My Favourite Commutes #4

Another blagged working holiday I’m afraid.

Kowloon peninsula to Hong Kong Island using the Star Ferry

I’ve always been fascinated by Hong Kong since reading James Clavell’s Tai-Pan at a young age. So when the chance came to work there for a week I jumped at it. With the deal the company had with the hotels there, I was able to finesse a weeks free holiday afterwards as well.

I was given a choice of hotels I could stay in, all very nice, all 5 star ,including the newly opened Mandarin Oriental on Hong Kong Island only minutes walk from the office.

But if you’re going to stay in Hong Kong and it’s not your money, there’s only one hotel you can stay in The Peninsula (The same as, if you go to Singapore you have to stay in The Raffles). If you can book it, stay in the original building with a harbour view, not the horrid 1994 extension. The memories of bygone ages leak from the walls.

The company would not spring for it, but for a sum, you can be collected from the airport in one of the hotel’s green Rolls Royce’s  (£50 and a Silver Spur when I did it, they are Phantoms now)

Anyway to the commute.

Come out of the hotel, turn right, walk down the harbour front dodging the traffic, Black Cabs and the Red Double Decker buses to the Star Ferry Terminal, join the queue, pay your ridiculously small fee, shuffle onto the ferry and make your way to a window, there’s no glass (Port side for the best view).

A stunning vista then gradually approaches, it’s a hell of a journey and one I think I could quite easily have seen myself making every day without getting jaded (barring typhoons etc.)

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Of course, you could be really lucky, like I was and go on or around Chinese New Year, then the trip back home isn’t that bad either.

Number 3 coming soon.

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