Well, to start with, this is my first blog. This is about a trip to Hong Kong and Macau on the occasion of my 30th birthday. Me and my family had an early morning Cathay Pacific flight from Mumbai and reached Hong Kong around 9.30am local time. We had the connecting Turbojet ferry to Macau from the Hong Kong Airport Terminal itself. We booked the ferry and started our exciting trip to Macau. The turbojets have seat belts and it is quite necessary to put them on just like in flights. Initially I thought what is the need of seat belts when you are travelling by sea. But as these ferries move quite fast on sea and due to the turbulence when the ferry is at mid-sea ,sometimes one feels nauseating. So it is necessary that one puts on the seat belts.
We reached Macau by 01.00pm in the afternoon. After completing the immigration at Macau,we were outside the Macau ferry terminal by 01.30pm and were searching for the free shuttle to our hotel. In Macau, almost every standard hotel has their free shuttles from the Macau ferry terminal to the hotel at a designated frequency (10 to 30 mins on an average). It took us a while to find the free shuttle for our hotel and finally we boarded the shuttle and reached the hotel. After having a quick lunch, we started our trip for the Macau city tour. We started off with visit to Ruins of St Paul’s. This structure is the basically the ruins of a 16th-century complex including what was originally St Paul’s College and the Church of St. Paul which got destroyed by a fire during a typhoon in 1835.After that, we visited Fortaleza do Monte (a fort) which is very near to the Ruins of St Paul’s. From the top of fort, one can get a great view of the entire city of Macau as well as a very good view of the Ruins of St Paul’s. One can also visit the Macau Museum, which is near to the Fort. After that, we walked down to the Senado Square. Its a market, where you can try famous Macau cookies of various flavours. One also gets to try many dishes for pork.
From there, we went onto the streets of Macau and our next stop was the magnificient Macau tower .It stands tall at 1109 feet. It is the world’s highest commercial sky jumping point. One can visit the observation deck of the Macau tower or see the huge structure from the ground. As we had no plans to do any adventure and were short of time, so we preferred being on the ground and see the mesmerizing tower from the ground.
En route we saw many other city points like A Ma Temple,Kun Iam Statue.
We reached the hotel back at 5pm, had a quick nap and were ready by 7.30pm to visit the most visited tourist place of Macau - The Venetian Macau. It has the world’s largest casino. Being in Macau, one cannot miss visiting The Venetian Macau. From our hotel, we took the free shuttle bus to Macau Ferry Terminal. From the Macau Ferry Terminal, we took another free shuttle to the hotel, The Venetian. The free shuttles are by far the best way to roam around Macau, that too for free. It took around 15-20 mins to reach the hotel, The Venetian. It’s a huge hotel and is the seventh largest building in the world by floor area(10,500,000-square-foot area). In there, there is a structure, where you can get a feel of Venice within Macau. It is beautifully made and a must visit place.
One can also try their luck at the various casinos in Macau. As a matter of fact. Macau generates more revenue from gambling than anywhere else on the planet, including more than seven times the revenue generated by "The Strip" in Las Vegas. Inside every big hotel of Macau, one would find lots of high end shopping malls and brands.
On the way back, we saw other huge and beautiful hotels of Macau and had a quick visit inside the hotel Ritz Carlton. It is worth to see Macau by the night where the entire city is brightly lit up.
The next day we started off our journey to Hong Kong. We took a morning ferry from Macau and reached around 2pm at Hong Kong. We checked into the hotel by 3pm, this day was a leisure day for us. We explored the streets of Hong Kong and local markets by ourselves. and in the evening , we went to famous market place called Ladies market and Night Market. This market is a sort of flea market, where you can get all sort of shopping items, dresses, shoes, bags and yes you can bargain to a huge extent. A must visit market for all ladies! After the shopping, we took a taxi, came back to the hotel and called it a day. Let me tell you a particular thing that I noticed about the taxis in Hong Kong. The drivers hardly follow English so it is important that you carry your hotel card which has the hotel name and address written in Chinese . Also ask the hotel representative to write it down in Chinese the place/market you are planning to visit, so that you can show it to the taxi driver and he can take you there, else commuting becomes a problem.
The next morning , we had a planned a city sightseeing tour. We visited Aberdeen fishing Village, took the Peak tram ride to the Victoria Peak , this is an awesome tram ride up the hill and from there you can look at the entire Hong Kong City and landscape from the top. It is a breathtaking view. There is also a Madame Tussauds Wax Museum which one can opt to visit. After that we took a cruise along the river and had a great night view of the city. One should opt for the cruise in order to have a look at the tall skyscrapers of Hong Kong and also to see the well lit city at night. This ended our city tour of Hong Kong , we reached the hotel and called it a day.
I was quite looking forward and excited for the next day, as this was meant for the visit to the famous Hong Kong Disneyland. We decided to experience the metro-rail of the city. We took the metro map , followed the routes and reached Disneyland. It was wonderful to see couples, families with children – everyone excited to be in Disneyland. There are many wonderful rides , day and night parades and shows for entertainment which we thoroughly enjoyed . The night fireworks is something that one should not miss. It is simply amazing to see the hongkong sky light with continuous fireworks. Its leads to a breathtaking experience. After having an amazing day at Disneyland, we reached back to the hotel.
All trips come to an end. The next day we had our flight back to home. We had a amazing trip to Hongkong and Macau. Note , if you have a day extra, one can also visit the Ocean Park or visit the Lantau Island.
