On Wednesday night, sometime after my noodle bowl, we all bought tickets to go up to Lantau Peak on Lantau Island (the largest of Hong Kong Islands). To get up to the peak you needed to purchase tickets for a suspended 360 Cable Car. To avoid lines, Amy T suggested we buy these tickets the night before for our Thursday excursion and we picked an 11:45am time to get to the Cable Car. While that seemed like a leisurely time for the ride, the process to get to the Cable Car involved walking over to the Metro, getting on one train, changing trains in another station, and then riding the ‘Orange Line’ to the end of the line about 35-40 minute ride. Once you landed there, it was a 10-15 minute walk to the cable cars.
Amy B and I woke up at 8am on this morning to a text from Amy T, saying, let’s meet at the Orange Line/Tung Chung entrance at 10:20am. We both hopped up to start getting ready and I, of course, had the Dodger game on while getting ready but really couldn’t focus on it. It was a very close game and the Dodgers were winning 2-1 when we left the hotel. I knew I could listen to the audio while we were on the journey so we both quickly completed getting ready.
We didn’t make it to the Orange Line (the first change of trains) until about 10:15 am and realized there is no way we could make the rest of the journey all the way to Tung Chung by 10:20am. Once we boarded the Orange Line, I started texting Shelly to let her know we were probably about an hour behind and didn’t realize how long the process would take. After a few clarification texts, we realized there was miscommunication and they had meant to meet them at the beginning of the line, so we were actually ahead of schedule and ahead of them on the train. This was a big plus, because neither Amy B or I had eaten breakfast, and more importantly I hadn’t had my coffee yet. They let us know there was a big mall with plenty coffee and breakfast options at the end of the line and they would meet us wherever we decided on.
We found a coffee shop called Pret-a-Manger (which means ready-to-eat). However, every time I saw this chain in Hong Kong I would think about that 1994 movie Pret-A-Porter (ready-to-wear) and that soundtrack song ‘Here Comes the Hotstepper’ by Ini Kamoze would pop in to my head. Literally, every time I saw that sign throughout Hong Kong, I would hear that song in my head. We found a ‘healthy’ shelf for breakfast options and picked out a chia almond milk cup with nuts and dried fruit on top. I also had a cappuccino. I couldn’t wait to drink that down as it was near 11 and I had a slight I-haven’t-had-coffee-yet-the-Dodgers-are-now-losing headache kicking in. The girls arrived soon after we did, and after we finished off our breakfast and coffee, we walked over to the 360 Cable Cars.
We had two different types of reservations, 2 booked in regular cable cars, and 2 booked in crystal bottom cable cars that allowed you to see below you as you were headed up the mountain. When we got to the entrance Amy T and Shelly sweetly gave us their crystal cabin reservations so that we could get the ‘full view’ below us. We parted ways in line for about a 15 minute wait. This was WITH a reservation. The line for people that hadn’t pre-purchased was MUCH longer. Again, we were grateful that Amy T had us purchase the tickets the night before.
While we were waiting in line, I tried an experiment. I tried to see if I could get an older Chinese person to smile back at me. In general, the older generation seems very stoic. So I picked out this little old lady (and they are ALL little over there) and I kept making eye contact and gently smiling and she would look away, then she would look back, but not smile.
Finally, after a few rounds of this, I could see the beginnings of a smile at the corner of her lips. They were a bit ahead of us in line but with the line zig zag formation, we kept passing them. As it turned out, we ended up boarding the same car as them when the line keeper asked for a party of two which allowed Amy B and me to come forward.
So there I was sitting across from my ‘smile’ target. I could see she was shyly looking my way, but not quite ready to give me the full smile. We started engaging with her grandson and granddaughter who spoke a bit of English and we were laughing with them. All of a sudden, everything changed for her, the walls came down and she was giving me a much bigger smile. I have pasted a clip below of footage Amy took while we were in the Crystal Cabin and you can see her across from us in a magenta top. Not only is she smiling, she is asking if we want to switch sides so we can have a better view. I felt like a had negotiated a successful international peace treaty.
Our cable cab arrived on the mountain before Shelly and Amy T so we walked over to the Starbucks and ordered some drinks for all of us. Amy waited at the table outside to save it and I went inside to order. And well, well, well wouldn’t you know, as I was walking out, here comes grandma coming and and guess what? She greeted me with…that’s right, you guessed it, the biggest smile yet. I felt so happy in that moment for my connection with the little grandma.
When I went back out to our table with our drinks, Shelly and Amy T were already there. We were all sitting around and enjoying our coffee and teas when the cutest little Asian girl, in a yellow shirt came right up to our table and started engaging with Shelly. Her grandfather was a few feet away, smiling and keeping an eye on her. She was such a happy little girl, and communicating with us through her laughter, eyes, and smile. Then she walked off, then she came right back and started smiling and laughing with Amy. It was as if she really had something to communicate to us and she was probably mesmerized to encounter two blondes (Shelly and Amy).
After we finished our coffee and teas we got up to head over to a path called the Wisdom Trail. To get there we had to walk through the theme-park-like Ngong Ping Village (it reminded me of Mammoth Village). The walk up to the Wisdom Path was beautiful and all paved. It only took about 20 minutes to walk up there at a leisurely pace and it was nice to feel like you were in nature. It was a very easy and level hike with lots of stops for pictures.
After we finished Wisdom Path we headed back down through the now crowded village and walked quickly in hopes of not getting stuck in a long line to head back down in a cable cab. We were in luck, there was a show going on in the center of the village, and most folks were engaged looking at the show so we were able to quickly pass through and get to a no line situation to head back down the mountain. I stopped to take a quick video of the show below.
Once we got back to base, Amy B and I were hungry, we were on fumes by now as it was already 3pm and all we’d had was that tiny chia cup for breakfast. We found a Pizza Express that surprisingly served delicious salads and VERY quickly. We finished up in less than 30 minutes. We still were planning on heading over to Tai O Fishing Village and the clock was ticking. It would take at least an hour to get there on a bus.
We were having a little challenge finding the right bus to take to the fishing village, and Ubers weren’t available, so we grabbed a cab and had a little bit of a Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. This very engaging man who referred to us all as a car full of ‘elegant ladies’ took us on the 30 minute drive to the other side of the island and was truly whipping around corners, even with the knowledge of many cows wandering on these roads that sometimes wandered on the middle of the road ‘and might just be laying there’, he said. Say what?
At that point Amy T is up front with him and starts engaging him in hopes that he’ll slow down a little. So we learned a lot about him as she starts peppering him with questions. He drives cab to make ends meet and he has to live in a tall apartment complex with rent of about $350 a month. He had 5 children with a span of 25 years between them, the youngest was in University now. He said, ‘I had 3 wives, of course.’ Say what? I guess we had a real Hong Kong ladies man on our hands driving us around. We should have been tipped off when he was referring to us as ‘elegant ladies.’ Great opening line. He left us with his card so we could call him to pick us up when we were done. This was an old fishing village, and we weren’t sure what the cab situation would be when we were done, so we were taking his card as an insurance policy.
Tai O was once an important trading and fishing port to China a century ago, today it is in decline, but offers a very intriguing glimpse of life in a traditional fishing village. We took a boat ride through the center of ‘town’ if you considered ‘town’ to be a waterway, like Venice. We also went out to the ocean in this boat hoping to see the famous Pink Dolphins found in this part of the world. At one point as we were out there waiting to see some, Amy T looked at me and said, ‘You are praying for dolphins. right?’ I thought, oh that’s right, yes, of course, I’m praying for dolphins. We didn’t see any, but the boat ride out there was beautiful as the sun was setting on this beautiful old fishing village.
We walked through the village some more taking pictures of their village life. It felt a wee bit intrusive, but it seemed like they were used to it. And as a village on decline I’m sure they were thankful for the tourist dollars that came to the fishing village. It reminded me of the simple life that I have seen on the island my mother was born on in Brazil. The ocean smell, the simplicity of the people, the strong community feeling.
When it was about 30 minutes before we were supposed to be picked up, our driver told us to call him, so Amy T did just that. When she called he picked up and said, ‘I’m busy, call me back.’ Huh? Just what was this ladies man up to, anyway? Ha, ha. Well, it all worked out and they were able to connect a little bit later and he said he would pick us up in 30 minutes.
Amy T and Shelly wanted to walk deeper into the Village and Amy B and I had to desperately go to the ladies room. This Village didn’t look like much for good bathroom prospects, it could take a while to find something. We told them we would meet them at the entrance, near the taxi stand.
We found a bathroom and Amy went in there first while I held the bags outside, you just didn’t want to put anything down. After a few minutes, I decided I really needed to get in there and go and saw that they only had squat toilets. No!!! A squat toilet is one that is level (or, pardon the pun, “flush”) with the floor. I was envisioning, with no experience, this potentially would not go well for me. I didn’t want to risk any ‘stuff’ potentially on any part of my clothes. I had to think quickly and went outside again and saw they had a handicap sign on another door. Surely, they don’t expect the handicap to squat!? I opened the door to the handicap bathroom, and sure enough – there was a normal toilet in there. Saved!
We all met out by the taxis and apparently our driver sent a little old lady to pick us up that could barely see over the dashboard (I know, who am I to talk?). She actually was a much safer driver and it didn’t seem long to get back to base at all. At one point Shelly had a coughing fit in the car and the little old lady turned around and looked at her and said, ‘You okay, lady?’ We all laughed.
Once we got back to base we took the metro from Lantau Island back over to Hong Kong Island. It was about 8pm when we got back to our stop at the Metro. Amy B and I were hungry again and had really wanted to try a few of the restaurants that our friend, Will, had recommended in SoHo. We asked the girls if they wanted to join us for a night out on the town or head back to their hotel. They opted for the latter, both tired, and Shelly needing rest for that cold and cough.
Amy B and I were surprisingly not tired at all. We think the day out in nature and in a fishing village felt super restorative. We went back to our hotel, changed, freshened up and grabbed a cab to head to dinner. Will had told us, there would be about a 90-minute wait at this restaurant, Ho Lee Fook. But to not worry, there was a cool and elegant (there is that word again) bar around the corner to grab a drink and wait for your table. Sure enough, we get to Ho Lee Fook at 9pm and they tell us, ’90 minute wait’ and they took my cell number and said they’d call me. We weren’t even phased by this as we were prepared by Will.
We headed around the corner and found the bar. Sure enough, it was a very elegant atmosphere and they sat us in front of the MOST entertaining and talented bartender I have ever seen in my life. He gets a 10+ for his technique and style in whipping together the drinks, and the drinks themselves, well only the pics below will do them justice – and the taste was always perfectly balanced and incredible.
One hour in there felt like 5 minutes it was so fun and entertaining and they put a little bowl in front of us with little chips of different shapes and sizes. Amy says, “These kind of taste like those little chips you ate when you were little that come in a can that cradle each other.” I say, “You mean, Pringles? Oh yeah, they do taste like that!” Just then I was texting Will to tell him we had made it to, Quinary, for drinks. He texts back, ‘Are you eating Pringles?’ We totally started laughing. How did he know?
Check out this video of the bartender making the lemon meringue drink!
They actually called us within an hour for our table at Ho Lee Fook, so we wrapped up but not before I gushed over the hipster bartender and told him I would be back and I was convinced he was the best in the world and he humbly wouldn’t even accept my accolades, but said ‘Thank you so much, I will see you tomorrow.’
We headed back over to the restaurant and they took us downstairs to a dark atmosphere with pumping hip-hop music. It was a funky but cool place, inspired in the spirit of late-night Chinatown hangouts in the 1960’s New York. Despite the awkwardness of the phonetic pronunciation of Ho Lee Fook, it actually means ‘good fortune for your mouth.’ And that it was! Wow, the cuisine here was truly off the charts. We ordered an autumn salad that was creative and inspired, chicken wings like no other, set in a bed of dried red chili peppers with equal heat inside and out as you ate the wings, followed by incredibly tasty lamb dan dan noodles. Wow, just wow.
We even ordered dessert on this night. It was their dessert called Breakfast 2.0. It was a bed of cornflakes, topped with raspberries a scoop of ice cream, with cocoa coffee crumbs on top. Yum. Thoroughly stuffed, and me now WAY OFF the Keto rails tonight, we paid the bill and called for a Taxi.
It was a fun Taxi ride home, we were buzzing all the way home over the energizing night and the opportunity to experience the Hong Kong restaurant scene that we had heard so much about before we left. We got back to the hotel around midnight, not even really tired, but to the same question we asked every night, “Do you want to get ready first?” The girls were going to be hiking in the morning and we were going to sleep in again and have a mellow Friday morning to recover from the full day.
