Arrival @ Outer Harbour Ferry Terminal, Macau

The ride from Kowloon to Macau took an hour and we got excited when we saw the Macao Sands from the ferry window. Hmmm but I wonder what's the deal with that volcano right beside it?

The line to the immigration counter was long and it took us about 30 minutes to get our passport stamped. I'm thankful that Macau allows Filipino passport holders like me a 30 days visa-free stay. It must make the serious gamblers among us happy, huh?

 

We were met by our tour guide Sari at the arrival hall. She's Indonesian, but can easily be mistaken for a Filipina. She was charming, spoke good English (and a smattering of Tagalog too), so we quickly felt comfortable with her.

Sari led us through the bustling crowd, and out to the seemingly endless line of shuttle buses provided by the various casinos--Wynn, The Venetian, Sands, Grand Lisboa, MGM Grand--so many to choose from! You can ride for free to whichever casino you want to visit, which is cool.

Since they have shuttle buses to take you to the casinos, you can actually wing it and forego the tour guide but we were traveling with our mom. We didn't want to tire her out by taking a wrong turn, amid the hustle and bustle, and getting lost in a foreign country.

We headed to the Wynn casino bus (to catch the dragon show) and enjoyed the view of Macau with its gleaming new buildings, cobbled streets & temples. The old and the new fabulously mixing together. I love it.

@ Hong Kong's China Ferry Terminal to Macau

When planning a trip to Hong Kong, I highly recommend an excursion to Macau. It's just a ferry ride away, so why not? It also helped that in our case, my mother has Portuguese ancestry and she was excited to somewhat get in touch with her "roots" by visiting this former Portuguese colony.

I had my travel agent fix our itinerary for our Macau day tour. I wanted to make sure we'd have the chance to visit both the historic places in Macau and also the towering casinos. We were picked up by 8:00am to go to the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront where the China Ferry Terminal is located. The New World First Ferry tickets we got was for 9:00am so we had plenty of time to chat with the nice Chinese-Canadian lady who was waiting to board a ferry to Guangzhou.

We passed through Hong Kong Immigration and found out that my sister misplaced the extra copies of the arrival cards we filled out previously so we had to fill in new ones, but aside from that, we breezed through immigration as usual.

                                     

 At about 8:30am, we were instructed to proceed to berth 13 to wait for boarding. The number 13 is not unlucky for the Chinese unlike for most of the world which I think is refreshing, but apparently 4 is a "no-no" for them because it rhymes with "death" in their language, hmm they are not as evolved as I first thought. So at exactly 9:00am we boarded the New Ferry LXXXVI and we're off.

Taking a ferry from Hong Kong to Macau is said to be the most popular way to travel between the two Special Administrative Regions and now I know why. It's very convenient, it just took us an hour to arrive at Macau's Outer Harbor Ferry Terminal. The ride was smooth and the view from the boat was amazing and at HKD 139 it was cheap too.

China Ferry Terminal
33 Canton Road, Tsim Sha Tsui
Kowloon, Hong Kong
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Bargain Hunting @ Temple Street Night Market

Temple Street Night Market is one of the busiest and biggest flea markets in Hong Kong. It's conveniently right across Silka Seaview Hotel where we were staying, and after a busy day of touring, we had a lot of fun just walking up and down the street looking for bargains and taking in the authentic Hong Kong Chinatown vibe of the place.

It opens in the late afternoon and ends at midnight. Get your comfortable shoes or flip-flops ready. Temple St. Night Market is five blocks of rows upon rows of glaringly-lit stalls, so make sure you have comfortable footwear, that way, you can seriously hunt for bargains. One can buy anything from jewelry, magnet souvenirs, lucky charms, clothing and food here. Fortune tellers also abound.

We bought souvenirs like the ubiquitous key chains, refrigerator magnets and mirrors ($20/piece) with "Hong Kong" emblazoned on them, to give away to our family and friends back home. My sister bought her boys some cool $50 shirts, mom bought herself a body bag for $70 and we also got the 3 for $100 scarves they are hawking in one of the stalls.

Temple Street was very safe, we roamed around without worry and everyone was really nice. We also walked by the Wing Sing Hotel, it's smack in the middle of the night market and still very near Silka Seaview. If you want to save a little money on your accommodation, Wing Sing is an option. Though we were very happy with Silka Seaview, it costs more.

A tip: if you see something you like, buy it! We came back the next night to buy more scarves (it's surprisingly "quality" for the $33 apiece we paid for it) and the lady selling it wasn't there anymore. That was a bummer, but Temple Street Night Market was a blast... just don't forget to haggle.

Killing Time @ Jewellery City, Hong Kong

When you arrange your trip through a travel agency, a visit to a jewelry shop or a factory outlet is almost always inevitable. This is a way for the local tour guides or agency to make more money off the tourists.

On our trip to Hong Kong, after the compulsory city tour (the word "compulsory" rubs me the wrong way, but whatever), we were brought to Tokwawan Road in Kowloon at Jacky Chan's Jewellery City Co..

There was some cursory introduction about jewelry making, but everyone knows we were there to be tempted to buy their merchandise, and were ushered to the showroom post-haste.

It's not bad really, my sister and I bought some silver rings for $150 and our mom loved her bedazzled $400 magnetic bracelet so much, she swears days later that claims of its "healing properties" were true ( No hypertension in weeks! She enthused).

I guess it's not a total waste of time and our tour of the factory outlet in Hung Hom resulted in me finding my friends' usual choice of pasalubong (ref magnets) and we bought some quality shirts for $100 so I'm not complaining too much.

But do be quick about looking around these places or else you won't have much time in Disneyland or wherever you're supposed to go after that. Don't linger more than you have to, buy what you want or need and skedaddle. Spending time in Disneyland and Ocean Park are way more fun.

Jewellery City Co. Ltd.
Unit A3, Ground floor
Merit Industrial Centre
94 Tokwawan Road
Kowloon, Hong Kong
Tel (852) 2764-1133
Fax (852) 2764-175
Email jcl@jewellerycity.com.hk