Day 74 - Taking to the Air

The road to the airport was a relatively stress free affair, for once the adlibers had planned ahead and knew exactly when and where to catch the airport express bus! Check-in went smoothly, except for a 10 minute loss after waiting in the wrong line, and after a couple of hours wait we were on our way to Hong Kong.

Hong Kong's one of the stops on our journey that everyone would have heard of, and although it is now officially part of China (since 1997) as soon as we arrived, we realised how different it is from the China we have experienced so far. First of all Hong Kong is a system of systems - operating in a fast and extremely organised manner, completely in contradiction to the China we had just left! Secondly, even though we travelled less than 200km, the weather was significantly more pleasant - we're not even sure we hit 30 degrees today?!!

We have grown accustomed to sky-scrapers, but the skyline of Hong Kong is like the trump card, with fancy buildings, mammoth plazas, and designer stores in every direction we look - although on our budget we don't look too hard, in fact the only designer goods we'll leave Hong Kong with will be of the fake variety.

Our first mission of the day was to get on transport in the direction of our hopeful accommodation, boarding a bus that took us right outside the infamous Chungking Mansions where hawkers were ready and waiting to show us to their rooms. Despite travelling by air, we were running out of time to get to the visa office before closing time, so we took the first decent room we came across and took minimal time to haggle the price down to something we were willing to pay for a bed inside a cupboard. Dumping our packs we set off at lightning pace to the visa office, the English signs of the subway and streets added an element of speed to our travels that we were unaccustomed to in China. Venturing underground, we paused to purchase "Octopus Cards" that allow us to travel on most public transport by the swipe of a money-loaded card (you can even shop at the 7-eleven and McDonalds with the cards). The visa office was a perfect example of the efficiency of Hong Kong - go in, fill out a form, take a ticket and wait, and so we waited. Finally our number was called, just after closing time, and a wave of relief spread over us, as we were dreading having to return tomorrow morning. All we have to do now is wait until Thursday for our brand new Chinese visas.

Mission number two for the day was to acquire train tickets to Shanghai - trains only go every second day and it is a popular line that fills up fast. As we head North via the main tourist destinations, we have to be organised and plan more than a day ahead in order to get tickets - especially considering we have to be in Jinan in under three weeks!

Feeling extremely proud of ourselves after not only successfully making it to the train station, and getting the exact tickets we wanted, we headed back to our wee corner of the mansion for a well deserved rest. We were a little nervous coming to the Metropolis of Hong Kong, especially on our budget, but so far it has been a breeze and EVERYONE speaks English.

Hanging out in the Mansions we had a chance to take in our surroundings - in our prime position on Nathan Road, is our age-stained building that has been the budgeters' choice for accommodation for as long as Hong Kong can remember. The ground floor is a calamity of rip-off electronic, clothing and porn stores, while the third floor is taken up with numerous Curry Houses, and the rest of the 15 floors are full of small guesthouses, run inevitably by Indian immigrants. Having the time, we searched the mansions and realised every guesthouse was basically the same - the size of the rooms, the state of cleanliness, and the cost - so we decided to stay where we were for our entire stay in Hong Kong (though we would use our length of stay as a bargaining tool for a reduction in price).

For dinner, we decided to check out one of the Mansion's Indian restaurants - The Everest Club - where we dined on the most expensive meal we've had in a while, though we will have to get used to this in Hong Kong - this was actually cheap by Hong Kong standards! Before heading to bed, we worked off our full bellies by losing ourselves in the neon lights, and scouting the shops for cheap electronics and crazy expensive water!

Adlibing Hong Kong, by Octopus card.