Yet another early morning because we would be leaving #Hong Kong to take the ferry to #Macau. I think we woke up at approximately 8AM and got ready to leave by 9AM. Once we checked out, the hotel staff went up to our room to check the supplies, and they told us that we had to pay for the 2 bottles of water that we drank. ARGH. Expensive. We left the hotel and headed straight for the ferry terminal @ Tsim Sha Tsui.
Once we got out of the station and walked towards the habour... it was a nice view. We thought we were supposed to go to the "Ocean terminal" to take the ferry, but this was not the case. There were no signs indicating where to go. We were lugging our luggage back and forth in the heat. My mother asked a worker and he said to go straight but we still couldn't find it... ends up it was quite far away... not at Habour City/Ocean Terminal (this is a mall/hotel). It was another 10-15 minutes walk away (we followed a bunch of people with luggage).
View from Habour City.
We needed to go to the Hong Kong- China Ferry Terminal to take the ferry to Macau. Well, once we got inside the building, we stood around trying to figure out where to buy the tickets. We also needed to know which area of Macau we wanted to go to since the ferry takes you to different points in Macau. There was a guy who was walking around and selling tickets on hand, kind of sketchy, and asked if we wanted to buy it and so we did. Each ticket cost $172 HK (~$30CND) for the turbojet and the ride was around an hour long. We were exhausted so we fell asleep on the ferry. Oh, by the way, there's no room to place your luggage beside you so you have to place it at the back of the ferry. Once you get off the ferry, there are a lot of "special buses" that brings you to the casino/hotel. You can just hop on anyone of them for free so that you can go to the city.
The first stop is the Venetian Hotel in Taipa? You can store your luggage here for free, you do not have to be a patron. It's gorgeous inside with plenty of luxury boutiques that we cannot afford to shop at.
The shuttle bus drop you off here. - crazy artwork on the ceiling
Venice in Macau! - a little embarrassing to be on the boat ride with spectators taking photos of them
Upstairs of the hotel is a mall for RICH people.
Later on I went to the washroom and told my mother and sister wait for me, but they left. So I had to wonder the mall by myself searching for them. They went to buy food, the least they could do was inform me. Flabbergasted. I walked through the same hallway 6 times and I think the employees standing outside the stores recognizes me. Anyways, they went to by those famous Portuguese eggtarts at Lord Stow's Bakery and Cafe; it was good, but I like regular egg tarts more. It was on the pricey side, but the drink they bought there does not taste good (watermelon juice- tasteless).
Famous Portuguese eggtart - had to eat this outside. It was very windy out, but at the same time, it was super humid and hot.
Here's some outside views of the Venetian; very nice architect.
The foyer of the Grand Lisboa has a lot of sculptures and statues, even jade.
I believe a gold coloured car to be won.
Casino Lisboa - looks gaudy. - EWWWW.
We walked from the Grand Lisboa to the "Senado Square" and the "Ruins of St. Paul's Cathedral". It was a long and tedious walk with the sun blazing and mobs of people walking together. TORTURE.
Senado Square looks like a Victorian painting
While walking from Senado Square towards the Ruins of St. Paul, you have to go up a narrow street and there would be MANY people handing out samples of beef jerky and other food. There were many people buying beef jerky here since Macau is famous for their jerky. People literally had bags and bags of beef jerky and the stores are jam packed too. But I got to say, the journey up the hill to the ruins was a tough one; so many people to push through.
OMG, do you see what I see? Those two guys look quite suspicious! The guy on the left seems to be looking at the hand of the guy on the right and wondering if he can hold it. From the back, I think they should be quite cute! My crazy mind.
Ruins of St. Paul's cathedral
Climbed to the top of the ruins
The back of the ruins.
There's quite a lot of stuff to see at the ruins. Behind the ruins there's a mini exhibition "Cripta Crypt" that is free of charge. There's a lot of monuments (religious?) inside - quite interesting.
Next, a couple of minutes away from the Ruins of St. Paul is the "Na Tcha Temple" which was built in 1888. The temple was built to honor the deity, Na Tcha, for protecting the citizens during the time of a epidemic that engulfed the community.
After this, we just walked around the city exploring. One of the employees in the Grand Lisboa hotel told us that we should visit "Hotel Grand Emperor" because Jackie Chan owns it and there's a lot to see. Well, there wasn't much to see OR it's just that we went through the wrong entrance? I used their washroom and wifi. heh heh heh.
Well, by this point we didn't know what to do so we decided to go back to "Grand Lisbao" and gamble. Initially, the security guard didn't ask for my ID when I went in the first time, but after I went out and decided to go back in he asked for it. I showed him my driver license and he was like ??? and he asked his partner, "What is this?" so I took it back and showed him my passport. My mother was lining up to get our luggage and once she got it she went to the washroom so I was waiting for her outside. She thought we could go in the casino with the luggage but apparently we can't so my mother had to line up again and place it back in the luggage storage. LOL. We were playing the penny slots with $30HK and when we won a grand total of $50 HK we quickly cashed out. Profit = $20HK. We forgot that $50HK was only ~$7-8 CND. Hate those large currency.
After this, we decided to head to #Zhuhai as that was where our hotel was. The hotels in Macau was just TOO expensive. The Grand Lisboa provides free shuttle buses to Gongbei (border gate between Macau and China). I believe we started lining up for the bus at around 6:00-6:30PM and the line was SO TREMENDOUSLY LONG. It was crazy. I think we lined up for an hour and a half since it was passed 7:30PM. It wasn't that long to get to the border though. Macau looked very pretty during night time. Our goodbye to the city of lights.
Once
at the border you have to line up to cross. There was one line that
said it was for "diplomats." - only one person come by every now and
then. There was one guy who lined up there but got shooed away after the
guard saw his passport lol. You no diplomat, go back to the regular folks line.
Gongbei Port- border between Macau and China
The "Gongbei Port" has a great underground shopping mall. There's cheap food, clothes, shoes, toys, and the mall is very very big. They also sell beef jerky here too. My mother got some. We also grabbed dinner here; dinner cost $78 RMB/ $15 CND. And by this point we almost had no more China currency, only HK.
I enjoyed my drink, green tea slush with red bean, though the drink took a long time to come. I already finished half the rice already.
One bit of caution is that outside the Gongbei Port, there are a lot of sketchy and suspicious people asking where you are going. If they see you with luggage, they will try to get you in their car by following you. DO NOT GET IN. We had to avoid around 4 of these guys in the span of 5-10 minutes. We crossed the street to wait for the taxi and there is a specific waiting area for taxis and it was again, A SUPER LONG LINE. I think we had to wait almost an hour, so by the time we reached the hotel it was passed 10PM. Anyways, back to the part of waiting for the taxi, well, there's this hobo who would try to get you to give him money by opening the taxi doors for you and attempt to help you with your luggage. Oh, right, and those illegal drivers would come up to people lining up at the taxi area and ask you if you need a ride. From what I saw, the "taxis" are just normal looking small cars but when you get in, the person who asked you if you need a ride would bring you to the car and he would get in too, there's a separate driver.
We booked the hotel at the last minute while in Hong Kong. We stayed at " Baili Hotel" in Zhuhai, Jida District. We booked the hotel through agoda and we wanted a 3 person room but there was no option for that, so we booked two double bedrooms. Wasted money. I hate how they have the 15% service charge. For two nights it was over $200 CND for two rooms so that was around $50-55+ CND per room per day ($100+/day). Also, you need to give them $150 RMB deposit but they will give it back after you check out. We had NO "RMB" so we gave them 600 HK instead.
I had this standard twin bedroom to myself. My mother and sister had another room that they shared. The room had this funky smell inside plus the hygiene stuff they have in the washroom, you must pay to use it. Good thing our rooms were right beside each other; I had to go over there and tell them that you must pay to use the toothbrush and toothpaste. And because I had the room to myself I could turn up the AC. OH YEA.
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