Back to Africa!

We started our Africa vacation in Cape Town, South Africa.  If it wasn't for Table Mountain looking over the city, it could be any modern city in the US, well except its history goes back hundreds of years starting with the Dutch and the British.  This history has left Cape Town with a Castle (more like a fort but the locals insist it is a Castle), beautiful old churches, and developed vineyards that were prized by Napoleon!

The first site we hit up was the V&A Waterfront... and let me tell you it has everything!  Shopping malls, numerous restraunts in every price range, live music, and even a Hofbrauhaus beer garden... and we tried and enjoyed it all!  

The first day we had some of the best fish and chips we have ever had.  The sign even boasts "the fish you are eating today was swimming in Table Bay last night"...now that's fresh!  The best thing of all was it was cheap, it would have cost 5x more in HK and been less than a 1/5 as good! After lunch we walked around the area stopping to listen to some live music.  One of these bands was really talented (Bocelli with an African beat anyone?) Melissa took them home with her - well, she bought their CD. After that, we happened to stumble across the beer garden ;) This beer garden didn't have the correct table cloth or trees but the beer menu was spot on.  And that's all that really counts right? I had a weissbier and Melissa had a radler (a mix of lemonade and light beer.. it's apparently quite refreshing for the non beer drinker).  

Yum! 

Prost!! (Cheers in German!) 

All that beer drinking coupled with the jet-lag and it was lights out!! 

The Big 3-2!

Philip's birthday was last Wednesday so we decided to head out to Wan Chai on Saturday night to celebrate! Wan Chai is 2 MTR stops from Central and has tons of restaurants and bars, including a pretty decent selection targeting expats - English menus, western food and decent drink specials. 

We settled on drinks at Coyete's for drinks (margaritas!)  and....chips & queso! Yes, we got a little Mexican food fix! We've definitely enjoyed better queso....but not in Hong Kong! To be fair, there's not a lot of queso to choose from. In Dallas, there are multiple Mexican restaurants on any given street. In Hong Kong, we know of about 6 and for a city of around 7 million people, that's not many! 


After that, we walked around Wan Chai, just taking it all of it - this is a particularly interesting area of town..especially at night. My favorite is all of the lights. 


Happy Birthday Philip! 

Hop ON, Hop OFF, DUCK!

On Day 2, we did what any tourist in a big city does...the infamous hop on, hop off, double decker bus tour. The company we chose had 3 different routes which made it very easy to see the entire city. We started off our morning at Clarke Quay where we took a short riverboat cruise along the Singapore River out to the Marina Bay. 

The views from the water were incredible especially since many of the main tourist sites are along the river and marina including Merlion Park, Boat Quay, the Esplanade (Opera House), the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and the city's business/financial district. 


Back on the bus, we noticed there was a lot of construction of stands and barricades and premium street lighting and a pretty killer sound system (which they were testing, our very own Singapore city soundtrack!).We later found out that this is all in preparation for the Formula 1 races later this month, the only one held at night. 

For lunch we stopped at a mall food stand and had "modern" satay (meat on a stick) but unlike the traditional satay we're accustomed to in Bali and Thailand, the preparation at this place was perfected - they had a premium satay maker machine which basically automated the entire process - cooking, broiling and dipping each individual skewer - I need to get one of these for our kitchen! My favorite one was surprisingly one that I have never tried before (or seen for that matter) - bacon wrapped asparagus. It was awesome. I'll definitely be trying to make this one myself at home. Melissa's "something new and different" - chicken balls did not fare quite as well. This one up close did not pass the look test so we never actually made it to the taste test. 

Asparagus wrapped bacon

After lunch we headed to Chinatown which was like Hong Kong but much better. It was clean(!!) Remember, this is Singapore and there are fines for spitting, chewing gum or littering. Chinatown was decorated for the upcoming Mid Autumn Festival. Melissa's colleagues have explained that this is kind of like a Chinese Thanksgiving. 


After China, we headed over to Little India which was best viewed...from the top of the bus. Hop not?

What the duck!

While on the river earlier in the day, Melissa saw this weird looking boat painted like a duck. Later we found out it was a "unique land & sea amphibious vehicle" used during the Vietnam War. So basically this vehicle is capable of literally driving right into the water and then navigating the waters just like a boat.  

Of course, after seeing the DUCK in action both in the water and on the road, Melissa added the DUCK to our "to do" list so later in the afternoon we headed out on the DUCK. For the first half of the tour, the DUCK went into the Singapore River and subsequently navigated around the Marina along a somewhat similar path as our morning riverboat tour. Then the DUCK drove right back onto land and we drove around the city taking in some more of the tourist sites. 

As we had a very early morning flight, we decided to head back over to Le Pac Sat for an early dinner. This time we sat outside and enjoyed some satay - this time, not so modern - traditional style cooked over a coal fire. We also tried some seafood noodle dishes - the Singapore noodles and the Hong Kong noodles. Both were good but the Singapore ones were a little spicy for Melissa's taste.  

Overall, we had a really great weekend and enjoyed a much needed break from Hong Kong. I am sure we will be back here soon. Melissa already has 2 more trips scheduled here in the next 6 weeks! 

Singapore Sling!

Melissa was in Singapore last week for work and we decided to make a weekend out of it so I flew to meet her late Thursday night. Singapore, like Hong Kong, is a former British colony. Almost everyone speaks English so the city is very easy to navigate. We had pretty low expectations as we expected Singapore to be pretty much like Hong Kong but we were very pleasantly surprised. Singapore has a lot of things that Hong Kong is lacking - namely trees, grass and flowers....everywhere! 

Our to do list for our weekend in Singapore was short but at the very top of it of course was having a Singapore Sling at the Raffles Hotel Long Bar (the drink was invented there)! So Friday night we made the trek to the Raffles Hotel which was absolutely beautiful - a magnificently preserved British colonial style complex. The hotel is one of the most expensive and most prestigious hotels in Singapore. Rooms range from $1,000 to $7,000 a night - needless to say, we did not stay there! However, we did make our way to the Raffles Long Bar to have a Singapore Sling - the Long Bar held its traditional colonial style all the way down to the peanuts on the tables that you just chuck the shells on the floor but all of this ambiance and history comes at a price...our 2 drinks were $62! We didn't order another round but we also didn't let that kill our buzz as we headed over to Le Pac Sat for dinner. 

Singapore is known for its food stalls which serve everything - Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Indian, Korean, Singaporean, Filipino and one of the food pavilions even had a Wendy's - no Mom, we did not have Wendy's! Le Pac San is probably one of the biggest and most famous of these food stalls. We had Indian for dinner and enjoyed (I use that term very lightly!) a Filipino cover band belting out the best (or most annoying) American songs of the early 1990s.

Fried Duck & Beer - Saturday Night in Hong Kong...

Saturday night, we decided to head over to Kowloon's Temple Street Night Market. They sell pretty much everything and well nothing at the same time and all prices are very negotiable. There are no prices on anything so you bargain for everything.

In the event that you are looking for an Obama shirt where he is dressed like Chairman Mao or a some Calvin Clein (not Klein!) mens' underwear, head on down to the Temple Street Night Market!

There were so many people there, including some US navy seaman and marines. The USS Boxer has been ported in Hong Kong across the harbor from our apartment for the last few days. It just left early this morning.

We didn't buy anything from the market but we did enjoy some San Miguel beer and local cuisine. No Cape Cods on Temple Street so San Miguel for Melissa as well!

Every corner had street stalls with plastic outdoor stools about 1.5 feet off the ground. And yes mom, I did bring my hand sanitizer! I had a sweet & sour chicken dish (the only sure bet on the menu) and Melissa had the fried duck. I guess they wanted to prove it was really duck being served so they made sure to have the head on the plate. Don't worry..neither of us actually ate the head! As we were walking home we passed an Indian/Nepalese restaurant that had chicken naggads! Yep, see the photo below.

Can I interest you in some duck head?

Pull up a stool and have a beer or two!

From Our Living Room - The USS Boxer aircraft carrier heading back out to sea

Summer Weddings?

Hong Kong's Lady in Red 

When you think of wedding pictures, you think of a nice park, flowers, pretty scenery.  Here in Hong Kong, they have a totally different idea all together, and it is BIG(!!) business.  In the central business district (near Melissa's office) on any given night of the week you will see at least(!) two wedding photographers taking photos.

Some of the scenes would shock you!  I have seen photographers waiting until the red light, then the bride goes running out in the middle of the street capturing the taxis, buses and trams going by.  When you go down that dark alley...yep another photo shoot.  I even saw a photographer pointing up at a catwalk connecting two buildings...you guessed it the bride and groom were up there! In front of the Gucci & Prada store windows - yep, they're there too!

Glad I am already married!!

Life is a Beach!

This weekend the weather was sunny and (incredibly!) hot (and humid!), so we decided to make it down to one of Hong Kong's 150+ beaches. Amazing isn't it? This concrete jungle is also filled with TONS of country parks, beaches and hiking trails.

So after a 30 minute walk from our apartment to Central, a 20 minute metro ride (Central to Shau Kei Wan), and a 20 minute (scenic!) double decker bus ride....we were finally there... Shek O Beach.

Shek O is a tiny, sleepy village at the far south-eastern corner of Hong Kong Island. It was a great spot to just relax and hang out for the afternoon. The view of the South China Sea is great....but most amazing of course is the fact that this place is in Hong Kong!

We had lunch at a quaint Thai restaurant - baked mussels and a chicken curry. The mussels were excellent...the curry not so much. The chicken was literally hacked up pieces of chicken - bones, skin and all - next time chicken curry...without the chicken please!

We also had some local entertainment during lunch - 2 women brought their dogs with them for lunch. Their dogs sat alongside them - in chairs! One of the dogs was "lucky" enough to have a visor and sunglasses! Maybe next time we venture out to Shek O, we should bring Bailey....err....maybe not!