Hong Kong - Lots of fun, watch the pollution!

I was recently in Hong Kong for a few months for work. It's a fascinating place. The place oozes charm and style nearly as much as it oozes pollution. It can be a great place to visit and empty your wallet. Here's a few tips...

The best way of getting around Hong Kong is to buy an Octopus card. It's a stored value card, so you can just keep topping it up when it runs low. It covers all the major transport options - buses, MTR, ferries, etc. etc.

Not to be missed, is a trip to The Peak. That's the big mountain behind Hong Kong. The first day you're there that has clear weather, go and have a look. Going on a cloudy or overcast day is a bit pointless. You can pay for the ticket with your octopus card - efficient, hey?
A trip to Lantau island is also a lot of fun. It's on the MTR line, so just catch the train out. The star attraction is a very large seated buddha. It's quite impressive. To climb to the top is free, but you'll be pressured to buy a food voucher that gives you a "free" vegetarian meal at the buddhist monastery next door. It's not compulsory to buy the meal, but the food is quite yummy.

They've recently opened a ski lift/gondola that takes you from the MTR stop to the buddha. It takes about 30 minutes or so and gives you great views over the mostly rural island of Lantau, as well as some great views of the airport, if you're into that.

The only problem, is that it's amazingly popular. Queues on the weekend of 90 plus minutes are pretty common. My hot tip is to get a taxi to the top (quite cheap), then catch the gondola back back. Bizarrely, the queue back down tends to be quite small if you time it right.
Every night, there's a laser light show on the harbour. Catch one of the Star ferries over to the Kowloon side of the harbour and soak it all up.

Then there's Disneyland Hong Kong. It's quite new, not terribly popular and quite small. It's about half a day's worth of fun. Again, you can get there on the MTR using your octopus card. It makes a fairly enjoyable diversion, but it's quite small compared to the other Disney parks around the world? Have they tailored to be uniquely Chinese? Definitely not. You get the same gloss and sparkle as in the other parks, but there's nothing Chinese about it. Not even any Mulan.


If you're at all interested in horse racing, head on down to the Happy Valley race track. It's on the main island and getting there is quite easy. You can get a taxi, which are always cheap, or ride the trolley bus using your octopus card.



Apart from the sights, there's a whole lot of shopping to be done. You can't walk more than 5 seconds without running into a shop. Then, when you're finished shopping, there's the delicious food. Hong Kong still has its fair share of cut price markets, fake goods and mass produced souvenirs. Haggle hard, but remember it's cheap, so don't be too agressive.

The major down side to Hong Kong is the pollution. Some days are fine - the skys are blue and there's a nice sea breeze. Other days can be terrible - seeing across the harbour can be impossible. It's extremely variable from day to day, so you can't really plan a "good" day for the pollution. That shouldn't put you off though. Everywhere is air conditioned, so unless you decide to go for a jog along the harbour, you should be ok.

If you can handle the pollution, then Hong Kong can be a lot of fun!