Stepping into a new continent – a week in Hong Kong COMPLETED - Page 8 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
As of January 1, 2019, we have closed our forums. This is a decision we did not come to lightly, but it is necessary. The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk. The server software itself must be updated, and it cannot be without removing the forums.
So it is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our long-running forums. They came online in 2000 and brought together so many wonderful Disney fans. We had friendships form, careers launch, couples marry, children born ... all because of this amazing community.
Thank you to each of you who were a part of this community. You made it possible.
And a very special thank you to our Guides (moderators), past and present, who kept our forums a happy place to be. You are the glue that held everything together, and we are forever grateful to you. Thank you aliceinwdw, Caldercup, MrsM, WillCAD, Fortissimo, GingerJ, HiddenMickey, CRCrazy, Eeyoresmom, disneyknut, disneydani, Cam22, chezp, WDWfan, Luvsun, KMB733, rescuesk, OhToodles!, Colexis Mom, lfredsbo, HiddenMickey, DrDolphin, DopeyGirl, duck addict, Disneybine, PixieMichele, Sandra Bostwick, Eeyore Tattoo, DyanKJ130, Suzy Q'Disney, LilMarcieMouse, AllisonG, Belle*, Chrissi, Brant, DawnDenise, Crystalloubear, Disneymom9092, FanOfMickey, Goofy4Goofy, GoofyMom, Home4us123, iamgrumpy, ilovedisney247, Jennifer2003, Jenny Pooh, KrisLuvsDisney, Ladyt, Laughaholic88, LauraBelle Hime, Lilianna, LizardCop, Loobyoxlip, lukeandbrooksmom, marisag, michnash, MickeyMAC, OffKilter_Lynn, PamelaK, Poor_Eeyore, ripkensnana, RobDVC, SHEANA1226, Shell of the South, snoozin, Statelady01, Tara O'Hara, tigger22, Tink and Co., Tinkerbelz, WDWJAMBA, wdwlovers, Wendyismyname, whoSEZ, WildforWD, and WvuGrrrl. You made the magic.
We want to personally thank Sara Varney, who coordinated our community for many years (among so many other things she did for us), and Cheryl Pendry, our Message Board Manager who helped train our Guides, and Ginger Jabour, who helped us with the PassPorter-specific forums and Live! Guides. Thank you for your time, energy, and enthusiasm. You made it all happen.
There are other changes as well.
Why? Well, the world has changed. And change with it, we must. The lyrics to "We Go On" for IllumiNations say it best:
We go on to the joy and through the tears
We go on to discover new frontiers
Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
Moving on with a spirit born to run
Ever on with each rising sun.
To a new day, we go on.
It's time to move on and move forward.
PassPorter is a small business, and for many years it supported our family. But the world changed, print books took a backseat to the Internet, and for a long time now it has been unable to make ends meet. We've had to find new ways to support our family, which means new careers and less and less time available to devote to our first baby, PassPorter.
But eventually, we must move on and move forward. It is the right thing to do.
So we are retiring this newsletter, as we simply cannot keep up with it. Many thanks to Mouse Fan Travel who supported it all these years, to All Ears and MousePlanet who helped us with news, to our many article contributors, and -- most importantly -- to Sara Varney who edited our newsletter so wonderfully for years and years.
And we are no longer charging for the Live Guides. If you have a subscription, it's yours to keep for the lifetime of the Live Guides at no additional cost. The Live Guides will stay online, barring server issues and technical problems, for all of 2019.
That said, PassPorter is not going away. Most of the resources will remain online for as long as we can support them, and after that we will find ways to make whatever we can available. PassPorter means a great deal to us, and to many of you, and we will do our best to keep it alive in whatever way we can. Our server costs are high, and they'll need to come out of our pockets, so in the future you can expect some changes so we can bring those costs down.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your amazing support over the years. Without you, there's no way us little guys could have made something like this happen and given the "big guys" a run for their money. PassPorter was consistently the #3 guidebook after the Unofficial and Official guides, which was really unheard of for such a small company to do. We ROCKED it thanks to you and your support and love!
If you miss us, you can still find some of us online. Sara started a new blog at DisneyParkPrincess.com -- I strongly urge you to visit and get on her mailing list. She IS the Disney park princess and knows Disney backward and forward. And I am blogging as well at JenniferMaker.com, which is a little craft blog I started a couple of years ago to make ends meet. You can see and hear me in my craft show at https://www.youtube.com/c/jennifermaker . Many PassPorter readers and fans are on Facebook, in groups they formed like the PassPorter Trip Reports and PassPorter Crafting Challenge (if you join, just let them know you read about it in the newsletter). And some of our most devoted community members started a forum of their own at Pixie Dust Lane and all are invited over.
So we encourage you to stay in touch with us and your fellow community members wherever works best for you!
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Kevan as you can imagine, is seriously enjoying your photos and just added it to our must see list. I am seriously enjoying your photos as well of course- great installments and updates.
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Saturday 16 February – part four: a stunning lunchtime view
When we came down, we did a little bit of shopping, including some more postcards, stamps, fridge magnets and a book about Hong Kong. That’s the essentials out of the way early on in the trip then.
A look back at the main building at the Peak
Look what was showing on the big screen there – yep, our first sight of Hong Kong Disneyland!
I did fancy the idea of eating at the Peak Outlook, as that looked really neat on the website, but when I saw the prices and realised that we would easily be talking £70 (about $135) for the two of us for lunch, I decided to go for something a bit cheaper. At first, we didn’t have much luck with that, but then we found Pearl on the Peak. That was offering a set brunch menu for HK$298 (about £20) each and fortunately what they were offering looked like a good deal with plenty for me to eat.
We started off with a selection of seafood, including whelks, massive prawns, lobster, oysters (which we left, as neither of us like them) and mussels, then you had a choice of main courses. I went for the seared black cod fillet with spinach, champagne sabyon and salmon caviar, while Mark had the roasted chicken breast with green bean, pumpkin and bacon. Finally you ended with a dessert selection to sample. It was all excellent and we were left to enjoy it in our own timescale, which was a pleasant change. All too often, you’re hurried out of a restaurant before you have a chance to enjoy your meal.
And then there was the view from our table – talk about stunning.
When we finished our meal, we made the decision to come back to the Peak the next night to see what the city looks like at night, so we made a booking for Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. OK, so not exactly native to Hong Kong, but we had seen some of the advertisements on the way up and they appeared to have some really nice views over the city, so that’s why we went for it. With that booked, it was time to head back down on the tram and the downwards journey didn’t seem to be as jarring, but it was quite an adventure. All the seats face one way and that’s upwards, but to feel yourself falling down a steep hill so rapidly is quite something.
When we got to the bottom, I asked Mark what he wanted to do and he suggested that we should go and see the Government House, which used to be home to the colonial leaders. Now it’s the official residence of the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. You can’t go in, so the best you can do is get a shot of it through the gates. The only problem was it was up the hill, not down it and that was quite a big problem. If you’d seen the size of the hill, you’d understand why. That walk up the bill was just like some of the blocks we walked in San Francisco. It was really hard work.
At least it was nice to be able to go back down again, especially as we found Albert Path to walk back down, which was very picturesque.
We even found Duddell Street, whose stone steps and gas lamps date back to the 1870’s.
Then we were into what’s obviously the very posh shopping area of Hong Kong, with Gucci and Harvey Nicholls just some of the names we saw. We also saw the great British favourite Marks and Spencer, which was a bit surreal. Like I say, there are moments where you could be in the UK if it wasn’t for the Chinese signs everywhere.
I'm running out of adjectives for your photos, Cheryl! Hong Kong really looks to be an incredible place. That last photo of Mark at the top of the stone steps shows a tree in the top left corner. Did you notice the exposed roots running down the length of the wall? Wow!
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Saturday 16 February – part five: now where did I put that book?
We caught the subway back to Fortress Hill and then walked back to the City Garden Hotel for a bit of downtime…
… but before we could do that, we had to deal with something. We had realised on the way back to the hotel that I didn’t have the book I had bought at the Peak any longer and the only explanation was that I had left it in the restaurant where we had left, so we asked front desk to call them for us and, sure enough, they found it and put it to one side until we could come back and get it tomorrow night. Sorted.
After a couple of hours rest, we headed out again, mainly because we were both in danger of falling asleep and possibly not waking up until late in the evening. We took the subway over to Kowloon, which is actually on the Chinese mainland and is opposite Hong Kong Island. The subway was a lot busier than earlier on in the day and that theme continued when we got to Kowloon. This is the centre of nightlife and shopping in Hong Kong, with Hong Kong Island more the centre for offices and high end designer name shopping.
When we emerged from the subway, we were greeted by a mini version of Times Square or possibly Piccadilly Circus in London, with neon signs everywhere, but strangely, there weren’t that many places we really want to look in. We wandered around the shops, more to kill time than anything else. As we walked, I also grabbed a McDonald’s sundae. We went into a mall, but nothing grabbed us in there, although there were some lovely Chinese New Year decorations. I just loved seeing these everywhere we went.
[b]Kowloon Mosque
As we waked, we felt some light rain, but fortunately that soon stopped. We made our way to the Avenue of Stars, which is Hong Kong’s equivalent to the Hollywood Walk of Fame, so that we could get in position to see the Symphony of Lights. On the way, we found another mall.
When we got to the seafront, we had a wonderful view of the skyline on Hong Kong Island. It looks stunning at night, more so than during the day.
The Symphony of Lights is a display of lights from the top of Hong Kong’s high rise buildings every night at 8.00, set to music and I will admit I was expecting a lot from it and somehow it didn’t quite deliver. To say the least, the music was pathetic, certainly when competing with Wishes and Illuminations anyway. I was just expecting much stronger and more powerful music. Once it got started, I waited for a stunning finale, but none came. Yes, it was nice to see, but that’s about it. It’s a shame that it didn’t live up to all the hype, but I’m still glad we saw it.
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