Hong Kong – City of the Future

Wow. Nikki and I had a 24 layover in Hong Kong and it has to be one of the coolest places in the world. There's this breathtaking quality about it – something having to do with the huge green mountains, huge steel buildings, water everywhere, and mix of traditional and modern. Too bad it's ridiculously expensive! Oh well, that's the price of the future I guess!

We got in late in the afternoon and took the nearly silent high speed train in to town for a quick bite and a view of the nighttime skyline from the IFC mall. We were wiped from the 13 hr flight though, so made it an early night and returned the next morning for more sight-seeing. We started with Dim Sum at Luk Yu Teahouse, where we more or less randomly ordered whatever went floating past. Result – total deliciousness, including a weird-looking black gelatinous mass which I discovered to be a yummy tapioca-like concoction. We attempted to burn a few calories walking to our next destination, but found that a huge moving walkway existed that would do the work for us! We took in every kind of interesting shop and restaurant you can imagine as we glided up into the hills behind the city center. After stepping off the meandering walkway and hoofing it (like a sucker) to the peak tram, we shot to the top of the highest mountain around for incredible views of the city, mountains, ocean, and surrounding islands. It kinda reminded me of Rio, but with bigger buildings, no hangliders, and the occasional coal-fired power plant or strip mine on the horizon. We made our way down the hill to the water and took the ferry across to Kowloon, which apparently has every chic store known to man amongst some crazy tall buildings. We had fun people watching and taking in the sights while making our way back to the train and eventually the airport.

We just got a taste of the city, but had a ton on fun. Definitely warrants a return visit – maybe for the Redbull Luftag in a few weeks?