Hong Kong Adventures: Hong Kong Day 27

A LOT of pictures, just warning you ahead of time... Took a bunch today, and narrowed it down to these, wanted to have less on here, but I didn’t want to get rid of any. The place had so many cool things to see!

Today Ciara, Yan, Evelyn and I went to Ocean Park, which is basically Hong Kong’s Marine World. We slept in a bit and then left around 10. We took the MTR to Admiralty and then took the Ocean Park bus from there to right outside the park. We were able to buy tickets in the MTR station at a little bit of discount, and this also made it so that we could just go in once we got to the park and didn’t have to also buy them once we were there. There is a storm near Hong Kong, and last night they announced a typhoon level 1 warning. This morning they changed it to a level 3 for a little bit and then dropped it back down to 1. Level 1 doesn’t have too much of an effect, it’s mostly to let people know to prepare in case it does result in a big storm. If it gets to level 3, then some places and things will shut down. Ocean park stays open with a level 3 warning, but most, if not all, outdoor rides are closed.

The weather stayed nice for us, so we were able to go. Ocean Park is really neat, they have an area near the entrance that has an aquarium, a panda exhibit, and some other things to see and do. They also have roller coasters and other animals up on the hill. To get to the amusement park and marine world part you take a cable car (gondola) or a train up to the top of the hill. We stopped near the entrance to the park and took a few pictures of the sign and in front of the sign, and then walked over to the cable car to go to the other section of the park. It was a really neat ride, the cars are pretty high, and they are also right near the edge of the island, so you can see the ocean, other islands, and the park.

We got off the cable cars and walked over to the Hair Raiser roller coaster that is right at the top and edge of the hill. It was a fun ride, had a few loops and corkscrews. There was almost no wait at all, so we went on it twice when we first got there. It start raining a bit when we finished the first ride and then we went a second time in the rain. The rain felt like a bunch of little pins pricking us, it was pretty weird. After the roller coaster, we went over to the “North Pole Encounter.” It is a big series of rooms with animals from the North Pole. They had walruses, seals, sea lions, and some other animals. The whole building was cold, but it felt pretty good. It was also neat to see all of the animals up close. They are so big, but don’t look like it from far away. There is a video of one of the spotted seals at the end of the pictures. He was really cute, and kept sliding and rolling around on the ice thing they had set up. Of course he didn't do as much once I started recording as he was before I started recording...

After walking through the North Pole Encounter we tried one of the carnival games that were set up. It was a game where we had to throw wiffle balls onto a board with holes in it. There were some squares with colors and if you got it on one of the holes you win a prize. I was able to get one of the balls on a prize spot, and got a travel neck pillow.

We finished the game and then went on a couple more rides and walked through a rainforest that they had set up. They had birds, fish, small monkeys and some other animals in the rainforest. Next we went on the “Ocean Park Tower” a big tower with a seating area that lifts up and circles around slowly. It has an awesome view, can see the park, the bay, and all of the islands around. We were able to see Lamma Island, the island that we went to a couple of weeks ago.

We got off of the tower, and then went to go find some food. The food was a bit pricey at one of the restaurants we stopped at, so we just went to the McDonalds that was at the park. After we ate we went on another roller coaster and a log ride. This roller coaster wasn’t very fun, and it was pretty uncomfortable, all of our necks were sore when we finished. The log ride had a kind of long wait, and it ended up being a bit of a let down. It was fairly short and gentle, especially compared to what we are used to at home. Not quite as exhilarating as we expected.

We then walked back up to the Hair Raiser roller coaster. Yan didn’t ride it when we went in the morning, so we wanted her to ride it one more time with us. The line was a lot longer this time, we had to wait 15 or 20 minutes. For most of the day we did not have to wait in line at all, but as the day went and the weather was nice, they got longer. There were also a lot of tour groups that came as the day went along.

After we went on the Hair Raiser, we walked to the Ocean Express Summit Station to take the train back down to the other section of the park. We went to the Amazing Asian Animals area and the Giant Panda Adventure. The Panda area was really neat, they had a few red pandas running around in one area, and the star attraction Giant Panda. I think we got a bit lucky, because one of the pandas was sitting outside eating some bamboo or something. It was out there for a few minutes and then walked back into the inside/hidden areas. Everyone was clustered around where it was sitting, and then as it got up to go inside everyone started sighing, it was pretty funny.

We went into The Grand Aquarium to see some of the fish and other animals they had in there. It was really similar to other aquariums, they had some neat things set up. We then went to the gift shop and then headed out to the bus. We took a bus back to Causeway Bay instead of Admiralty, so it made it a much quicker trip. We got back to Causeway Bay and then went to our apartments to drop off our stuff, before going to get dinner. Today we ate at Hysan Place again, I went to the Korean place and got stone pot kimchi pork rice. It was really good.

After dinner, we walked over to another shopping mall with a Japanese store and then Ciara and I went to a drugstore so that I could get some contact lens solution. On our way back we were still a bit hungry, and wanting something sweet. We passed a restaurant that had a lot of different desserts, so we decided to stop there and get some. We ordered Mango Pudding with Mango, and also ordered glutenous rice balls with sesame. It tasted so good, I had been craving something sweet, so it definitely hit the spot. We finished eating, and then stopped at the market on the way home to get some fresh fruit. I got small bananas, dragon fruit, and pears. Already had a banana and it was really sweet, might have a dragonfruit or pear tomorrow.