Hong Kong--August 22, 2004--Star Ferry, Peninsula Hotel
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We took off from Los Angeles at about 2 AM on Saturday, 8/21/04 and were soon thereafter served an elaborate dinner. Eventually, we figured out that this was to get everyone on Hong Kong time, which was fifteen hours ahead of the clocks in Los Angeles. After watching some of the videos, everyone turned in for the night, which was especially nice on the upper deck of the 747 where the seats reclined into full beds.
In the morning of 8/22, we landed in Hong Kong, used the showers in the Cathay Pacific lounge to freshen up and headed into town for the day via the deluxe Airport Express train. This train connects the relatively new Hong Kong airport with Hong Kong proper and takes about twenty minutes. What was immediately apparent from the train ride was how dense Hong Kong is in terms of both buildings and people.
Although the weather was OK when we left the airport, it started to rain while we were on the train and the rest of the day in Hong Kong was wet, hot and sticky. Not planning on rain, we neglected to bring umbrellas from the airport so we got a little wet during the day. The weather explains the lack of pictures on this day since photo conditions were either poor or we were getting soaked.
From Hong Kong Central, we eventually found our way to the famous Star Ferry and went across the harbor to Kowloon (photo 5 was shot from the ferry). The Star Ferries have been crossing between Kowloon and Hong Kong Island since 1888 and cost only about 25¢.
Once in Kowloon, we went to church and then back to the Peninsula Hotel (6-7) for lunch. Many think the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong is the best hotel in the world--we were fortunate to have had both lunch and a later dinner here (upon our return to Hong Kong two weeks later) and also stay in their affiliated hotel in Beijing.
After a leisurely lunch, we reversed the trip and headed back to the airport to catch the evening flight to Beijing.