Spectrum of the Seas Review: Day 15 – Hong Kongfeatured

After such a great first day in Hong Kong, it was going to be hard for day two to live up to it because, you know, supposedly lightning doesn’t strike the same place twice. But we were excited to see another side to the city…even if it meant getting up at an ungodly hour (read: 6:15 in the morning!).

We booked a city tour through the ship for the second day. Normally, we’d prefer to reverse that and do a structured tour on the first day and our own thing on the second so we could learn about the city before we take it on by ourselves, but with the overnight, it was safer for us to tour on our own the first day when we had no risk of missing the ship.

Our tour had a meeting time of 7:30 AM, so we had a quick breakfast at the Two70. Outside those big floor to ceiling (spanning, like, three floors!) windows, the skies were ominously dark. There was no way we were going to avoid the rain today — a bummer for sure — but I’d take a rainy day in Hong Kong over a sunny day sitting at home so we only had one option and that was to roll with it.

The tour meeting place was the Royal Theater and the city highlights tour spanned many group numbers. Our stickers assigned us to group two. Group one left almost exactly at 7:15 AM on the dot. We waited. And waited. Because we couldn’t leave until the bus was full and there were a number of people running late. Like 20+ minutes late. I thought that was incredibly inconsiderate. Not for the ship to hold the group – that’s what they do. They have guest satisfaction scores to hit. I think it’s inconsiderate to have a meeting time at 7:15 AM and casually stroll up around 7:40 AM. Maybe it’s just me. I really try hard to be punctual (if not early) just about everywhere I go. I hate keeping anyone waiting on me because it inherently implies that my time is more valuable than theirs and this just made me twitchy — I was kind of peeved before we even stepped off the ship.

Once everyone showed up, we were escorted off the ship, down that long walk through the gangway and the terminal, outside to the parking structure where our tour guide, SK, and our bus, were waiting. I peeped a Hop On Hop Off bus in the garage, so I deduced that the ship’s HOHO tour brought a bus to the terminal, but I wasn’t sure on if it would drop back off there and it was sure to be crowded. Also? The rain would have made for a pretty terrible HOHO day, so I felt comfortable in our choice to take the tour.

The tour started in Kowloon and SK told us all about the history and transformation of the Kai Tak airport into the Kai Tak cruise terminal. I was fascinated by it all and made note to Google photos later (I’m weird, I know, this kind of stuff fascinates me!).

As the bus drove towards our first destination in Aberdeen, SK gave us the typical history and fun facts of the city. Amongst them:

• Hong Kong was a British colony for over 250 years. It was handed back over to China in 1997. Now it made sense why English was so prevalent all over the city!
• There are more than 270 islands surrounding Hong Kong. We sailed past some of them on our way in and they make for such a stunning sail in and out. Almost like the archipelagos of Sweden, but maybe not as small J
• 7.4 million people call Hong Kong home. 95% of them are Chinese. Most of them speak Cantonese (though in mainland China, the main language is Mandarin).
• In Hong Kong, everything is written in both Chinese and in English, both of which are official languages. English language is compulsory beginning in kindergarten, and on the schooling in Hong Kong, they follow the British system.
• Those crazy high apartment complexes with a million units? Those are common throughout the city, where the average apartment is 450-500 square feet, at $2500 per square foot. That’s a lot of money for a little space. Hong Kong is not a cheap city to live in!
• There are no bridges built on top of the harbor. Instead, there are a number of tunnels that connect the islands to each other.
• The infrastructure from public transit to the healthcare system are well-oiled machines here. SK mentioned that if you land in the hospital and you have insurance, each day you spend in the hospital only costs somewhere around HK$150, which is like $20 US

We ran out of time to go through more of the history and details of life in Hong Kong when the bus stopped in Aberdeen, a fishing village on the southwest side of Hong Kong where we’d take a short ride on a Sampan boat, which is like a small fishing boat. Around ten people fit on each boat, which kept it small and thankfully, they were covered because it was still raining pretty hard!

The cruise around the harbor took around ten or fifteen minutes and it was so interesting to see the floating restaurants and all of the different kinds of boats. They were so colorful and ranged from small Sampan boats to larger fishing boats.

After our boat ride, we hopped back on the bus for a stop at Dynasty Jewelry Manufacturer. I don’t think this was in the ship description and to be honest, I didn’t care for it – it was 45 minutes of an already short tour to peruse an overpriced jeweler. Salespeople followed us around the showroom and it just felt very…gimmicky. I know this happens everywhere. It happened when we were in Turkey with the carpet school, in Pompeii at the cameo factory – it happens just about everywhere. I just really hate it when tours waste scarce touring time with forced shopping gimmicks at stores where the prices are incredibly marked up. There are so many other things I could have (and to be frank, would have rather) done with that time and had it been in the description, I probably would have thought twice about the tour.

As it was, we were there and we couldn’t turn back, we could just wait it out until we could board the bus. After the jewelry store, we began the scenic drive over to Stanley (which connects the mainland to a peninsula) through Repulse Bay, where, fun fact, they have the largest beach in Hong Kong and they keep fences under the water to keep the swimmers away from waters that could have sharks in them!

We had an hour of free time in Stanley Market to shop, grab a snack or just walk around. I didn’t like Stanley Market as much as I liked the other two markets we visited the day before – it was smaller and had less to shop through (which may have been because we visited so early in the morning), but just about all of the stalls accepted credit cards, which was a plus. We finished our shopping for trinkets and teas, and picked up another suitcase to bring home because, of course, we shopped so much over our trip that we needed another one!

And then, on our way out, we grabbed bubble tea and bubble waffles from a vendor outside and they were super tasty and refreshing. And since this was our last shopping stop, I ran into 7-Eleven to try to spend our Hong Kong Dollars on candy and weird food to bring home. I even found Stephanie’s favorite Lakerol candies!

Our final stop on the tour was a drive up to Victoria Peak for a panoramic view of the city. Traditionally, most people will take a cable car ride up to the top, but the cable cars had been out of commission for refurbishment, so we drove up instead. The drive to the top reminded me a lot of the drive from Naples to Amalfi – twisting, turning, on the edge of the road (and your seat!), but super scenic.

At the top of the peak was not only the viewpoint, but also some cafes and a small shopping mall. I was disappointed that our time there was limited to 20 minutes – we had more than double that time at the jewelry store – but we certainly weren’t going to waste it, so we set out to find the best places to snap some pics. The rain finally abated into an intermittent drizzle and the clouds parted enough for us to see the beautiful skyline below us. Hong Kong is truly a breathtaking city and I wouldn’t hesitate to go back.

Our group reconvened for the 40-minute drive back to the ship. I put on my AirPods and some music and just kind of reflected on our time in Hong Kong and our whole trip. It was like one minute it was all anticipation and excitement, and then it was happening and crawling along in a way that felt like we’d been away forever, but then, all the sudden, as soon as we were comfortable and feeling at home where we were, it was time to pack up. Because, inevitably, like it does every time, as soon as it all came on, it all started to draw to a close.

We said goodbye to SK in the parking garage and made our way through the long and winding walkways of the cruise terminal. Thankfully, the lines for security were much shorter this time – I guess they only had one lane open at night but three open during the day. Once we got back on the ship, we beelined it up to the Two70 for Kummelweck sandwiches and salads and lots of strawberry kiwi juice.

The sailaway from Hong Kong was one of the most scenic I’ve ever sailed through, going from the middle of the city into the expanse of the open waters, with sweeping views of the surrounding islands. I took a little time lapse video so I could take it home with me to show Mom!

We relaxed in the room until it was time for dinner, when we had an early reservation at Jamie’s Italian. The starters, pastas and desserts were the best part of the meal. SO good! We also got to catch up with Amit, the wonderful server who we met on our first night on the ship. We asked him if he was finally able to get off the ship and he told us that not only were he and his crew friends able to get off, they got off after midnight (when the ship cleared for crew) and they didn’t get back until 6:00 AM! That’s one heck of a rally!

Such a heavy meal almost always calls for a long walk around the ship afterwards, so we headed around decks four and five, to the Bionic Bar and the shops, and outside to the promenade for some fresh air. This is always one of my favorite parts of cruising – just walking around the ship, the fresh sea air. It’s like nothing else and I can never get enough of it.

The evening’s headliner show was a group called The Barricade Boys, a group of four men who all starred in the West End production, the International touring cast or movie production of Les Miserables. They put on a fantastic set of rock, pop, Motown and, of course, Les Miserables standards. And I have to give props – Royal Caribbean killed it with the headliner shows on this cruise! Even as a “cultural cruise,” the entertainment options clearly trended Western.

We stopped into the Music Hall for a little while to catch some of the Beatles tribute. Put a Beatles singalong anywhere on any ship and I’m going to show up…but apparently, the hundreds of others swarming the relatively small venue felt the same way, and it was standing room only and packed!

I have to be honest, I don’t even know how we got back to the room. I’m pretty sure I passed out as soon as I saw the bed (a blessing given how terrible my jet lag was). Hong Kong was our last port, so we had two more sea days and a long flight home to look forward to.