On November 22nd, we took the G100 high speed rail from Hong Kong to Shanghai.
The trip took approximately 8 hours in total including the time of the stops. There were several stops, including some other big cities, like Nanchang (南昌), and Hangzhou (杭州).
The seats were really comfortable on the train, but the washrooms could use some extra care. Carol took the advantage of ordering take out on the train! This is not ordering from the train’s cafeteria. You can literally order food from restaurants on up coming stops, and have the meals delivered to your seat! You cannot do this on an airplane. Talk about advancement in creature comfort.
When we arrived, I was very hungry so we dashed straight to a near by mall on Nanjing Road (南京路) and have my favourite Shanghai food. You can watch Carol’s video below to see what I mean.
Checkout our train ride and the huge Shanghai train station
On November 21st, we went back to Hong Kong to conduct some more banking business but primarily to meet with relatives that we have not seen for many years.
We woke up at around 7am in Fenggang and arranged a DiDi ride to Lo Wu Control Point (羅湖管制站) a border crossing between China and Hong Kong. The one hour ride ended costing us around ¥140 (~$27 CAD), which I thought was not too bad, but relatives told me that we got cheated and should have been around ¥100. Oh well, live and let learn.
The border crossing again was uneventful, and we took the MTR to Tsim Sha Tsui (尖沙咀) where we met with Carol’s uncle and aunt. We had dim sum. It was good to see everyone in good spirits, and catch up on how everyone is doing in the past 10+ years.
We then went back to Mong Kok (旺角), where we completed some banking business which we thought was completed last week, but apparently there were some missing procedures that require our signatures. Banking in both China and Hong Kong is super strict and filled with rules, policies and procedures. If you seek to open an account, be prepare to spend hours in doing so.
In the evening, we met up with my cousin which we also have not seen for more than 10 years. During those years, he got married and had a son. It was good to see his family and his super cute three years old son. I personally had a really good time reconnecting with them.
Finally, we closed off the evening with dessert with Carol’s cousin in Causeway Bay (铜锣湾). We found a nice little dessert place near SOGO right next to the MTR station. We had some good laughs while eating our dessert.
We are blessed to have many family members in Hong Kong and the warmth of reconnecting with them never fades.
Our flight landed in Hong Kong late in the evening on November 8th and we took the Airport Express train and then a tax directly to the Royal Plaza Hotel in Kowloon. Very nice hotel for Hong Kong and I would come back here again.
We do not plan to stay in Hong Kong long, just enough time to sample some Hong Kong unique eateries, and renew Carol’s Hong Kong ID card. We will return to visit relatives once we have our China’s itinerary straightened out.
Even with such an uneventful stay, Carol still manages to muster up a video per day during our two day stay. The attached videos are below. They are far more descriptive than any words that I can use to describe our stay. We will be transiting to Fenggang, Dongguan (凤岗镇 东莞市 广东省) today to visit Carol’s cousin.
Carol’s videos:
From Tokyo to Hong Kong Transit (November 8th)Our one full day in Hong Kong (November 9th)