31st March - Hong Kong

We only had one more day left in Hong Kong so we had to forego the ferry ride to get a Metro straight to Central on Hong Kong island so we could go to the Botanical Gardens. One of the fabulous things about Hong Kong is how well they cultivate their green spaces in the middle of the city. The city has a number of huge parks and pretty areas and the gardens were quite astonishing to see against the backdrop of skyscrapers.

Crappy photo

The gardens also contain a zoo and we spent several hours looking around the enclosures. There were some realy great gibbons swinging about and playing and I could have watched them for hours. I'm not a big fan of seeing monkeys in cages but it was actually refreshing to see them acting like wild animals and not playing with plastic or eating ice-creams. We also saw lemurs, turtles and tortoises, frogs, orangutans and a few other things. The lady orangutan had quite recently had twins but rejected them and so they were being looked after by keepers in the zoo. There were twice daily sessions where you could see them so we waited around for a while. They were absolutely gorgeous! The cutest things I think I've ever seen. The only thing was that they were treating them very much like children. They were in a room with toys and playmats and tiny little chairs and it seemed wrong to see them like that. You can look up 'Hong Kong orangutan twins' on Youtube if you want to see how lovely they were.

After they'd forced us away from the baby orangutan window, we went to explore the aviary. There were so many birds there that I'd never seen before and some of them were massive and freaky! We soent quite a while looking around and spotting new ones. There was also a flamingo enclosure but we noticed that they kept raising their wings to fly and one of them had been clipped. It made us sad to see them so stunted so we left the birds and went to the greenhouse instead. We didn't stay there long because Matt was like a child and said they were boring.

We went to find lunch and came across a little cafe that looked ok. There was a McDonald's next door but I thought I'd give the food another go. Matt had roast goose and I ordered vegetables and rice. I was a little disappointed when mine came and it was a pile of just one type of vegetable but at least I got my greens for the day.

We then went to find the Central–Mid-level Escalators, which is the longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world. It was built to try and reduce congestion in the city in 1993 and connects the Central and Western Districts. It consists of twenty escalators and 3 moving sidewalks and 55,000 people use it per day. The total length of the escalators is 800 metres and it elevates over 135 metres from bottom to top. They go downhill in the morning until 10am and then go uphill until midnight and you pass by endless bars and shop fronts on the way. We even stopped off halfway up to pop into a supermarket. It was strangely fun making our way to the top and quite achey on the knees to take the steps back down again. It really is pretty steep and I've no idea how anyone would negotiate in in heels.

Most of the escalators pass through SOHo (South of Hollywood) expat area and the bars were full of Westerners doing what they do best and there were theme bars from every corner of the globe. Below that there were lots of markets sellling the things 'average' person needs but that aren't openly catered for in Hong Kong. With only a few days in Hong Kong you could be forgiven for thinking that everyone who lives there is rich and successful and it seemed almost out of place to see everyday items.

A bit darker during Earth Hour

Again, we took the ferry to the Avenue of Stars but this time it was to watch the opposite of last night. The Symphone had been cancelled in aid of Earth Hour and there were plans for the big companies to turn their lights off. We were there even earlier and waited for an hour until we though it was due to start. At 8pm nothing happened. There were a few stray lazers shot into the sky because they hadn't been switched off properly and then everyhting looked the same as usual. We walked off disappointed and decided to have a better look at the Avenue of Stars instead. They were holding public shows there with singers and promotion for Earth Hour and we realised that we had got the time wrong. At 8.30, the lights started switching off at the opposite side of the river and whole skyscrapers seemed to almost disappear into the skyline. It was so much more impressive that the Symphony and it was encouraging to see how many businesses had got involved. There were still one or two who hadn't bothered but their company names stood out as a beacon of indifference. It felt completely different to walk along the length of the water and not see Hong Kong Island glowing and reflected.

We walked back throught Temple Street Night Market to look for new charger because my phone was being naughty and wouldn't charge. Chargers wouldn't work so we took it to a phone-fixer man and it turned out the battery was just too flat.

We took a different route through the city to last night and ended up in King George's park watching people learn how to do Tai Chi. If we ever come to China again I think that's something we might like to try.
Back outside the hotel we had our last giggle at the 'mankee' food stand and collapsed into bed with a cracking headache.