I found Kwan Tong to Tsuen Wan late night be one of the best FF experience lol~

Go with a bit milder, bus 14 from stanley to sai wan ho is definitely worth trying

Too bad those non air conditioning bus are long gone. That wind blowing at you at 50Km/H on the upper deck is definitely something. Looking down from upper deck to the dam is still quite a thing though

I saw your Hong Kong post and thought, 'that's me'. And I'll be there soon for 2 days also, so I'm wondering how your visit went. Now that you've been, what were your best experiences?

good choice.
not exactly the most Hong Kong experience most people envisage, but its defo an experience you cant replicate elsewhere.

Two tips. 1) When you get to village from the cable car, check the bus schedule to Tai O...leaves once an hour. You may want to visit Tai O before the Buddha if timing works out better. 2) At Tai O, do take the pink dolphin tour as the tour takes you up/down the river...it's cheap and no more than 30 mins. Also, check bus schedule back up to the village.

Thanks!

The octupus card is your life, fill it up and don't lose it!

forgot about the boats, news are that the new bridge evicted all the dolphins. but i dont know. back then my dolphin hit rate was 100% but i havent been there for 5 years

Just note that the cable car will be closed for maintenance (as it so often is) from November 13 to 15.

I saw dolphins twice on a tour earlier this year. Even without dolphins, I think the boat tour is worth it to see the village from the river.

Okay, so I finally went (typing this from the United Club at HKG – boarding for home in an hour).

It went great. I have pics and everything but it would be too complicated to do without a mouse here at the UC. Maybe I’ll post pics another time.

I had 2 full days (Tues, Wed)

I woke up really early all 3 days as my body clock never got used to whatever day or time it is now.

Tuesday: Got on the MTR at TST (staying at The Mira) right when the station opened at 6 AM. Got off at Admiralty. Walking to the Peak Tram and HK Park was a little complex since I didn’t know about the pedestrian bridge (learn about the pedestrian bridge system before you come or you’ll end up frustrated that you can’t cross the street). Hung out at HK Park until 7, got on Peak Tram right when it opened (no wait). Walked around the trails for a little over an hour. Cool morning with drizzle but the views were great and so was the walking weather). Then coffee in the Tower area and a bit of breakfast.

Back down the tram (no wait, again). Took me about 30 minutes to walk back to Admiralty as I kept going the wrong way and in circles trying to figured out how to get across Queensway, but I made it in time for a walking tour at 10.

https://hongkongfreetours.com/hong-kong-free-tour/

Really great tour. A lot of politics, but saw a lot of the sites and was very interesting.

At 12:30, I walked down to the pier and took the Star Ferry to Kowloon. Walked around, ate a little, walked the promenade, etc. I thought about going to the Space Museum (the only one that interested me), but it’s closed on Tuesday. So, I hopped on the MTR up to Mong Kok and took another tour from the same company.

https://hongkongfreetours.com/kowloon-free-tour/

I got a full day of 2 great tours for $200 HKD in tips. Really good deal. I went down and had dinner in TST. I was just too tired to wait for the light show. I was asleep by 8.

Wed: Woke up again insanely early. Took the MTR to Tung Chung and walked around the still closed mall (watching the throngs of employees arriving and queueing to go to work was fascinating) and the harbor for a while before queuing up for the Nong Ping cable car at 9:25. It was early, but because I did, I was one of the first on line and I was in the cable car at 10:02 (booked online so only had to wait in the boarding queue). A little shopping in Nong Ping, up the Budha stairs, Monastary, etc. Caught a bus to Tai O (again, no wait).

Took a sampan ride out into the sea and it was amazing. I read that these tours rarely see the pink dolphins. Not on mine. The pink dolphins were all over the place. Without exaggeration, we saw at least 10 of them and multiple jumps from many of them. One was so close that if I were Manute Bol I might have been able to touch it.

Walked through Tai O (man, does it stink! How does anyone actually buy and eat food there?) and got the bus back to NP (again, no wait). The queue to go back down to Tung Chung was about 20 minutes. As I got down and saw the queue to go up, I realized what I’d spared myself by going early. I got back to Kowloon early enough to go to the Space Museum and even to see a Planetarium show about US national parks). Grabbed some food and sat on the promenade as darkness fell and HK Island lit up. At 7 I decided I was just too tired to wait another hour for the light show. I was fast asleep at 7:30.

Over-all, great trip!! I had plans B, C and D, of course, but I ended up hitting all my Plan A stuff (except the light shows) and had a great time. Because I hit everything early and got lucky, I spent almost no time queueing for anything.

Thanks for the summary, glad you had a good time.

IMO, light show is highly overrated.

So glad you had a good trip and gave us a trip report!! It sounds like you did a really great job of researching your own interests and incorporating the ideas given here. I've had visits to the Peak similar to what you describe - it is very special in those early hours. It's one of my favorite spots in the uncrowded hours - I'm so pleased you enjoyed it. (I couldn't resit stopping up top via bus on my last visit - about a week before your trip. CROWDS and BUSES! Wow - foggy day, mid-week, non-tourist season, still packed. I was so glad I knew what hiking paths I wanted to disappear onto. I hope the new bridge to Macau isn't bringing in more visitors than the iconic tourist venues can handle. I noticed a change in crowd levels at Citygate Mall also, not a positive change.)

Hooray that you saw dolphins! I've been lucky on this also and the village is interesting, although I also have not been eager to buy the street food. I have frequent short stays at the Citygate Novotel or Marriott in Tung Chung giving me the opportunity for Big Buddha area visits - you certainly did the right things to get the cable car with minimal waste of time. I've taken to having the hotel call a blue taxi for me. I like to go up to the Buddha for the many hiking trails, but the cable car line is just ridiculous at most times. My last visit had fog such that the entire upper half of Ngong Ping was covered, but that didn't diminish the lines!

I'm headed back in another month and you have reminded me that I've never been to the planetarium at the Space Museum. This trip is just a one day stop-over, I'm thinking I might explore that! Thanks for the report!!! By the way, I fully agree with all who said the light show is over-rated. You didn't miss anything (IMHO)! Thanks again for sharing!

Thanks and I hope you enjoy your trip as well.

If I had it to do over again, I'd probably go to the HK museum of history rather than the space museum. The space museum is nice, and I'm more interested in astronomy than I am in history, but the Space Museum is kind of generic - nothing you can't see in hundreds of other museums in various cities. The HK Museum of History is probably more uniquely Hong Kong.

But anyway, yes, this thread and some threads on tripadvisor really helped. By the time I got to Hong Kong (I'd never been in the far east before), I felt like I already knew my way around. Except for not being able to cross the street in some areas of HK Island, nothing really surprised me.

Some other things I considered, and might do if I ever go again:

- Walk down to Aberdeen from the Peak (whether to do do this or go back down and take the HK Walking Tour that I did was a 51-59 kind of decision)
- Dragon's Back hike. I seriously considered doing this hike with a tour from that same company, but after the Peak and the morning walking tour, I felt a little too tired for a 3 hour hike, so I did the Kowloon walking tour instead
- Really walk the mid-levels
- Go to the top of one of the skyscrapers
- Ferry to Mui wo or Lamma

PS: I logged almost 55,000 steps on my fitbit in the 2 days. Even without the Dragon's back, I'd say I did okay walking-wise. :)