Hong Kong to UK

Hong Kong – the final destination before we returned to Blighty.

We spent much of our time in Hong Kong at height, simply appreciating the views of the impressive city below. A highlight of our stay was a Wednesday evening at the races. It seems that most of the city makes the Wednesday evening pilgrimage to Happy Valley Racecourse in the city centre. The atmosphere was electric and we wondered if there was anywhere else on earth that would be as vibrant on a Wednesday night.

Hong Kong

On another day, we took a ferry to Macau and were glad that we had only arranged a one night stay. When we travelled through Vietnam we identified Macau as somewhere were we might dwell a little longer but it’s quite a harsh place of imposing hotels that house huge casinos and brothels. The old town was more pleasant but there wasn’t much else to hold our attention.

At the weekend, we travelled out of the city to Clear Water Bay where I took part in the “Hard as Nayls” mountain race. I was seriously unfit by this stage but I managed to potter along up the hillsides taking in the amazing views of the sea below and the city in the distance, it was a humid day and I was glad to finish. After the race we walked back to sea level and I went for a swim to cool down.

Downtown Hong Kong.

In the city centre, we travelled the ‘mid level escalators’, the worlds longest escalator system which takes commuters and residents from the city into the residential districts on the hillside. The escalators run downhill daily from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. and uphill from 10:30am to midnight. We had fun sitting in the open window of a bar at the top of one of the sections and people watched as, in single file like a conveyer belt, the escalator disposed of all manner of different nationalities illustrating the rich tapestry of international life.

Where’s Wally? (Macau).

 

It was time to move to a hotel near the airport. It is safe to safe we had absolutely buried our heads in the sand, we hadn’t considered that we were due back in England in two days time. I do remember the hotel had a desk with a phone on it and I sat on the chair imagining what it would be like to be back at work just a few weeks later. It was a very sobering experience to lay on the bed watching aircraft take off at the airport a couple of miles away and think about our impending return to the UK and all the amazing memories we had of the 19 countries through which we had travelled during the past 10 months.

Packing to leave for Blighty.

All good things come to and end and the next day it was time to head to the airport for the flight from Hong Kong to Manchester via Dubai, the only conciliation was that we had booked flights on Emirates A380 and being a bit of a plane buff, I was quite excited about that.