Disneyland was the highlight of our Hong Kong tour. My eldest sister was the only one who had visited a Disney theme park (Tokyo’s Disneyland) prior to this visit, so it should be a wonderful experience especially for my 2-year-old niece.

The theme park opened on 10am; we got there a bit earlier via a shuttle bus from Hollywood Hotel, which is just minutes away from the theme park.

Welcome to Hong Kong Disneyland Resort

Mickey and Minnie’s fountain before the theme park entrance

Based on my eldest sister’s experience, we went straight to the Fantasyland to take pictures with the cartoon characters – Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Winnie the Pooh etc. It could take some time to take photos with these characters if the crowd started to pour in… so it should be a good idea to get to Fantasyland as early as possible.

The Sleeping Beauty Castle, entrance of the Fantasyland

Adventure with Winnie the Pooh (kinda boring though…)

There are some (short) musical shows that are worth watching in Disneyland; we went to “The Golden Mickeys” and “Festival of the Lion King”, and both of the shows were good.

Golden Mickeys was a show mimicking the Oscar awards and introduced the cartoon characters (and films) such as the iconic Mickey, Minnie, Donald and characters from later stories like “The Little Mermaid”, “Beauty and the Beast”, “Mulan” and “Lilo and Stitch” etc.

The Festival of the Lion King was a brief story based on 1994 animated movie, “The Lion King”.

The Golden Mickeys

Festival of the Lion King

The Tomorrowland… we didn’t spend much time there

Other highlights of Hong Kong Disneyland include the Disney on Parade in the afternoon and the fireworks show at night.

Merry-go-round at Fantasyland

We checked in to the Hollywood Hotel around 5pm. The room was much larger than the hotel we stayed in Kowloon and was decorated with some Mickey figures here and there…

Welcome to Disney’s Hollywood Hotel

They do expect us to bring these home ain’t so?

View from a rest area on our hotel floor – the hotel had a decent park and swimming pool

The Flying Frenchman, by César

I am not an art enthusiast; I can’t really understand what the sculpture is trying to portray. It was pretty catchy though.

I am not really fond of checking the hand prints of celebrities. For me, Avenue of Stars is simply a great place to see Hong Kong Island across the sea.

Avenue of Stars

Bruce Lee statue

Hong Kong Island across the Victoria Harbour; I wonder what’s the boat doing there

Hong Kong’s night scene from Victoria Peak

Our journey to The Peak didn’t start off pretty well. It was partly our fault; we planned to go up the mountain before evening to see the view both in day and night, but we failed to anticipate the time needed to take the tram and the time of the sunset (much earlier than we thought).

Tram station on the ground

The wait for the Peak Tram was quite a pain. It was a long queue, and Q-jumping was quite uncontrollable. I even had a quarrel with on of the staff for the Q-jumping matter, but I might have overreacted in this case… the staff were probably doing their best but unfortunately short handed in handling the mass in what could be the busiest weekend of the year because of China’s week long holiday.

We managed to get on the tram after more than an hour of waiting. I am not sure if I was having a bad mood, or that the tram ride is seriously overrated… I didn’t find anything enjoyable with the tram. It was nothing bad, but just a mean of transportation for me instead of tourist attraction.

The sky was already dark by the time we reached the Peak Tower. Luckily the night view of Hong Kong from The Peak was quite spectacular; it eased the unpleasant experience while waiting for the tram.

We had dinner and hanged around the area to wait for the Symphony of Light. As mentioned in earlier post, the show is something that you should see once in your life, but just once as it could be pretty boring for the second time.

We didn’t wait until the ending of the show to get down The Peak. The tram waiting queue was not as long and chaotic on our way back, thank goodness… at least we came in grudge but went home with a pleasant smile.

Street, buses, trams in Central, Hong Kong

It’s a simple photo, but it really represents Hong Kong in some sense. Metropolitan, buses and double-decker trams… you can’t find the combination elsewhere in the world.

A tram in Central, Hong Kong

We had thought of taking a ride on one of those trams, but gave up our mind. I couldn’t remember the exact reason for our decision… we just didn’t feel like boarding one.

It was a weekend, and mainland China was celebration their week long holiday to celebrate National Day… so the park was really crowded.

Main entrance of Ocean Park Hong Kong

There are a few attractions in the park; we didn’t go for all of them, but just to see the show, aquariums and the pandas. We were bringing a toddler along, so the rides were out of question. Besides, it was too crowded… it was difficult to see the stuff, and some of the queues were unbearable.

We took the cable cars from Lowland Gardens to the Marine Land; people who are fear of heights should really take the buses instead…

The cable cars, and the ocean and cliff directly below

It was a full house at the Ocean Theater, with dolphins and sea lions’ show. I thought that I could see a killer whale performing, but only found out later that the whale has passed away a few years ago. The show was just ok, but the kids were loving it obviously.

Dolphins and sea lions performing at Ocean Theater

We managed to squeeze into the Shark Aquarium and Atoll Reef; but decided not to wait in the long queue for Sea Jelly Spectacular nor some of the other attractions.

The Atoll Reef includes a huge marine tank with hundreds of marine species… seeing this alone was probably worth the visit.

Marine life at Atoll Reef – fishes, seahorses and squids etc.

We went back to the Lowland Gardens by cable again to see the 4 pandas. It was my first time seeing real life panda in action… these animals were just so adorable. It makes me want to go to the panda reserve in China to get up close with these cretures.

The pandas at Hong Kong Jockey Club Giant Panda Habitat

[Ocean Park official website]

A Star Ferry as seen from the waterfront promenade at Tsim Sha Tsui

There are other ways to get across the Victoria Harbour (via road and train) these days but some locals are still using the ferries often. The ferry is also a favourite among tourists because if offers good view for both side of the harbour, or simply because it’s one of HK’s main heritage.

We rode on the “Morning Star”

There are currently 12 ferries in the fleet; the oldest ferry has been in service since 1956.

We rode a Star Ferry from Tsim Sha Tsui Pier in Kowloon to Hong Kong Island’s Central Pier on our 2nd day in HK. The ferry that we used was the Morning Star (曉星號) which started its operation in 1965 and named after the company’s first ferry in 1888 (now retired).

It was a fun experience. I guess it’s always fun for people to get on a ferry (or boat) except for people who are using it daily and some of those that are easily sea sick.

Our route didn’t offer any spectacular scene though; it was a direct journey from Tsim Sha Tsui to Central. For people who want to experience the scenic view on both side of the harbour, they should opt for the Central to Hung Hom route, or take the Harbour Tour ferry instead.

[Star Ferry's official website]

Central Ferry Piers 7 and 8 – the 4th generation of Central Pier that started operation in 2006; its design is a replica of the 3rd generation Edinburgh Place Ferry Pier (1957-2006)

Tsim Sha Tsui Clock Tower

The clock tower was part of the old Kowloon-Canton Railway Station that was built in 1910s; the clock tower itself was completed in 1915.

The railway station was moved to another area in 1975, and the building was demolished 2 years later despite protest; the clock tower was somehow allowed to stand though.

Traffic police on duty – bad luck for the taxi driver

Hong Kong policemen were quite plentiful; we saw them quite often in various places… Hong Kong streets should be quite safe and peaceful.

The taxis were quite a scene too… we saw it at every corner of the main streets. There were probably more taxis on the road then private cars (ok, I might be exaggerating… but there were really a lot of taxis on the street).

Btw, Hong Kong taxis are not as expensive as we thought. Hong Kong does have a cheap and effective public transport (mass transit and buses etc.) that makes taxi an expensive option… but if you are travelling in a group of 3 or 4, it is not a bad idea to grab a cab to save some time.

Lobby with portrait of Baden Powell

B P is the acronym for Baden Powell, the founder of Scout Movement. The 25-storey hotel building is actually the Hong Kong Scout Centre; the Scout Headquarters only occupied a few floors though, the rest are hotel rooms and facilities.

We chose this hotel because of its reasonable pricing and its location. It took around 5-10 minutes walk to get to Jordan MTR station, it’s quite near to the famous Temple Street, and there are plenty of restaurants and shops around.

We booked a standard room with extra bed for 3 adults; my 2 year old niece stayed for FOC. It cost us HK$1200 + tax for a night… quite reasonable for Hong Kong standard.

The room was small, a bit smelly (cigarettes), but offered a nice view of Tsim Sha Tsui and a bit of Victoria Harbour. Besides, the staff was friendly and really helpful… so we were quite happy with the stay. [Hotel's website]

Our room view – Victoria Harbour should be visible in good weather… but it was really hazy during our visit; it was nice enough though