Our Macau & HK Family Trip – Day 1

(super delayed post!!)

For the first time ever, my whole family traveled together outside the country. It was a shame my bro-in-law wasn’t able to come with us though. Nonetheless, the trip was fun & exciting!

Day 1: flight to HK then ferry to Macau

We arrived at the Centennial airport for our 7:00 am flight. We were so hungry we made do with coffee and ensaymadas from Goldilocks. While waiting to board, we took a few snaps at the airport.

Thank God we were fed at the aircraft! Breakfast was ok – better than nothing. smooth flight, too. Clear blue skies so we had very minimal turbulence. The little miss enjoyed her first airplane ride.

I got keyed up when I started seeing islands 10 minutes before we landed…I missed HK so much!

After going through the immigration and picking up our pieces of luggage from the conveyor belt, we proceeded to the nearest Travelex to have some currencies exchanged. We also bought our airport express passes, which was a good deal -- thanks to the guy at the counter! We had one way free from the airport to any of its designated stop and unlimited MTR rides on all lines (except for mainland China) for 4 days.  No need to top it up! I just forgot how much we paid for each Octopus card (I kept calling it Oyster card remembering how much MTR was patterned to UK’s Underground), but I remember it was a lot cheaper and economical. 

After getting off at the Central Station in HK Island, we went to the Shun Tak Centre to take the Turbo Jet to take us to Macau. Ferry ride was ok, except for the dizzying part when the ferry’s still docked.

Upon arrival to Macau, we took two taxis to take us to our hotel. Hotel Beverley was a budget hotel, but their rooms were pretty big. For the price we paid for the rooms inclusive of breakfast, it was quite a steal! More importantly, it was a walking distance to Sao Paolo, which was great because we didn’t have to take any shuttle or transpo to get there.

All throughout our trip, I was in charge of the arrangements and the map reading. While we were trying to find a place to dine in on the way to Sao Paolo, we stumbled upon good ‘ole Mc Donald's. Since we arrived in HK, my niece was pointing at every Mc Donald's outlet her eyes laid on so we gave in to her request and munched away happily at her place to be.

A lot of people could barely speak English in Macau so it was quite a challenge to ask for simple directions. We tried to seek help in finding the road that leads to Sao Paolo and Senado Square, but none of the staff of Mc Donald's understood what I meant. It was funny though because when we walked further down the road of where McDonald's was, we finally found what we were looking for. Sheesh! Good thing I trusted my instincts!

After walking around and checking out the sights, we walked a little bit more until we found ourselves in a bus stop. I asked the inspector who was stationed in the bus stop for the bus number we needed to hop on to reach the Venetian Hotel. Because of his difficulty communicating with me, he just led us to the nearby bus stop and asked the driver to drop us at our destination. Bless him for being very nice!

As soon as we got to the hotel, we wandered around the premises and later on had dinner at their food court. We had noodles, of course! I just had to share with hubby as I didn't have any appetite.

After tiring ourselves from all the walking, we dragged ourselves to the shuttle depot, rode the complimentary shuttle to the pier and took another short bus ride to return to our hotel. My sisters and i took some pictures outside the hotel before we retired for the night.

That concludes our day 1 trip recap. Be back for more of our day 2, 3 & 4 stories! Please bear with me as I sort through more than 1,500 photos :)