Travel Days

Thursday 20th Jan

The flight was quite good, all bar the turbulence a few hours before we landed in Hong Kong. Our plane landed late, so by the time I got out of the main part of the airport it was almost 5pm. Utilising the services at the Tourist Board I called a few Guest Houses to check for availability, then the girls at the Tourist Board assisted with directions. I boarded the A21 bus and watched Hong Kong unfold through the bus window.

Had a lovely chat to mum whilst on the bus organizing things for the weekend. It took an hour to reach Kowloon and my bus stop. I began walking to find the guesthouse, thinking that I might check out the Holiday Inn which was basically next door (according to the map). I found the entry way to the Guest House and decided to back track to the Holiday Inn just to see how much a room would be. Companies are hard to find because so much is crammed into every square centimeter here. But I did find the Holiday Inn. It would be HK$1600 for the night, not including breakfast. Hmmm, quick calculation, that's be $200. Thought I'd just check out this Guest House and see what it's like.

Thankfully some other tourists assisted me in getting rid of a hawker that was trying to get me to his guesthouse further down the way and we really beginning to get on my nerves. Up the tiny elevator, I paid in cash and took my room key and walked into the room. Within 30seconds I had my backpack on my back again and was out at reception saying, "No good, I want my money back." I was worth more than this. So back to the Holiday Inn I went!

A room on the 10th floor was lovely and I felt safe. The bed was good as was the bathroom. I was really starving by now, as I'd not eaten much at all in the last 24hrs. I found a café type restaurant (like Star East at The Glen, for those who know it), and was seated in a booth with an elderly couple. I ordered and ate my dinner managing to keep my eyes open.

I went for a short walk around, but was so unbelievably tired I really was not up for shopping. So I returned to the hotel room, sorted my bags and discovered that the jam I'd had issues with at Helsinki airport had opened and really didn't smell very good. So after all that fuss, I had to through it in the bin.

Working on Melbourne time, it equated to being midnight, so I set my alarm and slept like a log!

Friday 21st Jan

Up early, 5:30am HK time (8:30am Melb time), it was dark out, well that's nothing new, and the streets were deserted. I caught the A21 bus back to the airport and checked in, with no issues getting through security. I had a nice breakfast with oj whilst waiting until boarding time.

Unfortunately we boarded about 30min late and despite the instructions on the PA passengers didn't let those with seat row 50-74 on first, that all just lined up. So I just hung back and waited. I'd rather stand on solid ground than be crammed in for longer than needed. Then as we walked down the boarding ramp we had further security inspections and they took away my new 200ml bottle of water! How rude! This was only happening on flights to Australia. I was very annoyed. Right up the back again on a lovely Qantas Boeing 747, in seat 70J, one row forward of the seat I had on the flight over. Brought back memories, but there was not a good-looking, friendly young guy in the seat next to me.

The flight was not smooth; in fact it was the bumpiest flight of them all. But I didn't suffer from nausea much and enjoyed a variety of movies and tv programs during my flight. As it was a day flight, I wanted to stay awake as much as possible.

I was so lovely to be off the plane and see mum and Geoffrey outside the arrivals gate. It was also brilliant to be warm.