Hong Kong
We were a bit sad to leave Vietnam as we had both really loved it there, however, we were of course looking forward to the next step of our trip - Hong Kong. It was especially exciting to be going there as we were meeting my family there for a couple of days on their way back from their holiday in Europe.
We flew from Hanoi to Bangkok then Bangkok to Hong Kong as (strangely) it worked out cheaper to do it this way than to fly directly. It was our third time in Bangkok! It turned out to be a worthwhile stop over as this time we finally got our money back! If you recall from our Bangkok blog update we had stupidly fallen for a jewellery scam. We were told by the police that we would be able to get at least 80% of the money back but we had to wait for the jewellery
to be returned from Paris in the post. Finally it returned (we had never been and probably will never be so happy to see a little courier package) and we ended up getting 96% of the money back! We were so happy but also kind of afraid because they gave us the money in cash and they were some seriously dodgy mafia guys so we were really keen to get out of there and on the plane to Hong Kong. 
We basically went straight from the jewellery shop to the airport even though we had to wait there for about 5 hours! We just wanted to leave! Bangkok airport turned out to be MASSIVE and there was plenty to look at in the shops. It also looked like something out of startrek! (see photo)
A happy ending at last, yay! It had caused us a lot of headaches but it was finally over.
Our flight into Hong Kong was with Emirates and it was brilliant, what a great airline. Good service, comfy seats, individual entertainment screens and even French wine! This was the first glass of wine we had had on our whole trip as wine isn't really what they drink in Asia (probably because imported wine is really expensive and Asian wine
is horrible, I tried one sip in Vietnam and it tasted like cough syrup).
We arrived in Hong Kong at about 1am and were absolutely exhausted after two nights of late flights in a row and a day of taxis all over Bangkok sorting out the jewellery fiasco. We checked into a horrible cupboard sized room and slept.
Next day we woke up super excited as my family (minus my sister) were due to arrive that afternoon! I couldn't wait to see them! My Mum and Dad had booked a hotel room for us at the place they were staying so we checked out of our cupboard and found the Langham. Wow it was sooooo flash, we weren't used to this kind of hotel and probably looked a bit out of place walking in to the very grand lobby with our backpacks and cargo shorts! We had to wait for an hour or two until our room was ready so we went to The Hard Rock Cafe Hong Kong for brunch where we had a cocktail and toasted getting back our money! We also went to the Harbour City shopping complex (a huge and really nice mall that we would come back to many times) to get some drinks and nibbles for when my family arrived. We got some Verve Cliquot champange as a special treat to welcome them. 
Then we went back to the room. It was beautiful! Amazing marble bathroom and big bed with nice linen, what a treat. We also went up to the roof to see the pool which was GORGEOUS. And there were little rolled up towels and fridges with little mineral waters and bowls of apples etc etc. Very posh.
We wrote some postcards in the lobby of the hotel while waiting for them to arrive then they finally did arrive and it was so great to see them and have big hugs! My brothers had grown even more! We had the drinks in our lovely room and told them the news of getting our money back and toasted once again! Then we went out for dinner to a wonderful Chinese restaurant. It was a great meal and lots of stories were told over the table about our travels in Asia and their holiday in LA, Greece and Italy.
After dinner Mum and Dad went to bed and Tama, my brothers (Richard and Simon) and I went for a swim in our pool which was a lot of fun even though the boys kept dunking me under the water and my eyes got sore from the chlorine!
The next morning we had THE most amazing buffet breakfast ever at the hotel. They had everything including proper fresh coffee without any condensed milk in it! Then we went on the ferry across the harbour to Hong Kong Island and took the cable car up the famous Victoria Peak. The view was as incredible as we'd anticipated.
Dad also pointed out Stanley from the peak which is where my Great Grandfather worked as a prison guard. My Grandma was born in Hong Kong. 
After having a good look around and having another coffee, at Mum's request:-), we went back down and then found a shopping mall where we had a nice wrap sandwich for lunch at the foodcourt.
Back at the hotel Mum and I got pampered with an amazing massage and sauna while the boys all went for a swim. We then got dressed up and went to a lovely bar for a cocktail and on to another brilliant Chinese restaurant for dinner. We had some really nice wines with the meal too.
The next day we did some shopping and Mum and Dad brought me a gorgeous leather handbag which I was so excited about as I had been looking all through Asia for one but hadn't managed to find what I'd been looking for. Richard got a laptop for uni as they were much cheaper there than in NZ and Mum and I got some nice clothes too. Then they had to leave and I was a bit tearful 
as I don't know when I will next see my brothers. I will miss them heaps as I make sure to see them regurlarly in NZ. Luckily I get to see Mum and Dad in September when they are coming over to London as Dad is becoming a member of the World College of Obstetrics and Gynocology. There will be a big presentation for that and Tama and I are invited and hope to make it over there from France.
We didn't have to say goodbye to the hotel quite yet though as they had booked an extra night for us! Weren't we lucky! That night Tama and I went to watch the Symphony of Lights show on the waterfront which is a show with music of lights on the various skyscrapers that form the amazing skyline of Hong Kong. We just had a light soup for dinner as we had had a big lunch earlier in the day with my family. Then it was off to bed.
We enjoyed our last night of luxury and our last Langham breakfast then spent the day at Ocean Park. It's a theme park with lots of rides and Panda bears, acrobatic shows etc.
It was a great day but incredibly hot and humid. I don't sweat very easily but I did that day, it was boiling. What made it worse was that we had (stupidly) gone to the park on a Saturday so it was packed and we had to queue for all the rides in the hot sun! Still a good day though. Like the night before we went for a nice walk along the waterfront as the Hong Kong skyline is so pretty at night (in a big city kind of way!). 
We watched the light show again that night as they also have fireworks on Saturdays so it was even more spectactular than the previous night.
We had one more day in Hong Kong looking around and we went to the Temple Street market which was another big street of stalls much like all the other markets we've seen in Asia. We went to a great little street-side restaurant there for a chinese dinner and stayed in our hostel in Chungking Mansions. It was most definitely a few stars away from the Langham but the Indian guy who ran it was very friendly and did all our washing for us which was nice although Tama's white Shinga t-shirt came back pink!
We decided our next stop would be Macau so the next morning we caught the ferry and got another stamp on our passports....
Love Olivia and Tama xx
We were a bit sad to leave Vietnam as we had both really loved it there, however, we were of course looking forward to the next step of our trip - Hong Kong. It was especially exciting to be going there as we were meeting my family there for a couple of days on their way back from their holiday in Europe.
We flew from Hanoi to Bangkok then Bangkok to Hong Kong as (strangely) it worked out cheaper to do it this way than to fly directly. It was our third time in Bangkok! It turned out to be a worthwhile stop over as this time we finally got our money back! If you recall from our Bangkok blog update we had stupidly fallen for a jewellery scam. We were told by the police that we would be able to get at least 80% of the money back but we had to wait for the jewellery
to be returned from Paris in the post. Finally it returned (we had never been and probably will never be so happy to see a little courier package) and we ended up getting 96% of the money back! We were so happy but also kind of afraid because they gave us the money in cash and they were some seriously dodgy mafia guys so we were really keen to get out of there and on the plane to Hong Kong. 
We basically went straight from the jewellery shop to the airport even though we had to wait there for about 5 hours! We just wanted to leave! Bangkok airport turned out to be MASSIVE and there was plenty to look at in the shops. It also looked like something out of startrek! (see photo)A happy ending at last, yay! It had caused us a lot of headaches but it was finally over.
Our flight into Hong Kong was with Emirates and it was brilliant, what a great airline. Good service, comfy seats, individual entertainment screens and even French wine! This was the first glass of wine we had had on our whole trip as wine isn't really what they drink in Asia (probably because imported wine is really expensive and Asian wine
is horrible, I tried one sip in Vietnam and it tasted like cough syrup).We arrived in Hong Kong at about 1am and were absolutely exhausted after two nights of late flights in a row and a day of taxis all over Bangkok sorting out the jewellery fiasco. We checked into a horrible cupboard sized room and slept.
Next day we woke up super excited as my family (minus my sister) were due to arrive that afternoon! I couldn't wait to see them! My Mum and Dad had booked a hotel room for us at the place they were staying so we checked out of our cupboard and found the Langham. Wow it was sooooo flash, we weren't used to this kind of hotel and probably looked a bit out of place walking in to the very grand lobby with our backpacks and cargo shorts! We had to wait for an hour or two until our room was ready so we went to The Hard Rock Cafe Hong Kong for brunch where we had a cocktail and toasted getting back our money! We also went to the Harbour City shopping complex (a huge and really nice mall that we would come back to many times) to get some drinks and nibbles for when my family arrived. We got some Verve Cliquot champange as a special treat to welcome them. 
Then we went back to the room. It was beautiful! Amazing marble bathroom and big bed with nice linen, what a treat. We also went up to the roof to see the pool which was GORGEOUS. And there were little rolled up towels and fridges with little mineral waters and bowls of apples etc etc. Very posh.We wrote some postcards in the lobby of the hotel while waiting for them to arrive then they finally did arrive and it was so great to see them and have big hugs! My brothers had grown even more! We had the drinks in our lovely room and told them the news of getting our money back and toasted once again! Then we went out for dinner to a wonderful Chinese restaurant. It was a great meal and lots of stories were told over the table about our travels in Asia and their holiday in LA, Greece and Italy.
After dinner Mum and Dad went to bed and Tama, my brothers (Richard and Simon) and I went for a swim in our pool which was a lot of fun even though the boys kept dunking me under the water and my eyes got sore from the chlorine!The next morning we had THE most amazing buffet breakfast ever at the hotel. They had everything including proper fresh coffee without any condensed milk in it! Then we went on the ferry across the harbour to Hong Kong Island and took the cable car up the famous Victoria Peak. The view was as incredible as we'd anticipated.
Dad also pointed out Stanley from the peak which is where my Great Grandfather worked as a prison guard. My Grandma was born in Hong Kong. 
After having a good look around and having another coffee, at Mum's request:-), we went back down and then found a shopping mall where we had a nice wrap sandwich for lunch at the foodcourt.Back at the hotel Mum and I got pampered with an amazing massage and sauna while the boys all went for a swim. We then got dressed up and went to a lovely bar for a cocktail and on to another brilliant Chinese restaurant for dinner. We had some really nice wines with the meal too.
The next day we did some shopping and Mum and Dad brought me a gorgeous leather handbag which I was so excited about as I had been looking all through Asia for one but hadn't managed to find what I'd been looking for. Richard got a laptop for uni as they were much cheaper there than in NZ and Mum and I got some nice clothes too. Then they had to leave and I was a bit tearful 
as I don't know when I will next see my brothers. I will miss them heaps as I make sure to see them regurlarly in NZ. Luckily I get to see Mum and Dad in September when they are coming over to London as Dad is becoming a member of the World College of Obstetrics and Gynocology. There will be a big presentation for that and Tama and I are invited and hope to make it over there from France.
We didn't have to say goodbye to the hotel quite yet though as they had booked an extra night for us! Weren't we lucky! That night Tama and I went to watch the Symphony of Lights show on the waterfront which is a show with music of lights on the various skyscrapers that form the amazing skyline of Hong Kong. We just had a light soup for dinner as we had had a big lunch earlier in the day with my family. Then it was off to bed.
We enjoyed our last night of luxury and our last Langham breakfast then spent the day at Ocean Park. It's a theme park with lots of rides and Panda bears, acrobatic shows etc.
It was a great day but incredibly hot and humid. I don't sweat very easily but I did that day, it was boiling. What made it worse was that we had (stupidly) gone to the park on a Saturday so it was packed and we had to queue for all the rides in the hot sun! Still a good day though. Like the night before we went for a nice walk along the waterfront as the Hong Kong skyline is so pretty at night (in a big city kind of way!). 
We watched the light show again that night as they also have fireworks on Saturdays so it was even more spectactular than the previous night.
We had one more day in Hong Kong looking around and we went to the Temple Street market which was another big street of stalls much like all the other markets we've seen in Asia. We went to a great little street-side restaurant there for a chinese dinner and stayed in our hostel in Chungking Mansions. It was most definitely a few stars away from the Langham but the Indian guy who ran it was very friendly and did all our washing for us which was nice although Tama's white Shinga t-shirt came back pink!We decided our next stop would be Macau so the next morning we caught the ferry and got another stamp on our passports....
Love Olivia and Tama xx
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