I have decided I will never get caught up so I'll just cover the last two ports in this note. Hong Kong was pretty much unchanged from our last visit. The big difference was the weather. (You can see from the photo that the pool waiters were freezing as were we.) We docked in a cold, damp and foggy Victoria Harbour as scheduled and as soon as we were cleared by Immigration, we took the ferry to Ken's tailor in Wan Chai for his first fitting on the new dinner jacket and suits. We met Peter and Pru at the Four Seasons Hotel at noon but because it was such a lousy day, we decided to cancel our planned trip to Lama Island for a seafood lunch. Instead, we returned to Kowloon and had Peking Duck in a restaurant that someone had recommended.
On our second day in H.K. and with the weather still bad, we travelled to the Ladies Market, did a bit of bargaining and then headed back to Wan Chai to pick up Ken's stuff before returning to the ship for a 7:00 p.m. departure. The cityscape from the ship is still as spectacular as ever, particularly at night, and we enjoyed a drink on our veranda as we sailed away.
As we sailed north to Shanghai, the seas got rougher and the temperature kept dropping. We were told to expect it would get worse as we got closer to our destination. Happily, although it was cold, the sun was out and we were able to fully appreciate the thousands of towering skyscrapers that apparently have all been constructed during the last twenty years. Frankly, it's hard to believe this is a communist country! Shanghai is a newer version of Hong Kong and we were all impressed by the cleanliness and beauty of the place. The picture of the 3rd tallest communications tower in the world (after Toronto and Moscow) was taken from our cabin so you have some idea of how centrally we were docked.
On our first morning, we took a tour called "Shanghai - Old and New" and it was interesting to hear about the history of the place that is now home to 23 million people. This is a far cry from the less than 10,000 who inhabited it when Chairman Mao began his People's Revolution. Every tour guide repeats the same story about how wonderful he was and it's our guess that this is ingrained in them from childhood. No mention of any human rights issues though!
Our Silversea Experience in this city was a visit to see the Chinese Acrobats. The show was spectacular (my photos don't do it justice) and it seems likely that Cirque de Soleil must monitor these young people looking for talent for their productions. China trains them from the young age of 5 or 6 and their careers are pretty much finished by the time they reach 25. Everyone enjoyed the show.
We had two nights here and three full days so we got to see a lot and had some fun at the Bargaining Market which is five stories of small shops where you can get just about anything that can be reproduced. We left with the impression that this is a country that the Western world is right to be worried about!
As we made our way down 68 miles of the Huangpu River and out to the open seas, we again encountered rough weather and very thick fog. Our fog horn has not stopped blasting for 24 hours and although it is 9:30 a.m. on Saturday morning here in the East China Sea, our ship is still shrouded in the stuff. Yesterday, at about 5:00 p.m. Captain Corsaro announced that we would be deviating our course to meet a military vessel and transfer a crew member who needed hospitalization. Apparently it was one of our electricians who had a heart attack . The medical transfer took place just after 7 p.m. right underneath our veranda and I managed to get a couple of pictures of the small ship alongside. We have had several Code Alpha's over the past week and sadly lost one of our fellow passengers just before arriving in Hong Kong.
We have two more days at sea before we reach Viet Nam again. This time Hanoi, or at least the port of Haiphong nearest that city. This will be a new one for us and it will be interesting to compare it to Saigon which continues to grow and prosper. At least we will be back in warmer weather which everyone is looking forward to.
Hope you are all well. It seems that Toronto has been warmer than where we've been for the last few days so that's a good thing.
Adios for now
D & K
No comments:
Post a Comment