Category Archives: Trips

Traveling experiences.

The Tenth Day

Monday was the last day we were going to be in Hong Kong. However, our flight left a little after 5pm so we had a bit of time, theoretically. We got a taxi from the hotel to the Airport Express station, which is near central Hong Kong, where we were able to check-in and drop off our checked in luggage. Unfortunately, we learned they didn’t have any window seats left on the flight so we had to check Calvin’s car seat as well.

Once we did that, we took the MTR train to the actual airport where we dropped off a couple of our carry-on bags with a “left luggage” service. Then we got on a bus and with the plan of taking the Ngong Ping 360 cable car to the Tian Tan Buddha. Unfortunately, when we got there, it appeared that everyone else also wanted to take the cable car. The line was at least an hour and a half long which might have left enough time to make it across but wouldn’t let us do anything once we got there.

We ate the pastries I had gotten the previous night in hopes of it inspiring some great plan. However, the options available were not good. Eventually we wandered around the adjacent outlet mall looking for something vegetarian for a real lunch and couldn’t find anything. So, we found a bus to take us back to the airport. The upside of the journey is it was a double-decker bus and we got to sit on top at the very front. Calvin definitely enjoyed that part of the trip.

We got back the airport, grabbed our left luggage, and headed over to terminal one. We found a deli we had eaten at before and ordered some sandwiches. However, they were less satisfying than we hoped (The vegetarian sandwich consisted of a baguette with lettuce, tomato, and hard-boiled egg. I’m not vegan but I don’t like egg when I can taste it).

We wandered closer to security and discovered another restaurant that had vegetarian items clearly marked on the menu (a very rare event). We felt the needed to reward good behavior so we decided to eat there too. We got a little pizza for Calvin, a lasagna for me, and Jaeger got a curry. The curry was pretty good. The lasagna was completely overwhelmed by massive amounts of cheese. I do like cheese but this was going behind what I was able to
consume, especially since I wasn’t really hungry.

While there, we tried to get seats for our flight from Taipei to Hong Kong. Jaeger booked via United’s website but this leg of the journey was flown by ANA. Unfortunately, each airline claimed the other one was responsible for getting us seats. We called ANA, then United, then ANA and never got a satisfactory response. This is important to me because we do have reserved seats for all other legs and I really want to bring Calvin’s car seat on with us.

Our flight for Taiwan departed and was fairly short. We arrived in the Taipei airport and walked past a line specifically for disabled people and those carrying babies. We started to queue in the normal non-resident line but one of the immigration staff people saw us and indicated we should go in the almost non-existent carrying baby line. It is true that Jaeger was carrying Calvin at that exact point but we had thought he was a bit big for the exception. Due to the special line we made it through immigration faster than I ever have anywhere before. It was magical.

Most of our luggage arrived promptly except for our car seat which made me nervous. However, it did eventually arrive and we headed out past customs to find a driver for the hotel waiting for us. It was a fairly long ride to the hotel and Calvin fell asleep just a couple of minutes before we got there.

The hotel itself is very modern-looking, not quite my style. However, the staff are very friendly and so far seem to speak excellent English which is nice. Also, they have a tub! Our hotel in Hong Kong, while nice, only had a shower and as a result, Calvin hasn’t had a bath for too many days. It was too late for a bath the night we arrived but I am hoping that we’ll have a chance to use it later.

Our hotel in Hong Kong was a suite. However, the one in Taipei is only a one-bed room. However, the bed is a king bed so we’re all trying to sleep in it together as one big happy family. Calvin is ecstatic though the rest of us are a little less excited and hope it’ll actually work out.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Ninth Day

Jaeger got in around 11pm last night and we had no specific plans for today so spent a leisurely morning waking up. Eventually, we made it out of the hotel and found a great bakery near one of the MTR stops for 2nd breakfast. We ate it in Victoria Park while Calvin watched model boats meandering around the little pond.

After that, we walked several blocks to hear the Noonday Gun which, predictably, fires at noon every day. Apparently exactly why it fires at noon is somewhat debatable. We almost got there a bit late having had trouble crossing the busy road. Google implied there should be a way across but it wasn’t obvious. We did make it there on time and only, as we were leaving, realized the route meant going under the road, not over. If we’d come from the other direction it would have been obvious but the secret doorway was too easy to miss coming from Victoria Park.

After that, we went for lunch. Yes, we’d recently had second breakfast but when planning the day it wasn’t obvious they’d be so close together. I thought it was prudent to go ahead and eat at a place we’d already vetted than hope for the best later on in a new location. Lunch was good and Calvin managed to keep his mess to a reasonable minimum, which was good because we had real tablecloths.

The plan after lunch was to take a ride on the Star Ferry but Calvin announced himself to be tired of ferries. I’m afraid we’re using alternate transportation enough these days that he’s starting to get rather jaded. So far, we’ve gone through trains, planes, and ferries. He still seems to have some enthusiasm for the tram, probably because I think it’s inefficient and have been avoiding it.

Since Calvin wasn’t interested in the ferry we moved to our next item which was visiting the Dr. Sun Yat Sen museum. No doubt Jaeger will talk in length about him so go read his entry once he’s written it. It isn’t a particularly child-friendly museum but they did have an amusing animated cartoon for kids summarizing his life as well as some coloring pages. Calvin was entranced by the cartoon though the audio alternated between Cantonese and Mandarin so I’m not sure how much he got from it. There were English subtitles but Calvin always gets upset when I try to read subtitles to him so I’ve stopped doing so.

We had some unscheduled time after the museum so went to the playground in the zoological gardens which was fairly close to the museum. There were a lot of kids and at first Calvin just hung out around the edges but eventually started getting involved.

For supper, we went to Starbucks and had drinks and a pastry each. Jaeger has introduced me to the “short” hot chocolate size which is perfect because I think it’s an actual 8 oz rather than the over-sized cup you get otherwise. It doesn’t appear on the menu but if you order it, they provide (though always appear a bit confused when they learn it’s not for a child).

For our return trip Jaeger suggested we take the street tram back. As previously mentioned, I’m not a fan of it so I suggested he and Calvin take it back while I take MTR. Jaeger agreed and I took the opportunity of stopping by the bakery we found that morning to pick up more items for tomorrow. In spite of my detour, I still beat Jaeger and Calvin back by a significant margin.

Calvin must be getting acclimated to this time zone. He voluntarily climbed into his bed but is still singing to himself and occasionally asking us to do things for him.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Eighth Day

Jaeger successfully got his visa for China yesterday so today he got up a little earlier than usual and left on his own. I had no particular urge to drag Calvin to China so we stayed behind.

My original plan was to wander the many Hong Kong parks and let Calvin play while I took advantage of the wifi. However, upon looking at the forecast and noting their predicted heavy rain, I decided a different excursion may be in order.

I looked through our Hong Kong for Kids book and decided to try Bumble Tots. It’s an indoor playground designed for kids 10 and under. The downside is it took 4 train changes to get there. I think Calvin has had enough subway trains at this point that he’s getting a little blase about them. I was hoping to grab an early lunch before we got there but failed to find the nearby food the guidebook suggested should exist. Calvin and I were both getting grumpy on the extended hike so I gave up on that suggestion and hoped the cafe within the facility actually had food we could eat.

Calvin had a lot of fun at Bumble Tots. It is a very large playground-like place that has ball pits for kids to scramble through, large trampolines, and numerous other things for Calvin to play with. The guidebook warned that it could get very crowded on weekends and I thought since it was raining, we were likely to get extra crowded. However, it wasn’t bad while we were there. Calvin ran around like a crazy person. We managed to sustain ourselves on muffins and apple juice from the small cafe until I decided it was time to leave around 2pm.

My next stop was a library, which was on the way back to the MTR station. I planned to stop there just long enough to email my latest journals and make sure there wasn’t any urgent email. It took a little longer than I expected because wifi kept dropping off but Calvin managed to amuse himself looking through some sort of Chinese grade-school reader.

As we were leaving the library, Calvin said he wanted to go play on the playground in the nearby park. I was a little dubious since the rain was pretty heavy but figured we could try it. The playground had a covered area
with benches so I sat there while Calvin joyfully scampered around in the rain. We stayed there for more than an hour till I finally decided it was time for us to leave. Calvin was completely soaked. I was only mostly soaked.

Getting back to the hotel involved the same 4 trains and it took close to an hour to get back to the hotel. We picked up more food for supper and then came back to the hotel and flopped down exhausted. Calvin ate supper and then climbed into bed, though it took him quite a bit to actually fall asleep. Even so, I’m getting spoiled with how easy it is to put him to bed these days. I am not looking forward to back home when we have to cajole him forcefully to stay in bed.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Seventh Day (Disneyland)

Today we went to Disneyland. Getting there required three different trains but other than that, it was relatively easy. The last train was Disney branded and had Mickey Mouse shaped windows.

Calvin didn’t know what Disneyland was and I had a couple moments of doubt where I wondered how much he’d get out of it since he hasn’t seen any of the movies (Cars, the original, is the only Pixar movie he’s seen and they don’t appear to feature it very heavily). However, Calvin did seem excited about a trip that was exclusively for his benefit.

We arrived at Disneyland and merged into the throng of people. There were a lot of people but I suspect it wasn’t as crowded as the US Disneyland. One of our first stops was going to be a stand that made Mickey Mouse shaped waffles to fortify us for the experience ahead. However, just as we entered, a parade started which stopped everything in its tracks and prevented us from going to the other side of the street where the food was. On the plus side, Calvin got a good view of the parade up on Jaeger’s shoulders. Disneyland is still in Christmas theme so all the Disney characters were dressed up for Christmas. Calvin grinned and seemed to enjoy it a great deal.

After we ate our Mickey Mouse waffles we headed to fantasyland which our guidebook recommended as a good place for small children. The first ride that caught Calvin’s attention was Winnie the Pooh. He hasn’t watched the Disney movie but we have read some of the original stories together. The line wasn’t too bad. We got in the little boat and Calvin seemed to enjoy most of the ride, especially Tigger’s appearance, but became less enthusiastic when we went through a stormy rain sequence.

I thought the Small World ride would be a little more pleasant for him so we headed that way but got distracted when we passed the twirling tea cups ride. Calvin decided he wanted to go on that and it was an unqualified success. We next went to the Small World ride and a girl in line ahead of us took the opportunity to get some photos of Calvin, making me once again feel like I was with a minor celebrity. The small world ride was interesting and I was amused by the rabid stereotypes embraced for every culture. The middle east had people flying on carpets and harem girls, Scotland was portrayed with bagpipes, and the US with cowboys and Indians (not fighting each other though).

While lines were short, it still took time to get through so by the end of the Small World ride we went looking for lunch. I had been concerned about vegetarian options in the park but learned online that the Tahitian Terrace restaurant had a Vegetarian Indian option so we headed over for that. The food was really salty but other than that it was decent and much better than I had expected to find in the park.

After lunch, we took a “raft” over to Tarzan’s Treehouse. The Treehouse was large and sprawling and consisted of many steps and platforms. Calvin seemed to enjoy it but was quite disappointed when he learned there was only one “treehouse” rather than several to explore. We got on a raft back to the mainland and then queued for the “Jungle River Cruise”. This was a boat trip around the “river” that showcased fake animals moving in relatively realistic ways. I was a little bemused by the excited picture taking of many of our fellow tourists. It made me wonder if there would come a point where animated fake animals are the best our children will ever get to see. The boat ride also had a bit of a scary moment which the program did mention but I had failed to notice. Calvin really didn’t like that part.

To do something calm and non-threatening we took the Disney train that circles around most of the park. Another tourist snapped a picture of Calvin which I keep finding amusing. As an aside, last night, as we were standing in line at Starbucks, a young women pointed to Calvin’s face and said something. I didn’t quite catch what she said but I figured she was telling me he had a snotty nose or something similar. However, I eventually figured out she was asking if I put makeup on his cheeks. I shook me head and she said in amazement, “oh, it’s natural!”. This reminded me of all the times when he was an infant and people commented on Calvin’s “rosy” cheeks that were really just rashy.

After the train, we decided it was time for dessert. Making sure enough calories are making it into the respective Logans sometimes feels like an activity by itself. However, before we made it to dessert Calvin got distracted by the Dumbo ride which involves elephants “flying” around a pole. Each elephant only took two passengers so I decided to duck out of line and bring back dessert.

I went over to Toy Story Land which is apparently a fairly new part of the park. It was also mobbed, more than the rest of the park. However, I found a stand selling frozen yogurt with toppings. One of the toppings I got was mango flavored little balls of juice that broke once they were bit open. Calvin really enjoyed the Dumbo ride he also seemed to enjoy the dozen yogurt. The weather ended up being much hotter than we expected so I found the dozen yogurt to be particularly nice.

We decided we had time for one more ride so headed over to Tomorrowland. However, once again we got stuck by a parade, this time at the tail end of it. After it was over, we bobbed over to the Obitron ride which was almost exactly like the dumbo ride except it had a spacecraft theme and there were four seats for each pod. Calvin also really liked this ride.

Jaeger had to go back to Kowloon and pick up his visa for tomorrow before 6:30. In addition, Calvin looked like he was loosing energy so it was time for us to leave. Calvin seemed very disappointed but I think that’s the best time to leave, when you’re still enjoying yourself.

Jaeger split off at one of the stops on our second train and Calvin and I headed home. We ate a small supper and then Calvin put himself to bed, though it did take a while for him to actually fall asleep.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Sixth Day

Originally, I was thinking today would be a good day for Disneyland. However, the weather forecast suggested there might be rain so Jaeger convinced me we’d have better luck trying tomorrow. Unfortunately, most of the other things on our list were also outside activities. Eventually we decided to make it a lazy day and visit Victoria Park and then the library.

Naturally, Victoria Park has several playgrounds. Calvin and I settled down at one while Jaeger explored the rest of the park. Then he came back to watch Calvin for a bit. We had talked about Jaeger taking a day trip to mainland China (I have no particular desire to go there) so Jaeger hunted around and found a place that claimed to be able to get him a visa for China by tomorrow so he headed off there while Calvin and I stayed in the park.

After a while, Calvin got tired of the playground. We wandered a couple of meters away and came across a man-made pond specifically designed for model boats. There was an orange speed boat that whizzed around and caused splashing to Calvin’s great delight. We stayed there more than a half-hour, possibly even a full hour. Fortunately, I had a book with me to read while Calvin watched.

Eventually Calvin was done watching so we wandered off in the general direction of the library. It was almost lunch time though so I kept a lookout for food options. I didn’t have internet so I couldn’t find the closest vegetarian restaurant so I settled for a lunch stand-in from my youth when we couldn’t find anything vegetarian to eat: ice cream.

I saw a Haagen Daz in the mall and figured that would provide enough calories until we met up with Jaeger again. What I didn’t realize is that Haagen Daz in a bit city, at least Hong Kong, is a sit-down dessert restaurant. However, I had already promised Calvin ice cream and didn’t want to reneg on our deal. So we sat down and I had a look at the menu. I let Calvin pick and he chose a dessert that featured a snow man made out of ice cream, crem brûlée topped with strawberry ice cream and a strawberry and some sort of frozen berries (maybe currents?). They also offered ice cream fondue, which we didn’t order, which is little balls of ice cream that you dip into chocolate fondue. It looked interesting but was 3-4 times the price of the dessert we got.

After dessert lunch we headed to the library. I knew that you had to make a reservation to play in the “toy library” within the library. However, I didn’t realize there would be nothing at all to play with inside the library other than that. I guess I’ve been spoiled by the libraries in Colorado since all of them have some sort of activities for kids to play with while the parents look for books. We left fairly quickly because there wasn’t enough things to keep Calvin’s attention.

Jaeger had returned from his visa expedition at this point but we decided that he’d go look at the infrastructure gallery while Calvin and I would go explore one of the other playgrounds in Victoria Park. Calvin had a lot of fun at the park and we spent an hour or two there. Then Calvin said he needed to go potty, right away. I should have scouted potty sites out ahead of time but hadn’t. I raced wildly around and eventually found one which turned out to only contain squat toilets. I tried to convince Calvin this was a perfectly respectable way to go potty but I think he was dubious. As an aside, squat toilets appear to be the old-school preferred toilet option. However, newer facilities are grudgingly putting in place sit-down toilets (though often with at least one squat toilet stall also). Also, sometimes there isn’t any toilet paper in the stalls, you have to grab some near the sink before you actually go into the stall. This probably works better when you’re grabbing toilet paper for yourself instead of a preschooler.

I called Jaeger and we agreed to meet up at central station. I put Calvin on my back to hike to the nearest MTR station. On the down escalator a man with a cane and a bag in each hand slipped and fell while we were about half-way down. He couldn’t get up by himself so a person in front of him tried to help. However, he fell again when we reached the bottom, having not completely gotten on his feet. I was one person behind the man and was quickly running out of room. The lady in front of me tried to dodge to one side which left no room for me to maneuver. I grabbed the man under his arms while the person in front pulled and somehow he got off. However, several people behind me stumbled and fell do to the blockage. I think I was quite lucky and was happy Calvin had been on my back instead of on the ground in front or behind which could have been bad. Fortunately, the man appeared to be ok, at least he was standing, though I couldn’t tell for sure because he didn’t speak any English. I was quite relieved when we met Jaeger several stops later with no further incidences.

Jaeger proposed going souvenir shopping which I was a little dubious about since neither of us shop well (I’m ok in a thrift store but don’t have a huge amount of patience shopping other than that). We wandered around and Jaeger found a pretty nice place suggested by his guidebook. However, by that time Calvin had fallen asleep so by the next shop I decided it was time for Calvin and I to head back to the hotel. Naturally, Calvin woke as soon as I started heading back.

I successfully found an MTR station and headed home. Once back, I stopped by the grocery store and picked up some things for supper. I also picked up some more Dragon Fruit. We had seen dragon fruit sold in most produce stores but couldn’t figure out what they were until we looked them up. We ended up buying a cheap kitchen knife just so we could try it out. You cut the weird purple fruit in half and then can scoop out the insides. It tastes kind of like a very mild and slightly bland kiwi. It’s very interesting and, assuming you have a knife and spoon, relatively easy to eat. I suspect it’d taste great slightly frozen, kind of like a sorbet.

Calvin was awake when we got back, probably because of the nap. He ate well for supper and managed to demolish almost an entire carton of hummus by himself. While Calvin finished eating, I started doing laundry in the sink. Apparently there aren’t laundromats in Hong Kong because everyone has their own maid (or something like that). There are places to take laundry but it’s inconvenient so I was stuck with the choice of washing in the sink or paying exorbitant hotel rates. At the moment, we’re hand washing the lighter stuff that’ll dry easily and having the hotel wash heavier stuff that would take too long to dry on it’s own. The difference in humidity is pretty significant. Things that would have dried overnight in Colorado are taking closer to a day and a half here (and we have an air conditioned room!).

Jaeger got back while I was doing laundry. He read Calvin some stories and then convinced him it was time to go to bed.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Fifth Day (Boxing Day)

Today was another public holiday which meant that many attractions were probably going to be very crowded. Based on that, I suggested we visit the Hong Kong Heritage Museum, which Hong Kong for Kids describes as “the best-kept secret in the territory”, and then visiting the 10,000 Buddhas Monastery, which is in the same general area.

However, getting there from our hotel was a little more complicated than our prior trips. Jaeger suggested we walk to a nearby ferry to take us across the harbor. From there, we caught a MTR train. By the time we arrived at that station, it was nearing lunch time. 10,000 Buddhas had a vegetarian restaurant on site but we were planning on visiting that second. So we stopped at a local “bakery” to pick up some snacks. We got a raisin bread, which was pretty standard, and then glutinous rice balls in two favors, poppy seed and sweet red bean.

After buying the snacks we walked along a walking and bike path looking for somewhere to sit and eat. Cheung Chau had bicycles everywhere but that was to be expected as there were no cars. However, we hadn’t seen many bikes in Hong Kong itself. However, this area seemed to have a lot of leisurely recreational biking (this would be the kind of biking that Boulder wouldn’t have the foggiest idea what to do with because it was so haphazard and non-serious).

We eventually found a bench and sat down to eat the snacks. Calvin would barely take a small nibble from the rice balls but found the raisin bread, minus the raisins, fine. The rice cakes were interesting. I liked the sweet red bean ones better than I expected but the poppy seed ones seemed a bit more savory than I expected.

After we finished eating we continued on to the museum. It was practically empty which seemed kind of odd. I didn’t have much opportunity to look a the regular exhibits because Calvin really wanted to see there Discovery Gallery which was created specifically for kids. It reminded me a little of OMSI on a very small scale. There were lessons about local sea life and what life was like in a small village, complete with costumes to dress up in. Over all, Calvin seemed amused but not totally enthralled with it.

After the museum we walked a bit to get to the bottom of the hill for the monastery. The trail to the monastery starts at the bottom of a hill and includes about 400 steps to get to the top. Lining the trail were many gold painted figures, about one for every 2-3 steps, that I didn’t have the right background to understand their significance. I carried Calvin up the hill in my carrier, to what I perceived as the amusement of others, and was grateful to get to the top. At the top, we ate in a little restaurant that exclusively served vegetarian food. It was pretty good and I think I’m slowly getting the hang of chopsticks.

After lunch, we went into the temple which apparently has over 12,000 Buddhas in it. The sign requested we be quiet in respect for those praying. However, the din outside from all the tourists made me feel sorry for anyone who was actually trying to do any sort of worshiping. It reminded me a bit of all those cathedrals we visited in Rome where the tourists vastly out-numbered the religious people.

We finished with the monastery by the middle of the afternoon so had time for one more destination. We went to Hong Kong’s small Railway Museum. This was obviously off the beaten tourist trail and after the chaos at the monastery it was very relaxing. The museum itself is quite small. There’s a couple rooms with text and then some engines to look at as well as several train cars put together that the children can go through. There is also, in the “sitting-out” area, a model train that would run around a track when the button is pushed.

Calvin seemed to enjoy this museum even though it was fairly small. There were also a lot of other small kids though it was difficult to tell how many locals vs tourists there were. It felt like more of a local hang-out but I could be wrong.

Getting back to the hotel was also a production though this time we opted to use MTR the whole way instead of taking the ferry for part of it. The MTR station we started at was in a mall so I took the opportunity to try to find some Ibuprofen. The carrier is working fairly well but it is a strain my back isn’t use to so I’ve been going through the Ibuprofen I brought from home a little faster than expected. I found the pain relief section but only found acetaminophen. I asked a local sales girl for ibuprofen and more than 4 sales people later, we concluded they had no idea what I was asking for. (Upon returning to the hotel we discovered that ibuprofen appears to be only available behind the counter at a real pharmacy, though maybe without a prescription??)

We arrived back at the hotel and, for once, Calvin was still awake. However, he promptly asked to be put in bed. He’s certainly sleeping much better on vacation than he does at home, at least for now.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Fourth Day (Christmas Day)

I woke up bright and early at 5am but stayed in bed till 6. Calvin and Jaeger both slept several hours later. Calvin developed a distaste for eating breakfast in our room and kept insisting he wanted to go down to the hotel breakfast. Jaeger and I were not sure what to do because at home we certainly wouldn’t have given in but a hungry preschooler is no ones idea of a fun travel companion. Eventually I bribed him to eat our muesli by promising he could eat his dessert that was included in the kids meal from the prior night (baked pizza dough balls with Nutella as dip).

The breakfast crisis averted, we considered what to do for the day. Both Christmas and Boxing days are public holidays in Hong Kong. Not, you’ll note, Christmas Eve. Most of the activities in our book suggested we should avoid them on Sundays and public holidays which limited our options. Finally, we decided to go ahead and try the Victoria peak tram and hope for the best. On Saturday when we went past the line was 1 1/2 hr long. However, we decided to risk it and bring the iPad in case Calvin needed amusement.

To my surprise, the line was pretty short. Maybe it was because we’d arrived earlier in the day around 10am. The tram was stuffed full and we were one of the last ones to get in so all the sets were taken. However, as I was trying to figure out the best way to position Calvin, two people offered me their seats at the same time. I gratefully accepted one of them and sat Calvin on my lap.

Hong Kong may be a busy city but I have been amazed at how considerate they are to the elderly or those with special needs of some sort. Every single time I have boarded public transpiration with Calvin someone offers me their seat if there isn’t one already available. Sometimes, like when Calvin is on my back and it would be hard to sit, I decline. However, when I’m carrying him in my arms and it’s really crowded it is a lot easier to manage him sitting down. The same is true of anyone who is elderly or feeble. Someone always gives up their seat for them. I think there’s some sort of informal pecking order going on. Younger and healthier people obviously give up their seats first. However, what would happen if you got a train car full of pregnant women and elderly people?

The peak tram ride is quick but interesting. At times, it goes up at a 27 degree angle. At the top, riders are deposited into the smaller of the two shopping malls at the top. We milled around trying to figure out what to do next and ended up being accosted by an overly helpful visitor center lady. Eventually we wandered off just to be able to think in peace. While the tram lines had not been bad, it was still quite busy up top. We went up to the top of the building the tram was into to get the 360 degree view. It was impressive but probably would have been more so if there had been less fog/haze. It was also windy and Calvin was grumpy so we left fairly soon.

Since Calvin was grumpy, our next stop was lunch. Vegetarian food is not overly abundant on the peak but we did manage to find some vegetarian pizza bread that was reasonable. The restaurant was at the larger mall. After lunch, we went in to look at the local English bookstore. However, the books were packaged so you couldn’t look at them ahead of time. Picture book quality varies so much that I never take the risk of buying without reading the book first.

After the bookstore, we went out to walk the Peak Walk which is a circular trail that loops around Victoria Peak and is 3.5 km long. The trail is surrounded by lots of trees and other plants and the views are great. Once again, it was really nice to have the backpack carrier to schlep Calvin around in.

After the walk, we went and let Calvin play at a playground next to the mall. I was a little disappointed that we only saw one playground up at the peak and none on our loop walk. Though to be fair, maybe the city planners didn’t think making a playground on the side of a cliff was a good idea.

Calvin finished playing which left us an awkward amount of time to fill. The peak is very commercialized and other than the walking trail, there isn’t much to do up there other than shop. Eventually, we decided to head down and wander the free zoological and botanical gardens in central Hong Kong until it was time to eat supper. I’m still amazed by the amount of land devoted to park-like activities. The zoological area isn’t as extensive as a normal zoo but it still has several hundred animals. Calvin especially enjoyed watching the monkeys.

We decided we were ready for an early lunch so went back to the vegetarian restaurant we had eaten at our first day. Unfortunately, we were a little early and they requested we come back in about 40 min. Since we had time, we explored some of the other shops in the area and found a grocery store in an adjacent building. This store was bigger than the one across from our hotel and included several exotic things we hadn’t seen at the other place.

Supper was good and since Jaeger was feeling more awake, he ate a lot more than he did the last time we were there. I’m still not great with chopsticks but am getting better. We have discovered that the standard dishes one eats off are a bowl and plate about the size of our tea cups and saucers. This threw us the first time we ate there but after observing diners I think we have it mostly figured out.

Water isn’t an automatic starting beverage like it is in the states. Instead, we have tea. At most restaurants we’re given two tea pots. One with tea and the other with hot water. We believe the hot water is to refresh the tea in the tea pot whenever it gets low or too strong from sitting.

After dinner we went back to the grocery store and picked up more breakfast food. In addition, we splurged and bought a knife so we could buy and try some “dragon fruit” which is a fascinating item we’ve seen in most produce stands/markets. We’re saving the experiment for breakfast.

Calvin wasn’t quite asleep by the time we headed home but on the train he nodded off several times. As soon as I put him in the backpack to head back to the hotel he was asleep. I’m trying to stay up a little later tonight in hopes of waking up later but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to hold out.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Third Day (Christmas Eve)

I woke up around 4:30am Monday morning and lay asleep for a couple of hours before finally drifting off to sleep for an hour before everyone else got up. We ate breakfasts, stopped for coffee for Jaeger, and then took MTR down to central so we could catch a ferry to Cheung Chau Island. The ferry ride was a little less than an hour.

We got off the ferry and disembarked into a very crowded street stuffed with little tourist shops that would look at home on Pearl Street and seafood restaurants with their live seafood on display. By the time we actually got there, it was time for lunch. The island is known for seafood, not vegetarian food, but we had found online a couple of places that looked like they might work. Unfortunately, the first place was closed and we decided to just get fruit and pastries instead of fighting the crowds to find the other restaurant. We ended up with a stuffed sweet bun that had sweet red bean inside and some oranges. Unfortunately, Calvin didn’t seem to be a fan of the bun and ate very little.

After that, we followed a walking tour in Jaeger’s guide book. We first stopped in at a temple but Calvin wasn’t interested so Jaeger stayed to look at it while Calvin and I went back to a little playground we had seen a block back. After Jaeger finished, we continued exploring the area right next to the ferry. It was very crowded and the smell of fish was everywhere. After a while, we left that area and started a several kilometer hike to visit a famous cave that belonged to a pirate (when I heard pirate, I was thinking dinky ship but this guy actually commanded 50,000 pirates so it was a serious operation).

When contemplating our trip back in the states, I had wondered the best way to transport Calvin. Calvin is notorious for wanting to be carried everywhere. We had already gotten rid of our strollers. Plus, strollers are a pain to carry everywhere. So, I bought a Boba carrier that was rated to 45 lbs. The advantage is the carrier had is it’s a soft body so can easily be packed in our suitcase for travel. Unfortunately, it has no pockets so this makes Jaeger responsible for carrying everything but Calvin. The carrier has been working out very well and I don’t think we would have made it to the cave without a carrier of some sort.

The walk to the cave took us up a hill and we quickly left the mob of people fish smells behind. That was the point were I started to enjoy our excursion. The path was steep and was surrounded by all sorts of plants and trees. There are no cars on the island but there are motorized carts. However, we mainly encountered other couples walking up the hill. There were houses most of the way up. Many of the houses appeared to be in bad shape but a couple were nice looking. Near the top of the hill we passed a huge spiraling cemetery that had very elaborate tombstones. It was a pretty impressive site. We were also amused to see banners, within the cemetery itself warning about Japanese Encephalitis and asking people to report mosquito sightings. For some, reason it struck us as amusing the signs were at the cemetery when we hadn’t seen them anywhere else. It also made me a bit nervous that we had skipped that particular vaccination because it was considered low risk at the moment (though I didn’t see any bugs or mosquitoes anywhere).

Have I mentioned there are playgrounds everywhere? On our walk we passed several and Calvin wanted to stop and play at each though, if we’d done that, we’d have never made it to our destination.

After the cemetery, we headed downhill back to the harbor and came to a larger group of houses. There were more tourists there but nothing like the mob at the ferry dock. Apparently we had taken the hard route as there is a flat road hugging the shore and bicycles were skimming back and forth. However, I think our hike was more fun.

At the village, we turned left and headed back up the hill for a short distance and eventually arrived at the cave. It was a cave. Neither Jaeger nor I had a flashlight so we pronounced it to be a cave and the headed back down.

We took the easy path back to the dock and then took the ferry back to central Hong Kong. It was getting dark by the time we arrived which allowed us to see the Christmas displays on the large skyscrapers. Many of the skyscrapers had huge murals made out of lights depicting Christmas themed pictures. It was quite a sight. As Jaeger noted, Christmas here seems more like a folk festival than a holiday like we have back at home. It seems mainly an excuse to have fun.

For supper, we found a gourmet pizza place to eat. It was very good. Calvin fell asleep on the way back to the hotel and we put him in bed when we got back. Calvin has been consistently falling asleep between 6 or 7 and then not waking up till 7:30 or later in the morning. It makes for very relaxing evenings.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The Second Day

On Sunday, we decided to go see the Alexander Grantham, a retired Fireboat. It is located in Quarry Bay Park ( which appears to have at least two playgrounds, possibly more). Getting there was relatively easy, it was only one stop from our hotel. Calvin appeared to really enjoy the Fireboat but seemed nervous about falling off the side (which was well fenced-in so it would have taken real effort to “fall” off).

After, the Fireboat, we gave in and let Calvin play in one of the larger parks. As a plus, there was free government provided wifi so I had a chance to check email. We thought our hotel had free wifi but that turned out not to be the case. So, a chance to check my email was welcome. While Jaeger watched Calvin I also attempted to find lunch. However, as I’ve already mentioned, Google seems to have a hard time figuring out where things are in Hong Kong so it took both of us looking to find something.

We wandered into a section of town that, if not tourist-free, seemed relatively free of white tourists. When we arrived at the restaurant, the restaurant staff seemed very excited to see us, or, Calvin at least. They spent the whole time hovering over him. It was like having a celebrity in our midst. He was a little cranky and I explained that he was probably just hungry (though having that much attention probably didn’t help). Upon hearing this, one lady bustled back and brought out a small dish of pickled zucchini which, I am sorry to say, Calvin turned his nose up at. Upon seeing this dish didn’t meet Calvin’s expectations, she went back and came out with a piece of chocolate which did indeed improve his mood.

Jaeger ordered food and made sure to include some noodle and tofu, Calvin’s favorite things. However, the noodle was interspersed with skinny bean sprouts that Calvin didn’t like. Not to worry, one lady helpfully took the serving chopsticks and moved the sprouts he had discarded to another dish and then gave him another helping of noodle, attempting to avoid as many sprouts as possible. She also served him some more tofu and cut it up into little bite sized pieces for him. I mostly looked on in bemusement.

After lunch, we walked toward the Coastal Defense Museum. I always find it educational to walk inner areas, sometimes overly educational but not in this case. In the parts of Hong Kong we had been in prior to this, everything had been meticulously clean. There were signs everywhere saying things like, “This handrail disinfected every hour” or “This facility is regularly cleaned.” Our best guess is this is post-bird flu epidemic but we’re not sure. The restrooms are always very clean, even if it’s occasionally difficult to find a sit-down toilet (the handicap stalls usually have sit-down toilets). We haven’t seen any panhandling and very little of obvious homelessness*. We didn’t see any at all in the central area. On the way to the coastal defense museum we noticed several twin beds, complete with box springs, sheets, and blankets, under some stairs but that was about it and it was so nicely made up I had trouble deciding exactly what the situation was.

We got to the Coastal Defense museum, paid for our tickets, and then went up an elevator and our to a breezeway that took us on the path to the museum building. Along the way we saw various examples of cannons and other guns. Calvin seemed very concerned about the safety of them and kept telling us to be careful. The museum was a little above Calvin’s level so I took him back outside and read stories on the iPad while Jaeger wandered around and learned interesting things. Here also, the middle-aged female security guards seemed enchanted with Calvin.

Jaeger thought it would be interesting to attend an evening Christmas service at the local Anglican church so after the museum we went back to the hotel to change. We stopped to have a light supper of hot drinks and pastry and then continued on to the church. In central there were massive numbers of people, mostly Filipino women, sitting down huddled in groups on the side walks. Apparently maids are very common in Hong Kong and most have one day off on Sunday. So, they all get together to play cards and talk on Sundays.

We arrived at the church a couple of minutes before the service started. It was packed and we had trouble finding seating, apparently all the foreigners had the same idea we did. Eventually, we found two seats and I set Calvin on my lap. This was a “lessons and carols” service and everyone in the congregation had lit candles. it proved to be an interesting balance act holding a candle in one hand and stabilizing Calvin in the other.

The service was mostly in English though they did have small parts spoken in Catonese, Mandarin, and a Philippiano speaker. I’m addition, the program was printed in English on one side and Chinese on the other. The congregation was invited to join in the singing several times. Unfortunately, we were in an alcove that couldn’t see the platform and behind us was a very loud singer who seemed to have a different vision of tempo than the choir director/organ. As a result, our section was often woefully out of sync with everyone else. Calvin fell asleep before the end of the program.

Once again, I carried him home and tucked him into bed with only minor mutterings.

* Having been here longer, I now have seen people panhandling, though not a lot (certainly a lot less than Boulder). On my walk back to MTR one day I saw several people panhandling on one of the walkways I took. These were people with very obvious physical problems. It’s possible that begging is more common in the evening, when I’m already back at the hotel.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong

The First Day

Saturday morning I woke up at 7:30 local time. Considering the prior night, I would have slept later but the clock in our room isn’t illuminated in the dark and all I knew was it was light outside. Once I found my phone and checked the time, it seemed pointless to go back to bed.

We ate breakfast at the hotel buffet which was very good and included a wide variety of European and Asian breakfast items. At first, it looked like Calvin was going to demand noodle for breakfast until he saw the mini-pancakes. After breakfast, we went to the small grocery store across the road and picked up cheaper breakfast items for the rest of our stay.

With eating out of the way, our next task was to get an Octopus cards for MTR, the local subway system. I love this subway. It’s the best one I’ve been on yet. Each train shows the route and has lovely flashing lights to indicate which direction the train is going as well as which station is next. Naturally, Calvin was enthralled with the ride.

After getting off the train, we wandered around in circles for a bit but finally managed to track down the store of a local cell phone provider. Verizon was kind enough to unlock Jaeger’s phone for international locations and my cell phone was already unlocked so it was fairly simple to get SIM cards so we could make calls to each other while in Hong Kong. We also got a data plan with Jaeger’s phone to help us navigate the city (though it’s obvious that Google maps is a lot more comfortable in the US than Hong Kong).

Our next stop was lunch. We had been warned that it’s hard to eat vegetarian in Hong Kong unless you go to dedicated vegetarian restaurants so we wandered, only in small circles, to a place to eat. The menu was a little overwhelming as it still seems odd to me to have more than a couple vegetarian choices to choose from. We ended up with a noodle dish, an interesting soy milk soup dish, and some dim sum. Unfortunately, it was way too much food for us but it was good.

Our original plan after dinner was to take the Victoria peak tram up the peak. However, when we got there the line was 1 1/2 hr wait. I didn’t think Calvin could deal with that so we decided to try again another day. Instead we wandered around some of the parks and visited an aviary. Wandering around Hong Kong I’ve been amazed at how many communal spaces there are. There are beautifully landscaped parks and mini-parks all over the place. Also, there are tons of playgrounds. It seems like every time we turn around there’s an entirely new playground. Naturally, Calvin wants to try them all but if we did that, there wouldn’t be time to do anything else.

We ended the day going to a tea museum and then having tea. I got an Oolong tea that included an interesting preparation that involved, among other things, pouring some of the tea water over the pottery tea pot. By the time we left the tea shop everyone was dragging a bit so we decided to head back to the hotel.

Calvin was upset that we hadn’t taken the promised tram ride so to make him happier, we decided to take the streetcar back instead of MTR. In retrospect, that may have been a mistake. Calvin really enjoyed it in the beginning but the streetcar stopped often and it felt like it took an hour to get back to our hotel. Calvin fell asleep half-way back.

Back at the hotel, we successfully transferred Calvin to bed and then decided to claim that 8pm was a reasonable bed time for us as well.

Our Hong Kong/Taiwan Trip:

Traveling to Hong Kong