This was a lazy day and we slept in,followed by breakfast and topped the morning off with another dose of trivia with Hope. The rain had stopped but it was cold and windy on deck so most people stayed inside all day. There was an ice-skating show in the late afternoon, followed by the final on-stage show. This was our last dinner in the dining room with Mario and Mon,our very helpful waiters,and all of the waiters sang to the diners as a tribute.
ice-skating show
ice skating
We were looking forward to Hong Kong but the weather wasn’t kind to us. We had decided to go on a “hop on hop off” bus system where there were three bus routes which were colour-coded. Two of the routes were on Hong Kong itself and the third was on the mainland. It took a while to get from the ship to the bus/ferry departure spot in Hong Kong. We decided to take the green route which went to Aberdeen and Stanley. The last time I saw Aberdeen was in the 70s so it had changed considerably … where before it was sanpans where people were living, it was now boats and high rise buildings. It is amazing how many high rise buildings can be fitted onto the island with new ones apparently under construction. There were too many people from the cruise boat for the buses to accomodate all at once, so there was a bit of waiting time. We had to go upstairs to the double decker upper storey and , although we were given raincoats to put on over our raincoats, we got cold and wet.
Undefeated by the weather, we ventured on to the Peak by tram to see what was left of the view. Cloud had closed in, then rain, our audio equipment was getting wet and we were told that the 360 degree viewing area was closed due to the weather. When we got back to bottom, we had missed the bus and needed to wait for longer so decided to get a taxi to the ferry terminal.
one of the sky scrapers in Hong Kong
tram to the Peak
view from the Peak
We got the star ferry across to the mainland and after finishing there we got another taxi to go back to the cruise ship. Our taxi driver took us to the wrong terminal and time was ticking on. We were worried that we would miss the ship and it would leave the port. We made it but missed the late afternoon trivia session with Hope!
Ian and I went on a tour of the galley from which the 3500 people on board were kept constantly fed with masses of food and drinks. The tour was at 11 am so most of the cooking had already been done and the dishes were ready for the last minute touches. The main chef is apparently Indian and the indian food on the ship is very good so I asked for the eggplant curry recipe and plan to cook it when we get home. Computer programs are used to track the orders and supply of food to the eating areas. Speaking of technology, the internet was very poor on the ship whch is why these posts are being stacked for uploading when we get internet on mainland China.
galley on board cruise ship
Hong Kong at night
me at Hong Kong
Unfortunately the ship didn’t get into the port of Hong Kong until about 10pm. There was a hold up with leaving the ship and the weather started becoming worse with wind and rain. We braved the conditions on deck 12 to watch the docking but decided to leave our nighttime visit to Hong Kong until the morning excursion.
