Macau 2016 Day 1 – Arrival in Macau bypassing Hong Kong

It was a rather hectic week and we had only completed packing on the night before the flight. Equally crazy was baby K’s choice to be cranky on the night before, resulting in the parents clocking only 5hrs of sleep before waking up at 6am to get ready for the 10am flight to Hong Kong.

By 730am, we left the house but having to repeatedly return to pick up the milk and the stroller that we had left behind.

The PIE had sections of slow moving traffic as Tuesday was after all a working day for most. We got to the airport by 830am and checked in at the counter for our 2 luggage and the stroller. Had some drinks at the nearby cafe before bidding farewell to our parents for ferrying us to the airport.

Our flight was at the end of terminal 1 and before getting on the flight, had changed baby K’s diapers and picked up some hot water from the hot water dispenser.

Our bassinet seat was immediately on the right upon boarding which made it easy for us, having tugged along 3 hand carries and a baby. Made formula milk packed in disposable plastic packets (like those storage bags for breast milk but for formula milk powder instead) for baby K and while he happily finished the bottle and dozed off even before taking off. It was a short 1 hr break for us while he snoozed in my arms.

After waking up we had to keep him entertained through the inflight tiny TV and   magazines. Had our lunch individually as always, and fed him home cooked porridge after we were done with ours.

The flight was smooth though weather was expected to be rainy with the crazy cold snap coming in on the weekends before we flew. It was still busy and tiring to manage the newly 14month old toddler though.

After touching down at Hong Kong international airport, we could feel the cold bite while at the walkway to the arrivals and immediately put baby K into his one-piece down jacket. This made him more difficult to carry with the puffier size and the slippery surface.

Mommy had gone to purchase the Cotai ferry tickets to Macau, without the need to go through immigrations. At the counters, we only had to provide the luggage tag to the staff who would ensure that the luggage was brought on board the ferry for us. Paid 640hkd in all for the tickets, including a 140hkd for baby K for the 415pm schedule to Taipa (not the main terminal), the only closest time slot we could get (the other one was at 5pm).

Directions for ferry transfer to Macau.
Directions for ferry transfer to Macau.
Ticketing counter for the ferry tickets.
Ticketing counter for the ferry tickets.
Ferry tickets.
Ferry tickets.

Made some milk for baby K after changing him out of his diapers and checked that our luggage was retrieved at the ticket checker. We were only allowed to proceed to the gate at the time written on our tickets, supposedly to prevent overcrowding at the gate. There was a short train ride to SkyPier where the ferry was.

Machine to check luggage status, by scanning your tickets.
Machine to check luggage status, by scanning your tickets.
Towards Skypier.
Towards SkyPier.
View from waiting area of our ferry.
View from waiting area of our ferry.
Skypier waiting area before boarding.
Skypier waiting area before boarding.

The road to boarding the ferry was extremely cold as it was opened to the outside. Once on board, we got some nap time for ourselves as baby K had also already fallen asleep on mommy shoulders while waiting for the boarding.

The ride to Macau was slightly bumpy but that had baby K in the snooze for a good hour. We arrived close to 6pm, after an hour and a half on the seas.

Going through immigrations, baby K had us on priority and we were taken to a short queue and we cleared rather quickly. Proceeded to retrieve our luggage at an enclosed area where everyone just stood around and waited. The luggage was to be brought into the room by human labour as there weren’t any belt there. After the doors opened, the luggage containers were brought in while the personnel unloaded the luggage. However collection could only be started after all the luggage was offloaded.

We waited for the crowd to clear before retrieving. The personnel were really kind to offer mommy a seat near the area as she tried to feed baby K and another offered to bring our luggage out on a trolley seeing that we were tugging a lot of luggage but we didn’t accept the offer.

Once out, I checked with one of the staff nearby only to find that there weren’t any free shuttle bus to Sofitel Ponte 16 (which was situated at the other island). So we had to queue for a taxi which had a couple of people before us already waiting. It was too long before we got onto one ourselves and I had issues loading the luggage and the stroller in. The stroller ended up on the front passenger seat with a rather unimpressed taxi driver.

The trip from the Taipa terminal to Sofitel was about 40mins due to the horrendous traffic jams along the way. Upon stopping at the luxurious lobby of Sofitel, a porter helped us unload, we paid about 100hkd for the trip.

Nice design at the recept.
Nice design at the recept.
Lift lobby.
Lift lobby.

Checking in was easy but there was some marketing going on as the receptionist tried to sell upgrades to suites and club privileges but we rejected it. We were given the 15th floor room that had a pretty good view of the sea and the room was luxuriously furnished. Porter came with our luggage some 10mins later.

Large room.
Large room.
See through bathroom.
See through bathroom.
Toilet with tub and TV.
Toilet with tub and TV.
Loccitaine bath accessories.
Loccitaine bath accessories.
Rain shower.
Rain shower.

Prepared some cereal mixed with the baby meal from the flight for baby K, which surprisingly, he liked and finished eating. I was tasked to go get dinner as room service wasn’t affordable and mommy found the cold uninviting for her to step foot outside again for tonight.

Just taking the bigger road, I walked away from the hotel and looked around. Saw some bright signboards and headed to a noodle shop (Loja Sopa Da Fita Cheong Kei) that had tripadvisor sticker on it and asked if taking away was available. Was immediately invited to sit in where it was nice and warm and then decide what I wanted. Ordered wanton noodle and their special. 10 mins and 63hkd later, I left with 2 small package of dinner.

Loja Sopa De Fita Cheong Kei noodle shop.
Loja Sopa De Fita Cheong Kei noodle shop.
Inside the noodle shop.
Inside the noodle shop.
Special dish featured.
Special dish featured.

The food was rather delicious but I wasn’t sure that was biased due to my hunger or not. The portions were small though.

The hotel did not seem to have a good aircon to warm up the place and bathing for baby K was challenging. I filled the tub with warmer-than-usual warm water and after quickly stripping baby K, brought him to the tub and he got used to the water rather well. Unfortunately it seemed like there was some leakage and I had to warm up the tub by reintroducing warm water into the tub.

After getting out of the water, we had to quickly dry baby K and apply the lotion and wear the long sleeve shirt and pants to prepare him for bed. He was shivering a bit before we could finally dressed him.

It was clean up time on the bottles and cooker and containers but all these were far easier than back in the days of breastfeeding where there was simply a hell lot of bottles and equipment to clean.

Baby K snoozed deeply after downing a bottle of milk and the rest of the night was sleep, after a long day to get to Macau.

Macau and Hong Kong 2015 day 3 – Macau and Victoria Park

Our day started really late, after all we only slept at 1 am. After waking up at 9am and carrying out the tasks of bathing the baby in the tub and cleaning up the bottles, we finally left the hotel at 11am.
Left the luggage at the luggage deposit and took the free bus to the terminal. Going back to the terminal and at the immediate right of the terminal was a bus and taxi queue. Initially wanted to take the bus (bus 3A, 3.20 MOP per trip) to the famous ruins of St. Pauls but in the end took the taxi instead for about 50MOP ( in bad traffic) to Almeida Riveria Road. The streets were particular busy with hordes of people, probably because it was a Chinese long weekend due to mid Autumn festival.
Buses that going to the various attractions.
Buses that going to the various attractions.
Black taxis of Macau.
Black taxis of Macau.
As we walked towards the direction of the church, it started to drizzle so we diverted to a cafe THS Honolulu for lunch. The meal we ordered was a tasty pork chop rice and so-so Portuguese fried rice. The soup of the day of carrot and radish pork soup was good though. The set came up to about 58MOP per meal.
Carrot soup.
Carrot soup.
Portuguese fried rice.
Portuguese fried rice.
Pork chop rice.
Pork chop rice.
THS Honolulu.
THS Honolulu.
After our meal and a very cranky baby (as he didn’t have his porridge and we had to give him rice and soup and Heinz pumpkin purée), it was still drizzling and so we had to give up and go back, through the same route on a taxi. It cost about 80MOP to get back to the hotel where we got our luggage and boarded the free bus to the Cotai jet terminal (Taipa).
Macau tower from taxi. Drizzle on the outside.
Macau tower from taxi. Drizzle on the outside.
Interesting shapes of the casinos.
Interesting shapes of the casinos. Grand Lisboa was the huge golden odd shape building.
Upon arrival, we found that the route Tsim Sha Tsui was sold out till 5pm. As we were rushing for time to meet up with my sister who were on their way to Macau and require my mom to babysit him tonight, we took the route to Shueng Wan instead.
Cotai jet ticketing counter at the Taipa ferry terminal.
Cotai jet ticketing counter at the Taipa ferry terminal.
Jet tickets.
Jet tickets.
Waiting area before boarding.
Waiting area before boarding.
Checked in the luggage at the same price (although the staff tried to overcharge us so we made him weigh all the luggage) of 75MOP, and waited at the waiting room right after going through immigrations quickly. Fed baby K some milk where he then fell asleep as we walked a 5mins walk to the jet cruise. Another 1hr and we should arrive in Hong Kong hopefully in better weather.
As the jet rocked slightly with the waves, the weather didn’t seem to improve. There was even lightning that we saw. We fell asleep easily as the baby was also asleep in my wife’s arms.
1hr later, we arrived in Hong Kong and had to go through immigrations again. It took a while longer as the officer was more strict and had used quite a bit of time to go through the document. Our luggage was ready just behind the immigration counter, not at the luggage reclaim area.
Upon exit, which was the same entrance as we first took to board the cruise jet, we met up with my sister’s family and our Hong Kong relative. The relative had been of the greatest help, if not for them, we would not have been able to meet up in time. After my sister left for Macau, we loaded up the luggage into the relative car and they drove us to Tsim Sha Tsui YMCA hotel.
Check in was done quickly while the porters helped with the luggage (even helped to bandaged one of the broken handles on my Samsonite which had an exposed metal piece). The room was a lot smaller than the one we had in Sheung Wan but it was adequately equipped. No tub though.
Bedroom.
Bedroom.
Small toilet.
Small toilet.
Reception area of the hotel.
Reception area of the hotel.
My mom left with my nephew and relative as they went back to my sister hotel while my wife had to expressed milk. Baby K became incredibly cranky so I brought him down for a stroll, which was when he amused himself with the various lights of the Hong Kong street. It was mentally exhausting sometimes.
Went back when he was a little calmer, fed him porridge before we went to Causeway Bay for makan. Exited near Sogo but couldn’t find anything to eat so we went to Itacho. There was a queue waiting and so I went around the building and found a local noodles store. We decided to move since the queue wasn’t moving.
It was a great choice as the Prince noodles was yummy. My beef noodles had soft meat mixed with Q noodles and tasty soup base. My wife’s pork noodles was equally nice, the similar Q noodles. The iceless iced tea was a little disappointing as it wasn’t cold enough and the red bean drink was a tad bit too sweet. For 115 HKD, it wasn’t cheap but it was tasty.
Beef noodles.
Beef noodles with the iceless ice tea and red bean dessert drink.
Pork Noodles.
Pork Noodles.
Prince noodles store.
Prince noodles store.
We took the MTR one more stop to Tin Hou and walked towards Victoria Park. There was a Mid Autumn festival exhibition of lanterns going on and there was a crowd there. Baby K who fell asleep while at the noodles store woke up to find lights and lanterns all around, naturally amusing him. It was actually quite a big area but there were so many people and the weather was extremely humid.
We bought a toy with spinning lights (not a exactly a lantern) for baby K and took some photos before we felt droplets of rain on our arms. We decided not to test our luck, especially when we don’t even have an umbrella on hand and left for the MTR. It even started to drizzle a bit before we reached the MTR entrance. Bad luck with the weather.
Event map in Victoria Park.
Event map in Victoria Park.
Stalls selling stuff.
Stalls selling stuff.
Lantern exhibits.
Lantern exhibits.
Dragon lantern.
Dragon lantern.
The train ride back was smooth. I was offered seats by the passengers twice because I had baby K on my hip seat, good folks of Hong Kong!
Back in the hotel and it was all about entertaining the baby till bedtime including the cleaning up. The trip was ending soon and tiredness was creeping in.

Escape plan to Hong Kong and Macau September 2015

A brief summary on the itinerary

Escape Plan to Hong Kong and Macau 2015:

Total duration 5D4N
Singapore is in the same time zone as Hong Kong.
Flight time is 4hrs on Cathay Pacific from Singapore to Hong Kong.

Afternoon flight on 24th September at 12pm and arrival in Hong Kong at 5pm.
Return flight is on the 28th September at 3:20pm and arrival in Singapore at 7:20pm.

Day 1 Arrival at Hong Kong
Day 2 Prada Outlet and Bon Jovi Concert
Day 3 Macau City and Victoria Park
Day 4 Tin Lung Heen and shopping
Day 5 Home Sweet Home

This escape plan was to attend the Bon Jovi Concert since their last concert in Singapore some 20 years ago. I didn’t want to attend the F1 one thinking that it won’t be a official full concert and thankfully so, with the haze that was around during this time. At the same time, with a Hari Raya Haji on Thursday, a 2 days leave would have yielded 5 days of holidaying.

Budget nature: Expensive (for this itinerary) with the a visit to Prada outlet, Macau concert and 2 Michelin starred dining at 102nd floor.

Travelling in Hong Kong and Macau can be affordable if we had taken the cheaper alternatives of staying outskirts, taking free buses, eating cheap food etc. This itinerary wasn’t so basically due to attending a concert in Macau and having expensive dim sum at a 2 Michelin starred restaurant at 102nd floor of Ritz Carlton. For a one time experience, why not.

Complexity: Easy to get around with the MTR and the buses in Macau.

Major places of interests were well connected to the MTR in Hong Kong. Macau was well served with free hotel buses and public transport. Taxis were inexpensive too.