It’s another day of blogging break for me today.  I like this image when I saw in on the Google search page today.  Yes, it’s Singapore’s 45th birthday today and I wish all Singaporeans and residents on this island nation, a Happy National Day!

On my last day in Hong Kong, I walked around at New Town Plaza III (above Sha Tin MTR Station) where they have a Snoopy’s World on their rooftop garden area.

Yup that’s Charlie Brown and he seems to be performing a welcoming a tap dance for visitors!

A nice outer ’shell’ of a yellow school bus is on display there.  Visitors can climb aboard to explore its spacious inside.

Charlie and his companions posing beside the yellow school bus.  Can anyone remember the names of his 2 companions?

There is a boat ride for visitors, or rather shoppers who had spent a certain amount at the plaza.

Haha, this structure and clock tower represents their school! 

Some more attractions are still “work-in-progress”.  Nevertheless, the artwork on the boards are very nice!  I think the black haired girl is Lucy.  I can’t recall the names of the blond girl (is she Sally?) and the boy with his beloved blue blanket.  Can you remember them?

I think the little yellow bird is Woodstock.

And the whole gang chases or follows Woodstock and Snoopy to who knows where, LOL! 

The ‘bony’ benches there look so cute!

Here are some more friends of Charlie Brown.  I really cannot recall who they all are, other than Snoopy.  It has been more than 15 years since I last saw the cartoon series, and I rarely even look at the comic strips in the newspapers.

And here we have the ’Peanuts’ gang, who are still going strong since their debut in 1950!  I think their creator is no longer around, but his legacy lives on in his unforgettable pop culture creations!

This is the latest attraction at Ocean Park, Hong Kong - Dreamworks’ “How to Train your Dragon” where visitors are each given an electronic Viking shield to activate the onscreen quiz and games about the movie.  Your score is recorded in your shield which you then use to print out a certificate of participation or graduation into a “Dragon Knight”, “Hero” etc.

This is the Monstrous Nightmare dragon from the movie.

The Hideous Zippleback dragon.

The little Terrible Tenor dragon.

Visitors can ride on the back of the Gronkle dragon which is posed against a large green background for a photo shoot.

Your photograph of riding on the Gronkle dragon will be photoshopped against a blue sky with clouds to look as if you’re riding it in the skies.  Too bad they only had the Gronkle for visitors to ride.  I only wanted to ride Night Fury, so I didn’t opt to have a Gronkle ride that day. 

And finally the main stars of the movie saved themselves as best for last.  Here we have Night Fury, together with Astrid, and of course his trainer and rider Hiccup!

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These are the other wonderful and traditional sights of Ocean Park.  As it mostly poured throughout that fateful day, I wasn’t too much in the mood to take many photos while holding an umbrella.  Nevertheless, I did take some scenery shots before all the colors became drenched with “greyness”. 

A pair of Giant Pandas reside in an air conditioned habitat at Ocean Park.  As the animals were sleeping then, I didn’t take their photos.

This is a view of the lowland section of Ocean Park taken from the cable car cabin as it climbed the mountain slope to the upper section of the theme park.

Then as the cable car ascended higher, the view of the nearby bay could be seen!

The cable cars travel along the mountain range just beside the sea, all the way to the “highland” station.  The sea and mountain views were fabulous, even on a cloudy day! 

Then it poured from mid-afternoon onwards and nothing much could be done for the rest of the time I was there, except to seek shelter, watch the Dolphin and Sealion show and visit the Atoll and Chinese Sturgeon fish aquariums.  All the outdoor rides were closed due to bad weather… 

Upon entering Hong Kong Disneyland, you’ll be greeted by the main train station building that is built on elevated ground.

Here is a beautiful sculpture of Stitch and his girlfriend (I think) posing on a hammock.  The entire showpiece is made out of flowers!  Isn’t it gorgeous? 

There are 2 castle designs in this photo - the traditional fortress type with grey stone walls in the front, and the fairytale land type that happens to be part of Disney’s logo in the background.  And the grey skies are also very evident!

This is one of my favourite rides in the theme park.  Visitors take “mini spaceship rides” and shoot at indicated targets during the mission and score points!

The famous and lovable characters from Toy Story are featured in a wonderful sand sculpture!  I had to wait several minutes to take this clear shot because many other visitors were also posing with it.

A photo taken from the back of the Disney castle buildings.

This cottage building is actually a Pooh Bear toy shop.  Lovely isn’t it?

The souvenir shops start to light up as evening draws near.

Part of the main street which also resembles a city central street in the US!

Be back again tomorrow for some more photos I took while on a recent short holiday in Hong Kong!

While I took many photos at the Hong Kong Avenue of Stars, these are a few of the big names that were there:

Jacky Cheung aka Zhang Xueyou.

Jackie Chan aka Chen Long.

Brigitte Lin Ching Hsia aka Lin Qingxia.

Josephine Siao Fang Fang.  I took this photo because this actress was innovative by adding in a smiley face as well!

After a while, all the designs were more or less the same, with differences in names, signatures, palm prints and some slight variations in the color trims.

As it was very crowded along this pavement by the harbour, I had to wait for the pedestrians and visitors to move away before I could take clear shots.

Be back for more photos tomorrow, this time of Hong Kong Disneyland!

The cable cars at the foothill station of Lantau Island.  Each cable car can seat 8 adults plus some standing room.  But the wait in the queue to ride them takes around half an hour!

An early aerial view that greets the passengers soon after the cable car ’launches’ into the air from the foothill station (see blue portion)!

One of the green mountain tops covered by clouds in the late afternoon!

A nice view of the first waterway covered by the cable car.

The muddy banks below are dotted with people wading on the shallows to collect mollucs and shellfish!

That flat island with buildings is the Hong Kong International Airport.  You can watch outgoing planes line up to take off and incoming planes land about every 3 minutes, clearly from the cable car!

After a 20 minutes ascending ride, the cable car reaches the station at Ngong Ping Village.  You can see the giant Buddha statue up on a distant mountain from here.  That’s where visitors will proceed to on foot.   

The entry point of Ngong Ping Village.  The traditional Chinese village buildings are now used as souvenir shops.

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Repulse Bay Beach on Hong Kong Island.  The temperature in summer time was around 32 degrees celsius!

A vast and long stretch of sandy beach in front, with a range of mountains (or hills) behind.  The many residential properties built on these hills are considered high end because of the fantastic view of the bay.  Many rich and famous people such as prominent entreprenuers and celebrities live at these hill top and hill side estates!

This man made shallow water part of the bay makes it very tempting for people to take off their shoes and wade in the waters.  That beige portion in the shallow waters is made of the same very stable concrete as the steps and walking areas.  You get to cool your feet and won’t get washed away by the tide!

There are many statues of several famous and popular Chinese deities along the bay as well.  Among them are the God of Fortune (grey statue) and the Deity of Fertility (white statue surrounded by many very young children carvings)

This is known as the Bridge of Longevity whereby visitors are supposed to walk across it and don’t look back and don’t retrace their steps.  People will then come back via another route further down (seen at the far end below the bridge).

This Deity of Matchmaking is very popular with visitors who come by to touch that mystic grey rock (where people are touching) for good luck in meeting their marriage partners soon!

Repulse Bay in Hong Kong.  The beautiful Chinese Dragon statue with a pearl in front of it, lies amongst the other statues.

Here is the other God of Fortune at the venue.

Cruise harbour at Aberdeen on Hong Kong Island.

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Here are some photos that I took during the first day of my recent holiday trip to Hong Kong.  This is a very famous and must see attraction there, where you take a tram up to the the Peak Tower at the top of Victoria Peak.  The aim is to view the cityscape of Hong Kong down below.  As I was there in the evening, I got to see the night view! 

The Peak Tram station at Victoria Peak, on Hong Kong Island.  It’s within walking distance from their Central MTR Station.

The Peak Tram at Victoria Peak, Hong Kong.  After a 10 minute interval, the tram arrived for the batch of visitors queuing before me.  I became the first in line for the next batch of passengers to be released onto the platform after this tram left!

The long queue of visitors to take the Peak Tram at Victoria Peak, Hong Kong.  I queued for more than half an hour on a Sunday evening, in the heat of summer!

The steep Peak Tram track at Victoria Peak, Hong Kong.  The very steep track slopes at around 45 degrees at some points, where the buildings next to the track seem to look like they are ’tilting’ at scary angles instead!

Hong Kong City view at night from the top of Victoria Peak.  A photo cannot truly capture the breathtaking night city view that I saw from the top of The Peak Tower.  You have to be there in person to experience the full granduer, though the feeling would had been much better if it wasn’t summer time.  It didn’t feel that much cooler than the foot of the mountain.

I’ve been to this venue some years ago during their winter season.  It was very cold but much more comfortable then.  So I suggest visiting Hong Kong during anytime except their summer time and typhoon season.  Summer time is great for sales though, if shopping is your main aim for your trip!

Be back again tomorrow to view the photos I took at Repulse Bay and Aberdeen, also on Hong Kong Island!

Yes, I’m back in Singapore as my plane touched down at Changi Airport around midnight today!  While it feels great to be stepping on home soil again, I also feel regretful that my short holiday trip was over so soon.  As I travelled light, handling my luggage and clearing the customs were easy for me. 

While in Hong Kong over the past 5 days, I visited the popular tourist attractions and some shopping areas.  Traveling by their MTR (equivalent to our MRT) was a breeze and very convenient.  On some days I travelled by pre-arranged tour coach to the attraction places like Lantau Island, Disneyland, Ocean Park, for the city tour, plus to and fro their air port.

The blog posts to expect in the coming days will be about:

1) Taking the Peak Tram and visiting the Peak Tower, plus seeing the breath taking night view of Hong Kong from the top of Victoria Peak.  Read more [>>]

2) The beautiful Repulse Bay (a long and curved sandy beach) and Aberdeen (formerly filled with boat people, now has a large collection of private yachts docked there) that is rich in history.  Read more [>>]

3) Taking the cable car up the mountains of Lantau Island to visit Ngong Ping Village (where the giant Buddha statue sitting on top of a hill resides).  Read more [>>]

4) The Hong Kong Avenue of Stars (Hong Kong’s equivalent of Hollywood’s Walk of Fame in the US).  Read more [>>]

5) My visit to Hong Kong Disneyland (the 3rd Disneyland I’ve visited so far, the others being the ones in California, and in Tokyo)!

6) My visit to Ocean Park, the most famous theme park in Hong Kong!

As my laptop is still awaiting its new screen replacement, I’m using an older and much slower back up laptop for now.  Hence uploading photos will be more tedious. 

Nevertheless after unpacking my stuff, I’ll find a way to upload my photos to blog about the places in Hong Kong that I visited.  Come back again to view my upcoming blog posts on the above places that I visited!

I recall reading about a similar topic to this on Jcee’s blog some time ago.  I’ll be going off for my mid year short vacation to Hong Kong tomorrow and will be back 5 days later. 

While I’ve finished packing all the things I need to use for my trip, I’m still considering whether to bring a toy along for fun photography while on holiday.  I used to do this many years ago when I was much newer into toy collecting.  For my previous vacation to the US last year, I didn’t do it.

One thing about bringing toys out with me is that I worry they might get damaged, lose their parts, or worse, get completely lost by some unforeseen mishap, which I am not prepared to accept.  That’s why my toys are called collectibles that are supposed to stay at home and just look pretty for my enjoyment, LOL!

Oh well, I might as well forget this thought and just go on my long overdue holiday without any toys.  Maybe I’ll buy a new toy in Hong Kong and take photos of it there.  That would be a good alternative!