Day 2 in Hong Kong doing my own thing, so it was up early for the shuttle into town. It was chaos in the terminal, NCL had a ship disembarking and everyone seemed to be aiming for the same buses. Thankfully we jumped on a bus, walked to the train & found someone to sell us a hop on hop off bus ticket

stopped for a couple of photos on the way to the ferry terminal, even early in the morning all the tourists were out in force. The Peninsula Hotel was in a Bond Movie & we planned to meet a friend here later

An easy ferry ride & we were on Hong Kong Island selling rickshaws among the skyscrapers

Our ticket included a tram up the peak, but the queue was already crazy long and we were on a mission to get to Aberdeen

Thinking we’d missed Aberdeen I jumped off for a quick stop at the very pretty town of Stanley, it’s beauty masks the horrors of its past as the Japanese POW camp was here during the war with many atrocities and barbaric acts

More tea, a mooch round the famous Stanley Market and a browse in the shops and we were on our way again. I’m not a shopper so had I been on my own I’d just have had a quick look at the market & maybe a tea to go

The beautiful beaches on the way to Aberdeen contrasted sharply with the jam packed sky scrapers just a couple of miles away

A Sampan ride at Aberdeen was included with the bus ticket, so on we hopped for what turned out to be a fabulous sail around the houseboats of the boat people & luxury yachts of the rich

Take in the contrasts between rich & poor, the traditional boats and the modern sky scrapers

Realising we weren’t going to make it to The Pen for afternoon tea, I texted our friend & we jumped off the Sampan at the famous Jumbo floating restaurant

Tea is automatically served on arrival and I managed the chopsticks! I asked the waitress for help choosing and I have to say her recommendation of the Mushroom Dumplings was spot on – delicious!

The Hong Kong police cruised by as we boarded our private Sampan back to dry land – still included in the ticket but we had to phone him to collect us before catching the bus back towards the ship

And that was Hong Kong. Two fabulous days gone in a flash. My favourite bits were the market, the cable car, star ferry, the Sampan and the mushroom dumplings at Jumbo. Next time I’ll definitely make it to the Pen for afternoon tea!