Ahh feeling fresh after a 12 hour sleep, one good way to get rid of jetlag. Went to get an octopus card first thing. Its the same as London's oyster card but it also allows you to pay for things in shops. Reached the tube to the central station and it was heaving. Again as was the only white person on the thing. Its all hussle and bussle. I'm loving the atmosphere, the heat and the people, but I could give the smell a miss. While I've been here I've tried not to look like a complete tourist. Granted thats never gonna happen for obvious reasons but the only thing I've look at my guide book for is for the map of the streets. It's fun being random and spontaneous.

From arriving at the central station I had a wander and ended up at the pier where I took the ferry to Kowloon, North Hong Kong. It cost me a massive.. wait for it... 15 pence. Quite literally pushing the boat out (thats such a s*** pun!) One thing I have noticed about this place is that the shops are really varied. You get ghetto-esque medicine and luggage shops next to grand marble and glass fronted jewellery shops. Very chalk and cheese. Lesson of the day: "fook" in Mandarin is something associated with jewellery. The amount of shops that I've seen called gudfook, happyfook, kingfook and lukyfook have had me in stitches. Had a good walk about the main shopping areas and also went to Kowloon park.

After I avoided being hit by a taxi for the 15th time, I went and bought little bits and headed back to the hotel trying to decide what to do for the evening. Being told that the best views of Hong Kong at night are from the Kowloon side. I went back to central and grabbed a ferry where I did take some fantastic pictures of the city at night. After a good few hours walk around the various little side streets and narrowly hitting my head on the low neon signs above, I ended up back at the ferry terminal when a disappointing sign waited for me. "Last ferry sailed". Crap. I started to walk back to the tube but realised halfway that I couldn't be arsed and hailed down the nearest cab. He knew very little English and had no idea where my hotel was. After many gestures and pronunciations of my hotel name we were on our way. If you ever go to Hong Kong get a taxi at night because its brilliant. You'll poo yourself at how crazy they drive but its really good fun. Haggled him down from $100 to $80 dollars and packed up my backpack as I was being kicked out early on thursday.

This place is so busy you feel safe and secure all the time. Its not intimidating at all. I'm not gonna start wandering off the baron track any time soon but for all the hussle and bussle you dont feel threatened one bit. Next stop... the hostel.