Hong Kong and Done

We spent far too long travelling today. Too many trains. A lot of the travel could have been taken care of in a cab and allowed for more time in Hong Kong.

That said, Guilin to Hong Kong was pretty rad.

We were on two bullet trains! This one topped out seconds after I took this photo at 302 km/h. You honestly could not feel it. The scenery didn't zoom by or anything. It was very smooth and steady. Probably the most comfortable transportation we were on the whole trip. It still took us about two hours to get from Guilin to Hong Kong.

Once in Hong Kong, we were on public transportation. Forever. It was spacious and efficient, it just was not fast. I think at that point we'd also reached our public transport/trains/subways limit. We just wanted to be outside in what looked like a beautiful city.

By the time we got to the hotel all I wanted to do was stop and check my email. There is no Great Firewall of China in Hong Kong so gmail worked and I had approximately 200 emails to deal with. Oy. but yay.

This is where my personal worst travel experience happened.
When I travel I have routines. I have to check in to my flights 24 hours in advance. I set alarms for this, even if this means getting up at 0430. I couldn't do it this time because we were on a night train at the time. Fine. I could check in when we got to the hotel. No big deal.
Except the airline's website wasn't working. Their mobile app was in Chinese. My flight is leaving in 10 hours and I can't check in. I'm willing to concede it might be my tablet so I try the hotel in the lobby. Nope. Site is down.
I am exhausted. I am drained. I am now stressing out with a lot of Worst Case Scenarios in my head. This is where I have a small panic attack. I can't breathe. I can't think. I can hardly stand. This isn't going well. My mind is going in circles about it - I can't check in so I can't get on my flight, I'll miss my flight home, I'll miss work, I'll be fired, I have no back up plan, there goes my pension, if I can't work I can't pay rent, I'm going to be homeless - and logic is not my friend. Logically, I'm aware that I can go to the airport a bit early and check in there. I'm not going to miss my flight and be homeless. I'm aware of this but nope, my brain isn't having it. So I start crying and freaking out. A lot. Team USA manages to calm me a bit with distraction in the hotel lobby and I am okay. Team USA gets panic attacks and what helps is controlling the things they can; in this case, I can request a cab from the lovely English speaking staff. It helps. One less thing to worry about. Then I think check the site again, maybe it's up now that you're sane. Nope. Still down. And it starts again. Team Germany has the wisdom to get me outside. The flashing lights and busyness help a lot. There's nothing I can do about it now so I may as well enjoy the time I have.

 We went to the Jade Market which is like the Pearl Market, but with jade. We didn't have a very long time to shop, sadly. It was also in a very sketchy area - in what looked like a plywood box, under an overpass.

It was a very warm night, probably about 28 degrees. Too warm for jeans! We went for dinner at an excellent place on Temple Street before going to the Temple Street Night Market. It was loud and bright and chaotic and hot. There were also a lot of undercover cops there busting people buying fakes. Whoops.

What was not fake was Ash's backpack.
Not long ago, Steve was looking for a "triangle drawstring backpack, but you can only get them in the Caribbean." Not SportChek or Walmart or anything, no sir. Only in the Caribbean. Except the one he bought at SportChek. I noticed early on that Ash had been carrying one of these bags so I had to ask him about it.

From here we went to Victoria Harbour to see the light show.

 

The CBD across the harbour from where we were puts on a spectacular light show. You can get on a tourist boat an see it from there but where we were and it was no less spectacular.

This is the International Finance Centre. It is a goal building of mine to see - it was designed by I.M. Pei. I've wanted to see one of his buildings and I'm glad it was in Hong Kong. 

James and the palm tree tradition.

On the way back to the hotel, the group split up. I didn't feel like taking the subway because it was gorgeous. Instead, I thought I could find my way back by landmarks and navigation. Nope. I circled the street the hotel was on for over an hour. Well hello again, start of a panic attack. But I don't let it happen this time. I have the card for the hotel and I went into a store. I asked for directions in English and they were able to tell me in delightfully British accented English that the hotel was four doors down.

The beds in the hotel were awful. It was a mid-market hotel but the beds were basically a plywood box with a piece of plywood on it and some warm blankets. They made the night trains look like luxury digs.  I was too tired at this point to care or to dig out my air mattress. My bag was locked. I found an English channel on the tv, read my emails (I love you, wide wide world of webs) and maybe nap.

It wasn't a long nap before I had to be in my cab (that was on time) and get to the airport early so I could check in. There's a long ass line up of people trying to check in to various flights. Well hello, anxiety. They can't find my ticket, despite me showing them the e-ticket on my tablet and things are not going well for me. Breathe. It takes them about 10 minutes but eventually they find my ticket. Thank god.

The airport is HUGE. I have to take a bus to get to my gate. It's not some like five minute bus ride either, it take about 15 minutes. Weird. There's another five minute bus ride to the actual plane as well; we boarded in the middle of the tarmac.

The flight is uneventful and before too long I'm back in Canada where I can shower and not worry about the water getting in my mouth and making me dead.