As promised, the Captain made an announcement regarding the effect that approaching typhoon Nepartak would have on our immediate itinerary. First of all, we’d be leaving Hong Kong at 8pm tonight instead of 16:30pm tomorrow. As I haven’t really published the itinerary before or made much mention of the ports, the only irony is that all the hoo-ha surrounding single or dual entry visas for China, will have gone the full circle, as it looks as though Shanghai, our first planned Chinese port is now off altogether, so a single entry visa would have been OK anyway!
Those doing private tours, including two or three day land tours, getting off in Shanghai and returning to the ship in Tianjin will indeed have lost out heavily, especially where advanced deposits have been paid. Our Hong Kong City night and dinner tour had to be cancelled, for which we received a refund and also for our Princess Shanghai tour. We now have even more on board credit to spend again. I suppose we’ll manage it somehow.
The first people off the ship at 8am or not long after, were those doing a Princess tour to Macau, but first of all the cruiser info:
Ship berthed on the port side, having done a 180 degree turn first, so bow into the dock.
Our el Cheapo, $30 Vodafone pre-pay phones worked – ‘Welcome to Hong Kong’.
We were advised to carry a photocopy of our passport (as issued by the ship) – wasn’t required.
We just walked off into the terminal and back on later. Ship’s security system only.
Walk to the ferry terminal was a few minutes and a bit beyond for the unadvertised HoHo bus.
We didn’t rush to go ashore and when we did, there was a fair sized queue, but that was only for the ship’s cruise card scanner and one or two slow passengers going down a rather steep gangway from deck 7. No big deal. We just walked off with no other passport or ID control and into the massive Harbour City shopping centre. Three immaculate floors of generally high end shops and virtually no empty shops either. When we say empty, we mean they were trading, but despite the huge numbers of people walking through, very few seemed to be inside the shops – and prices weren’t as low as some people expected either.
We had no idea whether or not there were HoHo buses in Hong Kong, but the centre’ staff pointed us to the exit at the ferry building. Once outside, we were at the ferry terminal which was also a bus station, but no sign of any HoHo. From our previous visit, we knew roughly where Nathan Road started and on the way there, bumped into the ‘Big Bus’ reps, who rather unusually, were not touting for business between the entrance to Harbour City, which would be the logical place to find customers, and the bus stop. The fact that we found them by chance probably explains why when the bus came, we were able to grab the front seats upstairs and even with ourselves on board, there were only three other people upstairs. Elsewhere, the buses are often almost full Even where we boarded (stop 11 on the map, but the blue route is only numbered from 10 – 16 anyway), there was no signage.
We had a look at their map and found that it travelled the length of Nathan Road anyway, so we paid $450HK (each) , using my Air NZ Onesmart debit card. Not cheap, but it covered the tower, a ferry ride across to the red and green routes and a museum entry – as it happens, none of which we took advantage of. Most HoHo buses seem to stop fairly often, but this one didn’t.
We had a shop selling dance shoes earmarked at 242 Nathan Rd and last time, it was a long hike to get there in the steamy heat. We got off at stop 13, which was already on the way back down Nathan, at the Jade rest garden, which seemed to be fairly liberally occupied by the homeless, but somewhat surprisingly for a small park, smoking wasn’t allowed. Elsewhere, there were no smoking sections of the footpath.
We hiked down from 400 Nathan Rd to our destination, only to find that at 10:50am, there was no sign of life, no published opening times and unless you knew its location, down a narrow alleyway and up to the first floor, you would never know it existed. A couple of other businesses there said that maybe they’d open at 1pm, or even 3pm. Somewhat deflated, we started to make our way back to the bus stop, only to bump into Ron and Angela. They’d already called at the shop and had been told it would open at 11am, so somewhat lighter of foot, we headed back and also picked up another couple from the ship. Still no luck so we left, only to find out later, that he opened up about three minutes after we’d left, but they managed to catch Ron and Angela who had been chatting to the other couple. Between them they bought about 4 pairs of dance shoes… You can imagine how Paula felt about that.
Back on the bus to the starting point again. No luck finding a music shop – though I’m sure there must be dozens and after a wander through the shopping centre (where we spent nothing) we headed back to the ship. One or two food cabinets looked impressive, (see pic) but even if we had elected to grab something, there was minimal seating. No doubt if we had been staying longer, we would have got better value out of the opportunities this amazing city has to offer, but with 800+ skyscrapers - and more being built, plus the heat, not our sort of city at all.
We’d only just got back on board when a shower of rain hit.
Lunch on board were the comfort food staples of beef curry and also rice pud. Yup. Cruising supplies some exotic foods.
With an 8pm sailaway, we opted for the buffet early enough to grab a prime spot for the famed ‘Symphony of Lights’. As last time, a major disappointment with one building only, showing any major changes in lights, with others simply changing LED colours and three green laser lights that came on for about 2 minutes. If that was a symphony, then they need a new score and a few more players in the orchestra. Maybe their head honchos need to have a look at Sydney’s ‘Vivid’, which is what a light show should be about?
We ambled under cover on deck 14 and chatted and in the short time it took me to go and wash my hands, there was a downpour and 100’s of passengers from the open deck rushed inside as though someone was advertising free food.
The Captain’s evening announcement of the measures to avoid the approaching typhoon, included port and date changes, but with the original Tianjin port date of Tuesday 12th of July, after an overnight in Incheon (South Korea) which was originally scheduled for July 14th. No mention as yet of Jeju.
Over the corridor tannoy (not the room tannoy) we just caught mention of an extra solo performance in the Vista lounge by Andrew, the ship’s English lead singer, at 9:15. Wow! A great semi-impromptu show, put together earlier in the evening. Being 100% honest here, up until then, we hadn’t rated the lead singers in the production show at all, certainly from the one theatre performance we’d seen. However, in the Vista lounge, with the drummer behind the other musicians, forming an effective shield and truly excellent sound mixing, this was a great show, and Andrew’s performance was top notch. (He was one of the 12 tenors, who toured extensively.) A standing ovation was well deserved – led by other cast members who were there in full support. We really do believe that so far, the sound mix in the theatre, not to mention the overly dominant drumming, has been very poor indeed.
We headed for the atrium for a hot chocolate and Salomom had just finished playing for the evening, so a chat to a couple of ladies there who thought the music should go on later. It seems that the great evenings we had there with Alan and Alana are but distant memories, as pianists now seem to finish very early, whereas A & A would play until 11:30 - and with plenty of people still around.
Three days at sea now before Incheon (for Seoul). The revised schedule was in our ‘post box’ by the time we returned to the cabin.
Still no internet ability to send emails. My ‘Outbox’ is getting bigger and bigger.
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