three little trees: HONG KONG

More from our China Trip..... We started and ended our trip in Hong Kong. Its funny when we first arrived, I really thought "Wow, this is what China is like!" but after going to China then coming back to Hong Kong, I realised what a huge difference there is in their culture, language and even appearance! Hong Kong was a fantastic, fun experience.

We arrived early on the Thursday morning after flying all night and caught the train from The Airport to Mongkok station. My first thought was that "everything is so clean! and not what I had expected at all" we then caught a little red taxi to our hotel "Langham Place" which we would highly recommend! The taxi driver couldnt fit our 3 HUGE suitcases in the boot, so they were hanging out the back of the boot with straps holding them in! The taxi drivers have a very strange way of driving over there! The 3 of us were cracking up laughing because the drivers kept putting their foot down on the accelerator heavily then lifting it off...putting it right down and then lifting it off! So we all kept flying forward, then back, forward then back!.

The hotel had amazing views out over the city, even the bathroom had views. Kate and I were laughing, because we shared a room and the wall of the bathroom was glass with a thin white blind! It made going to the toilet and showering a little bit awkward until we made sure that you couldn't see through the blind. he he.

We ventured out to have a look at the shops and walked down to the food markets. Kate is just about vegetarian, so it wasn't a very pleasant experience for her! It was very interesting though to say the least. The shops dont open until 11am in Hong Kong and stay open until late at night, so we had to wait a while to start spending our Hong Kong dollars. Kate had downloaded the "LUXE" Guide onto her iphone, which is a great little tool for any city guide so that you enjoy the experience and go to quality restaurants and sight seeing venues. It recommended that we catch a cab to "Stanley".... so we hopped in a taxi and drove 40 mins to Stanley. I honestly felt like I was in The South of France, it had beautiful promenades, old heritage buildings, cute little pubs and tea houses and boutique style markets. We LOVED it!

Time kept getting away from us while we were there, we even forgot about dinner most nights, because we were shopping until 8 or 9pm! On the trip home, Kate and I took a walk up to The Bird Markets, which Kate's mum had recommended seeing. Mum was a bit tired after a busy week in China, so she stayed in her room and had a nap. On the way to the bird markets we came across a really cool clothing and accessories market!! We were so excited...because just about every stall we looked at, had really great stuff! we had to control ourselves though, so that we could go back and get Mum. We passed through the flower market on the way to the bird market which was gorgeous, I love the smell of fresh flowers! They also had some stunning bonsai plants too. Its just so interesting though, each street and area are for different products... there is a gold fish street, a "bunnings" street (well thats what we called it), a food street etc. The bird market was beautiful, Kate bought a wooden bird cage, which she really wanted to get for decoration and for our up coming photo shoot (it was such a mission to get home though!!! well worth it!) and some cute little hand painted bird feeding dishes. We dashed back and got mum and then headed back to the clothes market to do some serious Hong kong shopping! ha ha. We have NEVER shopped so much in our lives! It was overwhelming! SO MUCH FUN...WE CANNOT WAIT TO GO BACK!

Hong Kong was nothing like I imagined and I could easily spend 2 weeks there sight seeing and of course SHOPPING!