Holiday Inn Hotel Macau Macau Peninsula

... was expecting Macau to just be the big gambling Las Vegas of the ...

... colonial buildings including St. Paul's ruins which now only has one wall standing, but its a good one! The Monte Fort is free is definitely worth a visit. The guy at Augusters really talked up the Macau museum, but we didn't feel like spending the money.<br><br>Instead we walked across town to take the Teleferico up to Guia Fort. We realized afterwords that we could have just as easily walked up to ...

... we had got got! They charged us for the tea, the edamame and the peanuts AND THE RICE! Wow, karma's a *****. So we paid the 268 HKD or whatever the price ended up being and we finished the remaining tea since we were paying for it and rushed off to find a taxi so that we would be on time for our 9:45 Ferry back to Hong Kong. Finding the cab wasn't hard, and he got us to the ferry in 10 minutes. So we were about 40 minutes early. We scrambled to pay him and ...

... from ground level to the highest point. An observation deck with panoramic views, restaurants, theaters, shopping malls and the Skywalk X, a thrilling walking tour around the outer rim. It offers the best view of Macau and in recent years has been used for a variety of adventurous activities. At 233 meters, the Macau Tower's tethered "skyjump" and ...

... and walked out of the ferry terminal and down to the city centre past huge ugly modern casinos and hotels. The Portuguese built them when Macau was still theres and now Macau has the only casinos in the whole of China and so is a very popular tourist destination which has nicknamed it, the Las Vegas of the east. I walked to the city's main cathedral which was quite plain inside. The city ...

... peninsula itself is 9.3square km, which is roughly the size of a large dog. It's puniness was driven home to me when, studying my map, I concluded that I didn't have the time or energy to go and see all the churches and temples and casinos today, so that would wait for tomorrow, and instead I would just go for a wander. In the course of this wander I stumbled upon 3 churches, 1 temple, the remainder of the old city walls and a casino. Tomorrow I may lie ...

... shocked to see sheets of rain coming down. Oh well, we were here now! We got off the boat and took a taxi to Largo do Senado (Square of the Senate). This place is AMAZING! It used to be an Old Portuguese colony and now it's a gambling Mecca. No joke, one part looks like Vegas (complete with a Wynn hotel/casino) one part looks like old Europe, and the rest is Chinese! We walked around the peninsula to find the best Portuguese food we could but most ...

... this! We ascended into the clouds, which smelled relatively fresh, up countless rock stairs on a path that goes straight up, up, up or straight down, down, down (it seems that the idea of a switch-back here is unknown). We climbed two peaks on our way to the big Buddha image (one of the peaks - Lantau - is the second highest in Hong Kong at 900+ meters). Our legs were exhausted but the knowledge that good ...

... dim sum that I enjoy at home, but luckily Matt had a list provided by a local guy he had met that had the names of some dishes written in Cantonese. The BBQ pork buns (fluffy buns) were a big hit as were the chicken feet and shu mai. After being in Hong Kong for a total of two days, it was nice to be in a place that was only frequented by local Asians. After a two-hour meal, our bill came out to be a robust $11US. We walked around for the rest of the afternoon, taking in the ...