We’d meant to post this last night but were so exhausted from our day – we walked for miles and miles and one adjective that comes to mind about this place is ‘Lush’.  Who knew that Hong Kong would be so lush?

Yesterday we took the tram to the Central/Mid-Levels ESCALATOR.  We could have taken the MTR subway, or buses from one of three different carriers that provide public transit for the city – double-deckers, singles, smaller 15-passenger mini buses and they’re everywhere.  Try to take a pic of
a street scene and they’re all over it.  Lineups are single file, orderly and SHORT!.  No waiting here.  The TTC is a joke by comparison.  Granted, the population is 2 1/2 times Toronto but the MTRs are all automated – just press a button here, press another button on the multi-line destination map, throw in the equivalent of about 20 or 30 cents Canadian and VOILA, out comes your ticket and you’re on your way to the other side of the city.  If you need to transfer lines at one of the transfer stations, you just cross the platform to the train on the other side, no multi-level escalator diversions here.  The transit system is designed to move 90% of the 7 million population daily.

For us, the little tram offered the most direct route – cute as a button, these little double-deckers run constantly.  We laughed because Mr. T can’t stand up straight on the second level because it’s a little short – he kept bumping his head on the wood framing.  Wood framing – gotta love that.  The Escalator starts in the central west part of town and climbs up through the little streets with multiple gaps so that you can jump on or off where you need to.  It’s 800 metres long (the world’s longest). It travels down the mountain in the morning towards the city centre and then changes direction and goes up , from 10:20 a.m. until midnight.  It passes through the antique markets of Hollywood Road, south of Soho, a district full of ex-pat hipsters and lovely colonial style buildings.  Beautiful, but quite expensive, no doubt.  Most of the restaurants in the area serve foreign fare and we stopped for a couple of pints of Guinness at The Wheel pub, which was full of Australians and New Zealanders.  Lots and lots of Australians here. 

Our final destination of the day was The Peak tram, which has been in operation since the late 1800s, back in the day it took the wealthy English folk to their colonial estates up the mountain, as real estate was already at a premium.  Everything that gets built here requires excavating part of the mountain away – no wonder it’s so expensive.  The peak offers a beautiful panorama of the island and Kowloon.  It was a little misty and threatened rain but it was breathtaking.  There were all the stores and restaurants offering overpriced bric a brac but it was worth the trip.

On our way to the tram we took a stroll through the very lush Zoological Gardens with a statue of King George VI standing right in the middle of the tall palm trees just like in his native England.  Lush is the word that comes to mind – palms abound, gum trees with their colourful smooth trunks and the beautiful Chinese banyan trees – where the roots seem to grow up the outside of the trunks.  They look like all root and even grow sideways over and down concrete walls that line the streets – I thought I saw a kookaburra yesterday but I’m sure it was something else :).  The vegetation is so rich and diverse.  Where no green space or garden beds exist in the city, potted plants and trees line the streets and public spaces.

We were going to go to Macau today but changed our minds.  It’s our last in Hong Kong and we take the train to Guangzhou tomorrow.  In two days we’ll meet our little daughter, Juno.  How awesome is that?

Just a reminder that more of todays pictures can be found at www.flickr.com/budbug.