Day 62 Hong Kong Park and the Aviary, climbing Victoria Peak

Sat 3 March
Today the plan was to ride the Peak tram to Victoria Peak, walk around at the top and admire the views. It didn't  quite work out that way!
We had to provide our own breakfast today so while coming through the MTR yesterday  evening we'd hurriedly bought a pack of raisin bun things.These together with the apple juice and fruit left in our room made our breakfast. We used the handy laundrette to get our washing done,  caught up with some admin stuff and then while our stuff was drying went to Pacific Coffee on the corner near the hotel where Jono had a coffee and a big pork roll and I had a fruit juice and muffin.

Refreshed and jobs done, we took the MTR from Causeway bay just 2 stops to Admiralty.  This meant we could walk through Hong Kong Park to where the Peak tram started rather than go another stop to Central and walk through streets.

Plan of park, from Admiralty you enter bottom right

Park was constructed on land that used to be the garrison

Hong Kong Park was lovely. We entered near a waterfall fountain which you can dash underneath, I went first then when Jono had a go he was asked if he would have his picture taken with a group of schoolchildren also ducking underneath, -we have no idea why, language was a bit of a barrier.

The park is worth a visit, and everything is free. There was a conservatory full of plants from different regions.

Dry area plants

Humid area plants

Next we came to a large lake with what we thought were statues of terrapins, until one of them moved and we realised they were actually all real. We think they had just been fed with a large fish because on the water there was a heaving mass of them tearing this large fish to pieces. We looked at these for ages.

Terrapins

Feeding on a fish

Waterfall into terrapin lake

The park meanders on with an Olympic square,

 a lovely childrens playground, a viewing tower which we climbed (105 steps up in a spiral), a tai chi garden with a moving memorial to the 7 doctors who died in 2003 fighting SARS and then the aviary.

Banyan tree

Looking down on tai chi garden

SARS memorial

The aviary has to be a must-do in Hong Kong. The walkway is only 600 m but we were in there for an hour watching these wonderful birds fly around us. The information in the aviary also explained about the incredible tree root systems we had been seeing ( more about these in Sundays post).

Jono was a bit tired there were a lot of steps to get to the Aviary

Aviary

Outside view of aviary 

There is also a caged aviary further up the hill but we had climbed so many steps already and were ready for a drink that we skipped this. The exit at the top of the park is right next to the Peak tram. We could see hordes of people in queue lines waiting to board. A helpful sign told us that it would take an hour to queue to board the tram. Refreshments were needed first, it was 25 degrees at 15:30 and we were both thirsty.
The peak tram view cafe was a short distance uphill by the side of the tracks. We were able to take a photo of St Joseph's School where Mum taught in the 60s and then sat and watched the trams go up and down while we had a refreshing drink, Jono had a french hot dog and fries and I had fries. This wouldn't  have been my first choice but it can be quite difficult to avoid meat here. Everything seems to contain it and this was the only item on the menu I could eat and there didn't  appear to be anywhere else in the vicinity.

St Joseph's  School

I knew Mum had lived near here when she taught, 3rd stop on the tram, 5 Bowen street. We could see the mist was coming down and the top of Victoria was already shrouded so we were unlikely to have spectacular views from the summit so we decided to just walk up to Bowen street and have a look. The path runs next to the tram so its a good vantage point for photos too. It's quite a lot of steps.

Looking down on tram as it travels up to Bowen Road

And the view as it travels up from Bowen Road

5 Bowen Road

Bowen Road 

360 here

At this point the sensible thing would have been to call it a day bit oh no, we'd come this far, why not keep going!
Its a very, very steep climb up. About halfway up Jono suggested we caught the tram at one of the stops but there were 3 problems with this, we didn't  have enough money on our cards to do a return and that would mean having to walk down, we weren't  even sure if we could buy a ticket on the tram half way up, and the trams were not stopping at the intermediate stops anyway as they were already full!

Its a bit steep

Tram won't  stop!

Last post box of this type left in HK

 Then the path moved away from the tram line and the roads. We were pretty committed to walking now. The path was unlit and still heading steeply up along switchbacks and it began to get dark.  We were both hot and sweaty and it took us until 19:00 to reach the top. By now the mist had really descended and we couldn't  see the skyscrapers below us. At least we could take the tram down!

We had climbed up from the bottom of the bottom skyscrapers

At the terminus the queues to go down stretched even further than the queues to go up had been. We drank the last of the water from our water bottle and abandoned the idea of taking the tram. There is a helpful public transport planner machine in the square at the terminus, we plugged in where we were, and where we wanted to go and discovered there was a bus that would take us home for only $11.3 -about £1. Just knowing we definitely didn't have to walk back down was reviving!
Also in the square is a tram that ran from the 50s to the 80s. Its been turned into a visitor centre with information but the front few rows of seats have been retained.

Old tram at top

Now the terminus is not actually the top of the mountain. That is another 20 minutes uphill walk. We'd come so far we decided that another 20 minutes wouldn't kill us and despite the dark and the thick mist now surrounding everything we headed up following google maps. At least it knew where we were even if we couldn't see it!
There's a children's park near the top where a girl in some sort on anime costume was having a photo shoot in the mist. Up further on there was so much moisture collecting on the leaves of the  trees above  us that it felt like it was raining underneath them.
We reached the top, saw nothing but mist but felt triumphant that we had done it and set off back down.

Its a bit misty

At the bus stop the bus we needed was at the stop together with a long queue of people not getting on. This confused me, there were people sat on the bus, the doors were open, why was no one else getting on? I asked the people at the front if they wanted this bus and was told they didn't  want to stand. We had no problems with standing. It was 20:00 and we were keen to go home so we jumped on. The bus picked up other people at stops down the hill until we were in like sardines and leaving people still queuing at the stops. We were the first people to get off. A helpful lady jammed in next to us on the bus made sure we knew which stop to get off at and where the over pass was to cross the road. We walked through a children's park with families and their kids still out playing and talking and came out close to the Hennessy Road where we could catch a tram the last bit back. Consulting google said the next tram was 15 minutes away but it would only take about that long to walk it. We needed breakfast for the next day so decided to walk for a bit to find a shop and then catch the tram. There was a supermarket below ground a short distance along, we stocked up on mandarins, yogurts, raisin bread,  butter, beer and a pomelo ( because neither of us had ever had one and we wanted to try something new),caught the tram that was stopped outside (standing room only on this as well) and finally got back to the hotel.