Day 63 – Hong Kong

Day 63, March 8^th –  Hong Kong

“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” – Mike Tyson – 1997

When Mike Tyson was asked by a reporter whether he was worried about Evander Holyfield and his fight plan he answered with the above quote.  While I wasn’t preparing for a prize fight, I did develop a very nice plan for our day trip to Macau.  Unfortunately, Hong Kong’s cool temperatures, wind and rain, punched my plan in the mouth and we were forced to adapt on the fly.  More on that later.

Arrival

Wind and rain greeted us as we sailed into Hong Kong which put a big damper on the normally scenic and festive sail-in.  We will be going to Kai Tak Cruise Terminal, which was built on the same site as the old Hong Kong airport.  According to my sources, Holland America is now committed to using the Kai Tak Cruise terminal for all future Hong Kong visits for financial reasons.  Berthing at Kai Tak must offer a significant price savings over the much preferable Harbour City location to justify the inconvenience of this location and the bare bones facilities inside the terminal.

There was a free shuttle bus offered to the Peninsula Hotel, but a taxi to the same location cost about $95 HKD or $13 USD per cab.  If you share this with a few people, the price is reasonable, and it beats having to deal with the shuttle bus.  Another plus is that unless you are going to the Peninsula hotel, you can avoid more walking and have the taxi take you directly to your destination.

Macau Day Trip

A few days before we arrived, we received a questionnaire asking us if we planned to leave Hong Kong to visit Macau so we could get an individual visa instead of the group visa.  There wasn’t any extra charge for this visa, but the ship needed to know so they could separate our passports and process them separately.

The night before we arrived, we were instructed to be in the Wajang Theatre at 7:45 am in the morning to collect our passports go ashore to clear immigration.  After we had our passports, we went ashore and proceeded thru typical immigration kiosks where the officials looked at our passports and gave us a loose sticker which represented our arrival visa.  We were on our way to the taxi stand by 8:30 AM.

NOTE: The rest of the ship wasn’t cleared for several hours so the lesson here is if you want to leave the ship early tell the ship you are heading to Macau and you will likely be processed as soon as you arrive.  However, once you say you are going to Macau, you MUST leave the ship early and can’t get back on for several hours.  Also, the people who went to Macau had an earlier all aboard time since we had to clear immigration again in the Hudson Room on the way out.

Taxi to China Ferry Terminal

There was only a short taxi line and one arrived in about 10 minutes.  Hong Kong has taxis that can hold either 4 or 5 people and they all display a placard on the bumper near the front license plate that shows the authorized capacity.  There were 5 of us in our group, so we had to take a pass on the first taxi and wait for the next taxi, which had a 5-passenger placard.  I considered using UBER, but the nearest UBER was 15 minutes away, so the taxis were faster.  However, with the taxis you need to have Hong Kong Dollars available – and in smaller denominations – as many taxis don’t take credit cards (but some do – so ask).

There was a helpful person working the taxi line and she gave us a card we could use for our return trip that indicated we wanted to go to the Kai Tak Cruise terminal.  She also circled our destination, written in Chinese, on a brochure that we could show the driver to avoid confusion.  Most drivers understand some English, but having your destination written down in Chinese is recommended.

It took about 30 minutes to travel the 6 miles to the China Ferry Terminal in the morning rush hour traffic.

China Ferry Terminal

Once inside the terminal, the signs to the ticket offices and ferries are well marked in English.  Since we had our tickets printed out in advance, we proceeded directly to a gate marked with the time of our ferry and the ferry company’s name.

Macau Ferry Options

Let me pause for a second to review the options for getting to Macau.

There are two ferry terminals in Hong Kong/Kowloon:

1. Hong Kong-Macau Ferry Terminal on Hong Kong
2. China Ferry Terminal on Kowloon.

There are two ferry terminals in Macau:

1. Macau Taipa Ferry Terminal – Near the newer casinos
2. Macau Outer Harbor Ferry Terminal – Near the older casinos and more tourist attractions.

Macau is not that big, so it doesn’t matter that much which Macau Ferry terminal you use.  We chose the Macau Taipa Ferry Terminal as it was closer to the Wynn Palace where we would be ending our day trip.

There are two major ferry companies:

1. Turbo Jet
2. Cotai jet

Cotai Jet Ferry

We chose Cotai Jet since it leaves from the closer (to Kai tak) China Ferry Terminal.  However, Cotai Jet only has departures about once per hour from Kowloon while Turbo Jet has departures every 15 minutes from Hong Kong.  Fares and service are similar, so I would pick based on schedule and your preference of ferry terminal, both from Hong Kong/Kowloon and Macau.

Unless you are travelling on a weekend, you won’t need a reservation and you don’t need to buy a ticket in advance.  We bought our tickets online in advance, so we could avoid waiting in the ticket line and go directly to the boarding gates.  As it turned out, the lines were not very long, so if you don’t buy a ticket in advance, don’t be concerned.  We paid the extra $12.00 each for first-class tickets.  That gave us front-of-line for immigration in Macau and Hong Kong.  As it turned out the lines weren’t that long, so you could probably avoid this extra expense unless you were travelling on a weekend when everything is much busier.  First class also includes a complimentary beverage and snack.

The ferry has two levels with the entire upper level dedicated to first class and economy class restricted to the first level.  There were probably 10 people with us in first class with a capacity of over 100 – there was about 75 people in economy.

The ferry left on time and the ride was smooth all the way across except for a few bumpy spots about ½ way.  Walking from the ferry to immigration was about ¼ mile and we cleared immigration quickly.

Arrival Macau

Once inside the terminal we went to the tourist information center to get a local map before heading outside to grab a free casino shuttle bus the Wynn Macau.  If you are in a hurry you may want to take a taxi directly to your destination since the free shuttle bus ended up (they have free Wi-Fi onboard) taking about 45 minutes – probably twice as long as a taxi would have taken.

Wynn Macau

It was raining, cold and windy when he got off the shuttle bus at the Wynn Macau.  Our original plan was to take a taxi to the Ruins of St Paul, spend a few minutes exploring the area, and then slowly walk the 1 mile back to the Wynn via some tourist spots.  The weather was miserable enough that we decided to cancel our outdoor activities and spend most of our time in the various Casinos.

We ducked inside the Wynn Macau to get out of the rain and we happened to be in the perfect spot to watch one of two amazing shows inside the Rotunda.  The two shows are called “Dragon of Fortune” and “Tree of Prosperity” which alternate and one or the other is shown every 15 minutes.  Each show is about 5 minutes.  Here is a description of the two shows from the Wynn website:

Tree of Prosperity

“This wondrous combination of music, video and lights starts as the golden dome above opens to reveal a spectacular 11-meter chandelier crafted of 21,000 illuminated crystals.  At almost the same moment, an 11-meter tree ascends from the floor, with each of its 60 limbs composed of more than 2,000 branches and 98,000 leaves embellished with both 24-karat gold and brass leaf.  As the tree gracefully spins, state-of-the-art video technology creates the illusion of changing seasons, from a vibrant green for spring to a golden summer, deep red for fall, and finally, an icy winter”. 

Dragon of Fortune

“A magnificent sculpture embellished with gold leaf, which rises from its jade-like base amid a rolling fog, accompanied by grand music tailor-made for such a dazzling entrance.  As the 28-foot Dragon with its glowing eyes slowly turns, affording each audience member a perfect view, a 12-foot lotus blossom gracefully opens at its center.  Each of these traditional symbols was designed to pay tribute to the rich lore and culture of China.” 

After the shows we walked through the casino to see what games they had and pick up some chips to keep as souvenirs.  Unlike the casinos in Las Vegas, you don’t have to walk thru the gaming area to get to anyplace else as they are segregated by security checkpoints with guards and arches that look like metal detectors, but they don’t require you to remove anything from your pockets or have your bags inspected.  You must remove your hat and men are not allowed to wear shorts – other than that, the dress of everyone inside was casual.  While they don’t permit photography inside the gaming area, they didn’t have a problem with my camera being slung over my shoulder while inside.  There wasn’t any problem taking photos anywhere else inside the hotels.

Gambling in Macau

Aside from the size differences, the casinos in Macau all had the same games in the same proportions.  Over 70% of the gaming area is dedicated to Baccarat with $500 HKD (about $64 USD) as the most common table minimum.  The second most popular game was a dice game using three dice call Sic Bo – More HERE.    The remainder of the floor space was spread amongst a variety of games including Blackjack.  There was no drinking or smoking while playing at any of the table games.  There were small rooms with glass walls for smokers.  The casinos were all brightly lit, spotless and smoke free.

We watched as people played Baccarat and were surprised that they dealt the cards face down and the players would slowly expose their cards by bending the edges sharply enough to crease the card – ruining it for further play.  This was to maximize their anticipation and delay the exposure of their hand, good or bad.  After about 5 seconds, with their cards known to them, the player would fling them toward the dealer who would neatly position them on the board while the rest of the hand played out.  We watched as someone came in and plopped down $200,000 Hong Kong dollars ($25,000 USD) and proceeded to lose it all in 4 hands after which he got up and left.

In addition to the table games, there was a wide variety of slot machines like you would find at any other casino anywhere in the world.  We didn’t play any of the games, but the pit bosses were friendly and a few spoke good English and they were quite happy to explain the games and the casino customs.

Hotel Lisboa

After we left the Wynn, we headed over to the original Macau Casino, The Hotel Lisboa, which was much smaller than the Wynn, but had a certain elegance that was missing from the newer, glitzier casinos.

Margaret’s Cafe

The rain stopped as we left the Hotel Lisboa so we decided to walk a few blocks to Margaret’s Café, which is known for its Egg Tarts, variations of which you will find all over Macau.  In addition to the Egg Tarts, they serve a variety of meats and cheeses on various types of bread.  There is a large menu board over a counter/deli case and when you get to the front of the line, you tell the person behind counter what type of bread you would like along with the meat and other toppings.  I chose ham and cheese, but it turned out to be chopped up ham and cheese prepared like a tuna salad filling, instead of slices of ham and cheese.

 

After they hand you your sandwich wrapped in clear plastic wrap, you can order some egg tarts from a woman guarding them as they sit on trays in pastry racks, next to the meat counter.  I ordered two and she wrapped them up, but she refused to hand them to me until I paid for everything at the cashier only a few feet away.  I gathered they had problems with people dashing out the door once they had the egg tarts in hand.

There wasn’t any place to sit inside but we found some spots on a picnic table outside under an awning.  In a few minutes we were joined by a Japanese couple, but it turned out that the man was from San Jose, California, and the woman from Tokyo.  They only met earlier that day on an app called “Tinder”.

Wynn Palace

We headed back to the Wynn Macau and caught their shuttle bus to the Wynn Palace and spent about 30 minutes browsing some of their shops and picking up some more gambling chips for souvenirs.  All the casinos have free and fast Wi-Fi.

Each casino has their own shuttle bus, but they only connect their casino to the airport or ferry terminal and their other properties.  The exception is the Cotai shuttle which travels in a big loop around the major casinos on Cotai.

After we finished exploring the Wynn Palace, we got on the Cotai Shuttle and headed over to the Galaxy Hotel and Casino.  We browsed the shops and stopped by the Starbucks to pick up some souvenir coffee mugs before heading back to the Cotai Shuttle to head to the Venetian Hotel and casino.

Back to Hong Kong

We were only in the Venetian long enough to pick up some gambling chips for souvenirs before we headed out to the shuttle buses to catch a bus back to the Taipa Ferry Terminal.  We just missed the earlier bus, so we had to wait 15 minutes for the next one and we arrived at the terminal 10 minutes later at 6:45 pm, one hour before departure.  This was the last Cotai Jet ferry from Taipa this evening.  Other companies have ferries leaving later, but they may leave from the other Macau Ferry Terminal.

Our ferry left on time and one hour later we were back in Kowloon.  There wasn’t much of a line for immigration and we were down on the street in the taxi line in a few minutes.  There was only a short wait for a 5-passenger taxi and we were back in the Kai Tak Cruise Terminal in 17 minutes and $100 HKD ($14 USD) later.  It took us 15 minutes to walk from the taxi drop off spot to the ship.  This is a big terminal and they seem to snake you all around on your way back to the ship.

We ordered room service for dinner.

Back on the Ship

There was a Chinese Cultural Show in the Queen’s Lounge, but it started at 9:30 PM and we didn’t get back on the ship until 9:45 PM so we missed it.

The Original Plan

As I mentioned at the start of this post, we had a wonderful plan for our day trip, but we chose to abandon the plan because we didn’t feel like walking around in the rain.  We will save this plan for a future trip to Macau.

Here was our original plan for our Macau Day Trip for the benefit of future travelers.  If anyone follows this plan for their own trip, shoot me an email and let me know how it worked out.

8:30 – Taxi or Uber to Hong Kong Ferry Terminal
9:15 – Arrive China Ferry Terminal – Coatai Water Jet
10:15 – Ferry Departs
11:15 – Arrive Macau Taipa Ferry Terminal
11:45 – Clear Immigration/Customs
12:00 – Taxi to Ruins of St. Paul

Walk 1 mile to Wynn Casino (2 hours budgeted) thru cultural/historic district

• Museum of Macau (optional)
• Lou Kau Mansion & Visit 15 minutes
• Senado Square – Center of old Macau
• Margaret’s Café for Egg Tarts and snack

Famous for Egg Tarts

• Lisboa Casino – one of Macau’s original Casinos
• Fountain Show at Wynn Casino
• Wynn Casino

2:00 PM Taxi to Taipa Village – More info HERE

If you are travelling by taxi, please tell the driver to drop off at Rua do Regedor Taxi Station. (地堡街的士站 – 黑橋巴士站對面)

2:15 PM  Arrive Taipa VIllage

Explore Taipa Village for 2 Hours

“Taipa village is the historical part of Taipa and the best-preserved area in the south of the island.  It used to be a fisherman village in Taipa catered for local residents who made a living through fishing, firecrackers production and other handicraft professions”.

Suggested Eating Spots

Cafe Tai Lei Loi Kei –
Rua Correria da Silva, No 35, Taipa,
Famous Macau Street Food “Pork Chop in a Bun”
Tian Mo Fang Dessert
Egg Tarts served in egg shells

16:30  Depart Taipa Village
Walk to Venetian Hotel Casino –   ½ mile
Walk Thru Venetian Hotel

Lord Stow Bakery – snack – Famous for Egg Tarts
Most Consider Lord Stow the best bakery in Macau

Walk to City of Dreams  Hotel Casino or take Cotai Connection

Explore City of Dreams
Take Cotai Connection to Wynn Palace

Walk Thru Wynn Palace
Watch Fountain Show at Wynn Macau Performance Lake

18:45 Take Taxi or Shuttle back to Ferry Terminal
19:00 Arrive Macau Taipai Ferry Terminal
19:45 Depart Macau Taipa Ferry Terminal
20:45 Arrive China Ferry Terminal
21:00 Depart China Ferry Terminal via Taxi/Uber
21:45 Arrive Kat Tak Cruise Terminal

 

 

This entry was posted in 2018 Grand World Voyage, Asia, China, Hong Kong, Macau

• Macau