Two weeks ago, Trevor and I hosted our first apartment guest in Hong Kong. To be honest, for you to be a “guest” in our 415 square foot apartment, there are a few qualifiers:
01 // You must be awesome, easy-going, and up for adventures
02 // You must be very comfortable with both Trevor and I (in order to access the only bathroom in our apartment you have to come into our bedroom)
03 // You must be very comfortable with a small pug who has no awareness of personal space (this small pug may jump all over you, lick you, and try to sleep on top of you)
04 // You must be okay with sleeping on a couch, in our hybrid living room – kitchen space (and, it definitely helps if you are under 5’8″ tall so you fit comfortably on the couch)
05 // You should probably only be in town for 1-2 nights max (as a combination of any of the above may get annoying fast :))
Alana arrived at our apartment on Friday. She was stopping over to see us after a work trip in Thailand and I was excited. She arrived lugging a giant suitcase up the million stairs that our neighborhood houses, and informed me that she had just walked down the smelliest street of her life (Central’s open air food market). I welcomed her to Hong Kong, and accepted the lovely Thai orchids she had brought (they are still alive!).
Shortly after her arrival, she informed me that she had lost a contact lens along the way, so she had a bit of a vision impairment. I think this served in our favor, as her depth perception and ability to see the details of our apartment clearly were skewed in our favor, as she thought our apartment was much bigger and cooler than it was. 🙂 After an hour of catching up, we headed to a delicious Vietnamese dinner at Bep, and ended the evening early, as everyone was exhausted from the week.
The next morning, Trevor headed off to play baseball while Alana and I made our adventure plans for the day. A hike on Lantau Island was the final decision, and after foraging for some breakfast (cauliflower and falafel from Life Cafe), we gathered up Rhino and ferried across the water to Lantau. My hosting skills were a bit rusty and I didn’t time our transportation well, giving Alana adequate time between our ferry and taxi ride to meet one of Lantau’s craziest drug induced residents as we waited for a cab. Eventually, we got away from the crazy man and his youtube videos, and made our way to the trailhead.
Our selected hike for the day was Sunset Peak, but as we hiked, we unknowingly exited and entered several different trails, adding unintentional kilometers to our hike as we continued upward. We finally decided it was time to end the hike when we realized we had been hiking for over 3 hours, and the trail signage was no longer matching up to our kilometers we were hiking. Nonetheless, it was a great climb to a peak (although not sure which one), with a final scramble up some rocks giving us a beautiful lookout onto mist moving over the ocean and island.
We were hungry (falafel only holds you over for so long) and thirsty, so we chose a more direct trail to return from the peak. The way down was beautiful, thick forest, with stone stairs guiding us down the trail. Trevor texted us to let us know that it was raining on Hong Kong island, and we quickened our pace to try to make it to the train before the rain. We arrived at the MTR station before the storm, and had time to relax and rehydrate ourselves. Rhino was whisked away by some overly enthusiastic Chinese tourists for some selfie shots. Surprisingly, no one wanted to take selfies with the super sweaty, western girls. With Rhino’s ego inflated, we headed back on the train to Central.
After getting cleaned up, we decided on Cha Cha Wan for dinner, knowing we would have to wait. We put our name in, and then walked around Hong Kong looking for a place to grab a drink. We stumbled upon a shop selling microbrews from around the world, learned that you can carry open beverages on the streets of Hong Kong, and had found our solution to killing time. Beer in hand, we had just begun our stroll around Soho, when the restaurant called us to let us know our table was ready. Over a meal of larb, papaya salad, chicken and a thai omelet, we caught up on our days adventures and shared stories of what we had been up to in our respective cities. A serving of mango sticky rice finished off the meal, and we ended our day with full bellies.
The next morning Alana headed off on her return flight to Portland, OR, where Dagny, Seamus and Chris would be awaiting her arrival. I was sad to see my friend go, but so happy I got to spend time with her in Hong Kong, and that we continue to add to our list of adventures we have experienced together. I cannot wait for the next one, although I know these Hong Kong accommodations will be hard to beat 🙂