Hong Kong Adventures: Hong Kong Day 13 -- Swimming and Ladies Market

Today was an early morning. Evelyn and I woke up early to get to the Wan Chai station by 7am to meet with Ana and go to the swimming pool. We took the MTR to the Kowloon Park Sports Centre in Jordan on Kowloon. There were many groups of people doing various exercises, it seemed like they were forms of Tai Chi type exercises They have many different places to participate in activities in the area. We went into the Kowloon Park Swimming Pool (check it out if you're interested, http://www.lcsd.gov.hk/parks/kp/en/swimming_pool.php), which cost about 19 HKD (a little under 3 USD) a person. This swimming pool complex is huge. First we went into the locker rooms, and then went out to the pool. They have 4 indoor swimming pools and 3 outdoor pools as well as an area for sun bathing. They also have a small, shallow "paddling pool." We left all of our stuff in lockers, so I don't have pictures of any of the pools. There are a couple of pictures in the link above, and there are also quite a few on Google Images. The whole complex is pretty cool and it is huge. Ana and I went to the outside pools while Evelyn went to one of the indoor pools to try to slim some laps. The outdoor pool is pretty big, so I swam a couple of laps back and forth and then just relaxed for a while. Ana also just hung out in the pool, we talked for a bit until Evelyn came out, and then we all stayed in there for a bit before leaving.

After swimming, we took the MTR back to Causeway Bay for breakfast. We ate at the Flying Pan, a 24-hour breakfast restaurant. I got two eggs with pork sausage, apple juice, fresh fruit, and spiced apples. It was good, and definitely hit the spot after getting up so early and being in the pool for a while. We headed back to our apartments and showered and rested a bit before lunch. We went to the Hong Kong Style Cafe again for lunch today. I had spicy fried noodles. It had shrimp and some other vegetables. After eating we stopped by a little shop that has postcards, magnets, and other souvenirs. We bought some things from there today.

We dropped off our stuff and then headed down to Mong Kok (on Kowloon) and the "ladies market." It is a long street with stalls full of things to buy. There are clothes, wallets, purses, souvenirs, electronics, and a bunch of other things at the stalls. Everything in the market can be bargained, so as you walk you see a lot of people haggling with the vendors and if they don't get the price they want they will start to walk away and a vendor will start running after them offering a different price. It is pretty fun to watch the whole process unfold. The market has over 100 stalls and tons of people walking through. We spent a couple hours at the market and then took the MTR back to Causeway Bay.

We rested and hung out in our apartments for a little while, and then went to the Japanese restaurant again for dinner. Today I ordered Corn Salad Gunkan, Softshell crab hand roll, a grilled pork hand roll, grilled pork w/balsamic glaze nigiri, and roasted fatty salmon nigiri. It was all really good, and was just the right amount of food. There was also a container of ginger on the table. I ate quite a few pieces of that. It hit the spot. My whole meal was $57HKD. When we finished eating we went over to Hysan Place for dessert. I chose Thai Black Glutinous Rice with Mango in Vanilla Sauce cold desert and added sweet balls to it. The rice was good, and it had a really big piece of mango. The sweet balls were good, they were a bit sticky outside, and had peanuts and sesame or something inside. After we ate we headed back to our apartments.

Tomorrow we are going to go biking on Kowloon with Ana (and maybe some other Crown people). I'm trying to find a way to watch a bit of the French Open finals (S Williams and Sharapova) for a bit before I go to sleep. As I'm writing this, it is 4-4 in the 1st set.

*** By the time I actually posted this (waiting for pictures to upload, doing other things to get ready, etc), Serena had won, and the NBC Sports LiveExtra stream never worked. It had technical difficulties the whole time...