Hong Kong Day 2: We are just getting warmed up

The fountain at The Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Gardens

Are you ready for day 2? Do you think after all the walking in day 1 your feet can handle it? Well of course yours can, I'm sure you're just hanging out somewhere right now. Sitting down. Notice how good it feels to sit down? Remember that feeling because we aren't going to be feeling it again for a while. Got your dragon shoes on? Are you ready? Let's go!

The plan for day 2 was very similar to day 1. Get up. Walk. The big difference this time was....Ta da! We had a plan of action! And a map! Yay us! Also, we decided to take the metro to the other side of town in an attempt to save our feet a little. See? We spend one day getting lost in Hong Kong and all of a sudden we are Hong Kong exploring masters.

 The first stop on our adventure today is the Man Mo Temple. The Man Mo temple located on Hollywood Road is among the oldest and most well-known temples in the territory. The words Man Mo mean civil and military, and like many other Man Mo Temples located throughout China, is dedicated to two very different gods. Man Cheong is the God of Literature while Mo refers to Kwan Yu, the god of war. Man is dressed in green and holds a writing brush in his hand. Kwan Yu is dressed in red and swings a mighty sword.

 

 

Now when you hear the word temple, you are probably picturing some grandiose building encircled by shrines, set atop a hillside over looking the city. In all reality it is a low building encircled by modern day Hong Kong. It blends right into the urban fabric and if you're not careful, you might miss it. But please be careful because it really is something you should see. With clouds of incense hanging in the air, streams of sunlight fighting its way through to dance across the gold statues and visitors filing in and out for pictures or prayers, the Man Mo temple is really quite active. In a modern international city, its a little reminder of China's long and storied history. 

After our stop at the temple, Lauren and I decided walk around some of the street markets to see what we could see. There was quite a plethora of sights, sounds and smells to put the full culture of China right in front of our face. It was pretty awesome to navigate through the crowds and past some of the stalls. Our goal for the afternoon however was to make our way over to the The Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Gardens because, well, who doesn't like going to the zoo? Especially when it's free! While not quite as grand as say the National Zoo in Washington D.C., it was still a nice way to spend the afternoon. Lots of trees, fountains, and flowers provided the backdrop to see some monkeys and birds. This is pretty much all they had. Oh there were supposedly some reptiles (turtles and snakes and lizards) but none of them were out and about. Regardless of the lack of diversity and the reptiles acting in cold blood and not showing up, the zoo was quite enjoyable. The highlights had to be watching the orangutan swing around and the sunbathing lemurs. We cruised around the park a little more, stopping in the botanical garden and getting approached by a monk asking for money (more on this at a later date) before making our way to Hong Kong park. This time though we didn't get lost.

Hong Kong park is quite large and we spent our time today walking around a part we didn't get to see yesterday. We saw some more fountains, an art walk, and made our way to the Tea Museum to check out some awesome artistic displays of tea paraphernalia. We even saw some wedding pictures being taken! By this time it was starting to get close to sunset and time for our next plan of action to kick in: Victoria Peak at Sunset.

Stay tuned for stories of fun with the sun!