Hong Kong

21^st March 2012 

We arrived in Hong Kong, this morning, travelling North around the top of Hong Kong Island and then following the coast between the Island and Kowloon  until berthing at the Ocean Terminal at around 7.30am. Fortunately for us, we are berthed with the starboard side facing the Island, so the views of Victoria Harbour from our balcony are spectacular. We will be here for the next 2 days before sailing for Shanghai late tomorrow afternoon.

Approaching Ocean Terminal

It is a very foggy morning and most of the tall buildings are partly immersed in the low fog. Victoria Peak is not visible. We have not booked any tours and plan to spend the next two days getting around on our own, as we know HK pretty well. Not long after we berthed, a fuel barge tied up alongside, and an endless line of provisioning trucks started arriving dockside.

Sea Princess at Berth

We headed ashore a bit before 10am, and found a Starbucks where we could get free Wi fi for 20 minutes, so did a bit of blog updating and checking email etc.

After shopping for a few essentials in the Harbour Centre, we dropped our heavy items back on the ship, and headed off to explore Kowloon on foot. We strolled around Nathan Road and many of the side streets, had a wander through Kowloon Park, which gets better everytime we come here, and eventually had lunch in Food Republic, a food court under one of the large shopping centres.  We had an excellent meal of roast pork, roast duck, rice, soup and green veg., all for the princely sum of A$ 5 each.

After lunch we caught the MTR to Mong Kok  to have a look around the Ladies Market, but didn’t buy much.

Ladies Market

On the way back to the ship we went via the supermarket to pick up some refreshments, and were back on board at around 4.30pm, with very sore feet.

The fuel barge was still alongside refueling us, and now had a lot of freeboard, so must have unloaded a lot of fuel.

We had a beer up on the pool deck taking in the view, and then retired to our cabin.

We were not enthused about going back ashore for dinner, and given the spectacular views from our balcony, we decided to order a room service pizza, and sit on our balcony with a bottle of red, and watch the laser light show over Victoria Harbour, which takes place every night at 8pm for 20 minutes.