFFY!!!

In the jade market

I remember these rolly jade balls my Dad got from Hong Kong!

Park

One of my all time favorite photos-in a temple

Goldfish street

Turtles for sale on goldfish street as well

Orchid street smelled heavenly

At the entrance to the bird market

Birds for sale

Last on our stop was a Hong Kong history museum. I was surprised to see that Japan had also invaded Hong Kong and brutally ruled over them during WWII as well. It amazes me that the Japanese had so much control of so many countries, being a small island themselves. After the museum, we wandered a bit and stopped in a Starbucks for a snack.

Old ship model in museum

We went to another restaurant for dimsum dinner and then went back to the area we started our morning in. There, the Sky 100 building has a great view of the city. We went up to the top floor and stayed there for an hour or so. It was really pretty. Then we took the ferry back across to the Island. That was a fun experience.

We're on a bus and we don't know where we're going?!

Instructions how to eat properly

Our dinner-when we only ordered 3 dishes everyone asked us "THAT'S IT?" and looked very concerned.

In the elevator of Sky100

Looking down

Sky100!

On the ferry going across the harbor