Lamma Island

Our third day in Hong Kong we decided to take a ferry to one of the many islands littering Hong Kong, Lamma Island.  This island was suggested to us by friends and feels completely different than Hong Kong because of two reasons: 1) Buildings are not allowed to be taller than three stories and 2) Cars are not allowed on the island.  There are two towns on the island that have ferry ports to Hong Kong and a walking trail from one town to the other.

We were dropped off at Yung Shue Wan, the northern and seemingly larger of the two towns (there are other towns on the island, but not many).  It was early afternoon when we arrived and decided to eat immediately.  I got a roasted vegetable sandwich which was fresh and tasty while Andy had a chicken sandwich that was pre-made and not very good.  We also split a small pitcher of fruit ice tea, which was delicious.  The trail to the other town takes approximately two hours on foot.  It took us two walkthroughs of the town to find it because of an ill-marked detour but it was a cute little town.

Once out of the town the trail is paved all the way through the island.  The trail passes by a beach that overlooks the power plant, heads over a mountain with gorgeous views of the ocean, and back down to the other side of the island.  The second ferry town felt deserted with very few tourists present.  We arrived just 5 minutes before the ferry left for Hong Kong and the next ferry to leave wasn't for another hour and a half.  Sweet!

Back on the mainland we headed to downtown Kowloon to watch "A symphony of lights."  We were worried about being late to it and rushed downtown to arrive just at the beginning.  It is hard to describe because it was amazing and corny and silly but a lot of fun.  Also, it's free and lasted 13 minutes.

For dinner we ate at Branto, a vegetarian Indian restaurant suggested in Lonely Planet and by email from a friend of a friend.  It was on the second floor, not very well sign posted, and we were the only non-indians in the restaurant.  We ordered a Masala dosa and vegetable curry with rice.  It was incredibly tasty.  For dessert we stopped at a grocery store on the way home and picked up some snacks.

The next day we headed to the airport and eventually left for Beijing, an hour later than scheduled due to heavy rain.

Chicken feet and cake

When we got up in the morning, we packed up as quick as we could to get the hell out of the Chungking mansions and over to our spacious and clean hotel room up in the Mong kok region of Kowloon.  For lunch we went to meet up with John Erik, a friend of a friend, at a dim sum place.  The place was packed and there was just enough room for us at the table along with two friends of John's and other guests at the restaurant.  John helped us order shrimp dumplings, rice noodle wrapped spring rolls, pork dumplings, bbq chicken feet, and tea.  The chicken feet were quite the experience, having to tear off a toe at the knuckle, then separate the skin from the bone with your teeth.  There isn't any meat on the feet, just skin and tendon, but the bbq sauce was tasty.

After lunch we headed to a little tea shop to drink some excellent chilled sweet herbal tea on some plastic stools on the side of the road.   While sitting on the side of the road John pointed out how quiet the area was.  We couldn't hear the drone of cars or hum of people.  It was peaceful yet in the center of town.  After finishing our tea we walked through Hong Kong towards Victoria peak.  Hong Kong felt like New York but a bit cleaner.

At Victoria peak we took a tram to the top where there was a lookout over Hong Kong and Kowloon as well as some outlying islands.  On the way down the peak we stopped at the (free) zoo.  There was a reptile house with one boa constrictor and one crocodile.  We saw some orangutans, lemurs, gibbons, and other monkey types.

For dinner we met up with even more people in an indoor food market.  I think the total count at the table was 10 people.  We had a blast meeting everyone and discussing jobs and traveling (with the exception of John and two others, everyone was a visitor to Hong Kong).  Someone ordered a bunch of dishes of food that we all shared.  My favorite was the roasted goose.  I also tried squid ink pasta, which was essentially black pasta, but tasted like butter.

Oh and because it was Andy's birthday, we stopped on the way home at a bakery and got two chocolate donuts and a mini chocolate cake.

Chungking Mansions

Arriving in Hong Kong from Phnom Penh we hadn't looked into places to stay or areas to go to.  In Cambodia all the towns were small enough that the tuk tuk drivers would show you to a couple of hostels before having to decide.  In Hong Kong we would be taking public transport and there was a plethora of places to stay and areas to check out.  After looking in our Lonely Planet and reviews online, we decided to head to Kowloon, which is attached to mainland China, as opposed to Hong Kong island.

Our initial destination was Chungking Mansions (from here on referred to as CKM) which had several hostel options in our book.  We didn't realize the scale of chaos that would meet us at the door.  There has been no place in Asia that we have encountered that compares.  From what I understand, the first two or three floors are all merchant shops and restaurants and above that (I think 20 floors in all) were residences that were originally built as apartments but have since been converted into multi bedroom guesthouses.  There are five blocks or sections on each floor which are serviced by a specific elevator, a person could not get from Block A to Block C on the same floor without heading down to the first two floors and switching elevators (unless there are some floors specific to transferring).

Upon walking into the first floor of the CKM a guy held out a business card and told us we should stay at his guesthouse.  We told him we would check out the rooms and then decide.  He loaded us onto elevator E and out we got onto floor 5.  There were probably 6 doors on the floor, one of which led into his guesthouse.  Our room was big enough for a large single bed (or a small double bed), enough floor space for our bags, and a bathroom that was just big enough for a toilet and sink (there was a shower but we would have had to stand on the toilet to use it).  It was surreal.  After we had checked in we immediately used the free internet to look up better places to stay for the next two nights so as not to be stuck in the Mansion again.

For dinner we read about a good indian place somewhere in the Mansion.  Not understanding how the block system worked at the time, we wandered around uselessly on the first floor until someone approached us with a business card for Taj Mahal Club, the exact restaurant we were looking for.  He loaded us onto elevator C and up to floor 3 where we found this little indian restaurant that was hopping.  Almost every table in the room was filled (probably 15 tables).  We had an excellent, although pricey, vegetable curry, rice, vegetable samosa, and garlic naan with a mango lassi and sprite.

This post does nothing to describe the craziness that this building contains.  You could try and look up Chungking Mansion on wikipedia or google but until you experience it, you won't fully understand.