Victorias (Part 2)

With only two full day in Hong Kong, I was actually properly motivated to get out of bed in the morning! I should be in Hong Kong every day…you know, if that were possible. Thanks to my tenacious research, the hotel deal I scored included breakfast buffet at the cute little restaurant on the third floor, Cellini. It had all sorts of delicious things, like chow mein and bacon.





When I looked out the room of my hotel room, it looks…very much like Hong Kong. This makes sense.





I managed to haul my cookies onto the shuttle into town, despite not knowing that reservation was required. Whatevs oldies from America, you can make room for lil ol’ me. They really had no choice. A neat little ride through the neighborhood and past the harbor showed a hazy day. That also seemed very Hong Kong-ish to me.



Since it was hideously early in the AM (something preposterous like 8:30 AM), I just…walked around and looked up. So far, so good. I’m two for two on my love for major Asian capital cities.















I wandered about this dewy morning in Charter Garden in Central (downtown), stumbling upon a movie shoot that seemed to have captured the locals’ attention – something with men dressed as lady Vikings and some other guys dressed as ninjas or something…and they were fighting each other. It was very lame. Apparently not lame enough for me to not photograph it though.







I wandered about, taking in the sights. I needed to kill time before 10:30 when the mid-level escalators changed directions, so I trolled Li Yuen alley looking at all the rip-off merchandise – they even ripped off Pierre Hardy! Do you know what that means? No? That just goes to show that they rip off everything.







The mid-levels escalators are the longest outdoor covered escalator system on earth. It runs for over 800 metres, heading up 135 metres in elevation. It only runs one direction and IT IS AWESOME.



It runs downhill during morning rush hour and then switches to head uphill at 10:30 AM. You can get off at all kinds of places along the way, so let’s go.







I was headed to the Man Mo temple, so I got off on Hollywood Road (that is what it is actually called – weird.) I bought a pair of cheapo shoes at ‘Dutch Items Shanghai’ that they insisted were made in Italy (LOL PEOPLE GET REAL) for $45. Good times. I then stopped for a coffee/internet freak-out at Pacific Coffee. Janelle got a very excited email from yours truly, gushing about my first five minutes in Hong Kong.



When I arrived at the Man Mo, I was dumbfounded to find that half of Hong Kong had the same idea as me and so I truddled almost two blocks away to join the lineup. WTF HONG KONG. I take back my first five minutes of excitement over you.





After watching and smelling a group of men asphalt a street for an hour, I finally made it inside. As soon as I got inside, I wished I was outside again, thanks to smoke stinging my eyes and a heavy stench of incense. It was absolute chaos inside. And then it hit me. CHINESE NEW YEAR.










This…stuff(?) was selling like hotcakes. Well, that’s enough for me.

I crossed a few blocks down to Cat Street, where they sold a whole ton of random shit. And I mean random.








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Okay…I guess I didn’t take that many photos of the random stuff, but if you ever want to see the worlds’ largest collection of rusty spoons, old picture frames with Jostens-like photos inside, pogs, copper dangly shit, a broken mirror, etc etc etc, please go to Cat Street in Hong Kong. You belong there.

I made my way up the hills to SoHo, the trendy dining district, to find some lunch. Like Japan, they have these awesome set lunches and fabulous interiors. As it was early afternoon, I really had my run of the place. Vivo was my pick – it was open-air and modern.











I believe there was some impossibly sweet dessert as well, all for $15. Not bad!

After lunch, I set off on foot to find the tram to take me up the mountain. This city is crazy. You can walk everywhere and it looks like you are in the middle of a rainforest when you leave the skyscrapers by a few blocks.



If you Google “Victoria Peak Hong Kong”, you will get some amazingly majestic images. While my image is a little less majestic than those, the view was still breathtaking.



I just hung out on the lookout for a while, even when it began to rain. Some Chinese man also wanted his picture together with me?? He couldn’t speak a lick of English, so I don’t know. I obliged though. I’m just going to believe I’m famous in China somewhere. There were also a bunch of mansions on top of the mountain, as well as a strangely-placed shopping plazas.









I decided to do a short mountain hike from the shopping plazas and, less, than 5 minutes later, I was alone in the rainy woods.







Well, you can walk in the woods anywhere in the world, so that got boring quick and I headed back to hyper-excited Asia land.


Yeah! This!



After gnawing on the sweetest, whip cream-filled crepe of earth and battling increasing drizzle, I packed it in and headed down the mountain in the trolley car. That was fun!



I wandered around Central as rush hour began picking up. Hong Kong is a shoppers paradise as it has no tax, but it is Asia, so it is still way more expensive than shopping for the same goods in America. I did happen into Milan Station, a second-hand luxury bag shop, and was astounded at all the Hermès Birkins contained within. Sure, I’ll just drop $4K on this lil thing right hurrr…





My coworker Yimi had stressed to me many times before my trip that I should visit Causeway Bay, so onto the MTR I went. Hong Kong really comes alive at night.







When it comes to malls, they don’t mess around. By this point my feet were ready to shrivel up into little balls and rot in a corner somewhere, so I didn’t bother checking out every nook and cranny. There’s only so much of a 10-floor mall one can see in this condition.






Boo Crocs! Boo this sign! Boo it!



Thanks to some snacks and a mini bottle of wine (tee hee!) I picked up from Marks & Spencer (why on why don’t they get these in Canada?!?!) combined with another convenience store sandwich, I crashed in my hotel once again and prepped for another outing tomorrow. How to jam Hong Kong into two solid days? I will do my best! Tomorrow, Tsim Sha Tsui. Waving goodnight from “ah sh*thole”!!