On Wednesday morning we headed to the Kunming airport one last time, this time serenaded by the Cabbie’s personal music choice….apparently a Chinese musical of some sort. Just listen…………
We have sung that song for the past two days!!!!
We were extremely early for our flight and while we were waiting to check in, a young girl approached and said that she had met us last year at Xishuangbanna. Who would have thought that we would have found someone that we knew!!!!
We arrived at the Hong Kong Airport and were picked up by a taxi. Unfortunately, our suitcases (all THREE of them) wouldn’t fit in the back of his taxi so he simply pulled out a bungee and tied down the trunk. Part of the problem might have been the laundry that he had hanging in the back of the trunk!!! We thought that this was a strange arrangement but then saw that almost every other taxi had the trunk lid tied down as well. Oh well, when in Rome…..
and an equally good view of the buildings and roads below……
The hotel is built on top of a magnificent mall filled with stores that we could not afford to even walk into!!!
After dinner the first night, we started trying to figure out what we wanted to do on our one day in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, there didn’t seem to be a whole lot that we were interested in so I had the bright idea that we would take the ferry across to Macau and visit some of the casinos.
The ferry ride was great, but it took about 10 minutes for us to decide that we are NOT casino people!!! So we grabbed the next ferry back to Hong Kong and enjoyed watching out the window as the high rises of Hong Kong re-appeared…..
Our next stop (and where we should have started) was to the Man Ho Temple. It was a very different type of temple as it only had three rooms and each of those opened onto the street. Also, one of the rooms was a “Room of Remembrance” and we thought that the cubby-holes on the walls may have contained ashes of deceased worshippers
The truly interesting thing about this temple were the incense coils that were suspended EVERYWHERE. The ceiling was covered with them and, in this chamber, they also hung from lower poles.
Each of these coils was burning and the intensity of the odor was amazing. We both had to leave fairly quickly because we just couldn’t breath. You can see the smoke in these photos…..
While driving up “Hollywood Drive” to arrive at the temple, we saw a number of interesting shops so decided to take a short walk around the area. One of the first sights were these temple worshippers….
The interesting thing in this photo is that one of these appears to be a woman!!!
Many of the shops had small altars just outside of their doors…..
…..and one very large altar on one of the side streets……
There were people in this next shop so I didn’t get a great photo, but this shop was selling hand made coffins!!!!
We went into one very interesting wood working shop where this gentleman was busy carving a door or screen…..
We passed numerous shops that were selling bird’s nests, probably used in the making of “Bird’s Nest Soup”. All we can say is “ICK!!!!”….yes, we have found something that we would not eat!!!…..
For our last dinner in China, we opted for the J.W. California Steakhouse at the hotel. We had a magnificent evening spent talking at length with the Maître de (John David) from Paris and enjoying a wonderful Rib Eye Steak and excellent vegetables.
When the time arrived for dessert, I immediately ordered the Chocolate Fondant. The waiter mentioned that it was large and did we want to share. We laughed and informed him that women do not EVER share chocolate!!! When it arrived we had a great laugh at the presentation……
John David laughed and said “Happy Birthday” but I informed him that I am at the age where I want fewer of them rather than adding more!!!!
Now before anyone asks, this chocolate orb was simply the cover for the ice cream covered fondant but it was a wonderful presentation….and tasty too although we left most of this shell on the plate.
To commemorate our last night, we had this photo taken……
After a good night’s sleep, we boarded our final taxi to the airport. This driver was very perky (wondered how many coffees he had drunk that morning) and he kept us entertained while we drove.
As I am writing this, we are winging our way toward the North Pole, over the top of the world and then down to Detroit. The final leg will be a quick run to Atlanta.
Tomorrow I will do a final wrap-up……