Trevor & Jonathans Cruise & Trip to the Far East and Australia 2016

Day 40 - Saturday June 18th 2016 - Ovation of the Seas - Hong Kong, China

So needless to say, we both slept well, perhaps a little too well to be honest as we were awake a little later than we had planned to be but it was not a problem. We went through the bathroom after having our cup of in cabin instant coffee and decided to just make a move. It’s no surprise that we have no appetite for breakfast, I mean we seem to be eating all the time (more on that later) and our stomachs are both not in the best of places so it was off the boat and back into Hong Kong.

Trevor will happily tell anyone that I am a nightmare shopper! I love to shop but I hate being rushed into buying decisions so when I see something that I like I always have to go away and think about it first, make sure I really want it then normally have to traipse back to the first shop and get it. Today would be no exception to that rule.

We left the ship, walked through that huge cruise terminal building once more and boarded the free shuttle buses to the MTR stations.

As we drove the streets of Kowloon the heavens opened and it absolutely chucked it down, proper torrential rain. By the time we reached the station it had not stopped but luckily we were undercover (it’s typical the one day we decide to take the two umbrellas out of the bag it rains!).

We had to change MTR lines twice to get back to Hong Kong Island and Causeway and when the clock is ticking against you it seemed to take longer mentally than it actually did. Back on board time is 14:30 so we need to get a move on but not panic, no dithering over buying decisions today! (I’m sure that Trev is secretly thinking not more clothes, not more luggage weight…. but I can’t help it!!).

We made it back to Causeway and the Hysan Place shopping centre, first stop being the Apple store once again.

Jonathan needed a cover to protect his latest acquisition, the iPad pro. In typical Apple style the covers are not cheap and the packaging is a complete work of art in its own right. Still seriously they are expensive but not as expensive as not having a protective cover so needs must. Purchase made we moved on to the second port of call for the day, The North Face Shop. This was not a normal North Face Shop oh no. This was a special outlet for designer pieces made by a Korean designer, so full of specials and being honest Jonathan could of quite happily of bought the whole shop. See this is where baggage weight allowances suck, you see things you really like and you can’t have them and you know you will never see them again. We left the shop carrying an additional two t-shirts and a baseball cap (mid-life crisis I know). This is where we go back to weight, I confess, I had to buy a size large…. like really yes a size large!! I kept making excuses like this was extra skinny cut for the Asian market and such like but the medium just made my boobs look ridiculous…. major weight fail, I’m size large, this does not make me happy at all. (Please believe me that this is said very much tongue in cheek, I’m on holiday and I’m damn well going to enjoy it, I’ll worry about my new found ripples of flab when I get back to GC!).

Leaving the shops behind we set off on a bit of a wild goose chase trying to find the mid-day gun at Victoria Park. We had seen a sign to it on the road and followed it but it led nowhere, just sending us back and forward along a busy road. To be fair there were a mountain of roadworks and excavations going on in the area so maybe it had been moved or someone had moved all the signs around? Anyway we failed but we did manage to make one more purchase from a supermarket, we have facemasks. Yes those delightful masks that you see the Chinese earing in London and you all smirk, we have them in a fetching blue (the only colour available). We will need them for Beijing without question or their awful pollution levels will make us ill so needs must and all that.

Having successfully dodged the rain all morning we headed back to the ship via the MTR and the bus with the heavens opening heavily again as we approached the ship meaning that we would not get to visit the park area on the roof of the cruise terminal, instead we went for staying dry.

Back on board we went for a really light lunch at an unusually packed Café 270 then it was back to the cabin to catch up on Blog writing. It was now getting close to being three days behind as we have been having really long days out since arriving in Hong Kong so much to remember and get down.

With at least one day’s blog written and Trev collecting in all the photos of the last few days we got changed and headed off to The Schooner Bar for our pre dinner cocktail ordering the usual again (you should know what it is by now but just in case, mines the espresso martini with baileys and Trev’s is the tall B52).

Tonight’s dinner was in Chops Grill (the steakhouse speciality restaurant on board). Secretly (after our cabin confinement) we both had bad stomachs, not like Trev had the last time but we were aware that things were not normal so this could go one of two ways…..

Now going to one of the speciality restaurants on board should feel a little special. You paying a little to be there and they are sold on the back of being a special treat it’s such a shame that our visit this time was not so special at all.

Firstly, we ordered our wine (Shiraz) to be told that they had run out, this was ok, we enjoyed a merlot but it was start of things to come. Next on the fail list was an onion soup that Trev had before the last time we ate here. Now I’m not saying it was bad because it wasn’t but it didn’t actually come with much soup, lots of onion and cheese and bread but not much broth. Our steaks then came massively overcooked, we had asked for medium rare and they came more well done to be honest and one of our side dishes was wrong as well. We let it slide (we are British after all) but in the end it did get the better of us and we spoke to the restaurant manager who offered us another free night in Chops. That would normally be ok but not tonight, we only have five nights left on-board and we already have another reservation in chops that we have paid for and we certainly don’t need to come again so we passed leaving more than disappointed.

It was a quick dash to the theatre next, we actually haven’t been since getting on this leg of the cruise, nothing before has caught our interest but tonight it was two singers, one American male ex Broadway singer the other an Asian Chinese woman who seemed to be able to sing in every language going, this was definitely a multicultural east meets west performance. Both singers were really good but the highlight had to be the male singer singing bring him home from les miserables with just the piano for backing…. really good if not a little over sung!

It was good to get back in the theatre again though and it made me wonder why we didn’t give more of the other shows a chance.

After the theatre we retreated back to the Schooner Bar but once again Laurence seemed to have turned the volume up or we were not in the mood so we passed and headed to the peace and tranquillity of Vintages (making a brief stop at Boleros to pick up Gin).

We sat and watched the world go buy (well actually the boat is not that busy so there was not that much in the way of people traffic to watch) for a good forty minutes or so before at midnight we gave in the fight to stay awake and Trev headed off to the Bionic bar for a nightcap (whisky tonight for a change) and that was our day……night folks!