I'm starting a new thread on this aspect John as we have some members on here who live in HK who may want to contribute in detail. I've had an office/agent there for 17 years and lived there in 1996, but I only get there a few times a year now by choice. Some old Hong Kong hands on here who are there now may have some good info.John HH wrote:Thanks for the report Pete, very informative. Am thinking about taking a trip over there later in the year specially for Disneyland but I'd like to check out HK too. Did you see much of HK at all?john
If you want to see HK Island, Kowloon and Disneyland, best not to stay at a Disneyland hotel. You can take the MTR easily over to Disneyland and believe it or not, the station is close to the main gate and you'll avoid the 1/2 mile walk.
. There's also ferry service from Wanchai and also perhaps Shun Tak Centre in Sheng Wan that docks at a new pier on Lantau right next to the Disneyland Hotel. Easy 5 minute bus from there to the park.Air quality is not the best in Hong Kong these days and that means all year round. I was reading the SCMP that levels year on year are up about 20%. This is all caused by southern China factories and prevailing winds. Even at Disneyland, at the end of the day you felt like you had potatoes in your nose and sand in your throat. It's a big issue there and on going fighting with Bejing to do something about it. Next life I think.
I personally like Hong Kong Island by far over Kowloon and stay there all the time when I'm there. Many things to do and see. In fact, I always stay for the past many years at the hotel where the the movie "The World of Suzie Wong" was made, in Wanchai on Gloucester Road. It's of course been renovated and nothing like in the movie now. Gloucester Road used to be the water front of Victoria Harbour in the 1950's. It's now about a half mile inland due to land filling and new building expansion. I have a friend/associate I've worked with for many years who as a young boy after WWII clambered onto land off a boat at that exact spot in front of the hotel in a pair of shorts, no shirt or shoes after his family fled Mao's China.
Give me time over the next few weeks an I'll find some links for you that explain everything in better detail than I have the energy for at the moment.
I don't know if you're British but if you are you'll be happy to know IMO, HK has changed little since the handover 13 years ago. Yes of course the system has changed somewhat but you'll still see British influence everywhere and with most everything. The Hong Kong people are also fighting very hard to maintain and grow their independence from the Mainland and that fire in them was in no small way instilled in generation after generation by the British. Good for them.
However, 20 years makes a generation so some of the old thinking and ways of doing things may slip away in the next decade or so.
There's a lot of British colonial history still to be seen and experienced there. As mentioned, I'll try to give you some good tips, but I hope others will speak up also. Pete
