We woke up the next day refreshed and ready to explore Hong Kong. Our day began with breakfast in the club room, followed by a trip on the subway to central Hong Kong. Our initial plan was to spend the day exploring, followed by a nice trip on the gondola to Victoria Peak. However, upon arriving at the gondola and seeing the line for tickets, in our usual “adventurous” fashion, we got the genius idea to hike up to the Peak. In the past we have hiked up Mt. Misen in Hiroshima, so how bad could this be right? RIGHT?!
Well, about two hours later we made it up to the peak, our legs tired, our bodies drenched in sweat, but our pride palpable. In sum, I would not recommend hiking from the gondola up. It’s basically an 25% incline walk all the way up, with very few stairs, and mostly through a residential neighborhood with narrow streets. Lesson learned. Take the damn gondola. Anyway, the Peak provided beautiful panoramic views of Hong Kong, making the 15 minutes we spent up there
almost worth the two-hour hike.
We made the hike back down, which was significantly easier, and made our way to Dim Sum Library, to eat the calories we burned in dim sum. The restaurant is located inside a large shopping mall, and at first appearance, it looked like a tiny shop. However, much like a TARDIS, the restaurant is surprisingly bigger on the inside. I highly recommend this restaurant for dim sum. I will caution and say it is not the cheap, authentic street dim sum people often look for in Hong Kong, but we can get that in NYC. We were looking for something a little more elevated, and Dim Sum library delivered.
We left Dim Sum Library in much better spirits than when we arrived, and made our way back to the hotel, where we relaxed and got ready for our dinner at Spring Moon that evening. Spring Moon is located in the Peninsula hotel and is decorated in a traditional Chinese style. We went with a single mission in mind, to devour Peking duck, and all I can say is mission accomplished. The food was delicious, the duck crispy and juicy, and the accoutrements were excellent. My only critique was our waiter, who while polite, was a little pushy with what we should and shouldn’t eat. He kept telling us that we were ordering too much food and we wouldn’t be able to finish, or if we sure we wanted certain items. Now, normally this can be done in an informative way, but his tone left us feeling like children who weren’t familiar with how to eat at a restaurant, which could not have been farther from the truth.
After dinner, we returned back to the hotel where we decided on a night cap at the Ozone Bar located on the top floor of the Ritz Carlton. Purportedly, it's one of the highest bars in the world, and I can believe it. The cocktails were overpriced but delicious, and the views were incredible.
Afterwards we retired to our room and packed, excited to begin the next leg of our journey in Bangkok. Little did we know what would await us…