After the 8 hour plane flight from Tokyo, we found ourselves waking in Hong Kong. From our bed out the morning window was a huge and modern apartment complex with windows starting to light up for the day ahead, Lower in the window the Red Chinese flag was waving with the backdrop of the Hong Kong harbor with lit up passenger ferries crisscrossing the harbor. We made it to China, but the best was ahead….the mainland.
With only 2 days in Hong Kong we did the harbor ferry tour, stopping here and there for exploration and on the Island side did a city open air bus tour. What a beautiful city(see been there done that). Imagine NYC financial district with Lake George in the middle of it. The streets have the bustle of NYC and at night what a sight the lighted skyscrapers are.
To prepare for the overnight 24 hour train trip from Hong Kong to Beijing, we filled the corners of our travel bags with reading material, water and food. What a surprise, we never had time to read, drink or eat up all our snacks, wanting the trip not to end. It was possible because of the sleeping compartment we had. It was comparable to a small RV, except no driving and of course the view of the anticipated Chinese landscape was displayed before us. From Hong Kong to Beijing not an uncultivated piece of land was seen or a piece of farming machinery, not counting the motorized bicycles in the fields or the rural towns separating the fields. The numerous, uniformed female train service attendants added a level of humor to the trip for no English was understood for us to undertake some of the routine Chinese train procedures, making conversations a game of charades. One international gesture so far is the holding up of crossed arms. What a ride, it beats the cramped air flights any day.