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Saturday, January 21, 2017

Hong Kong to Los Angeles

HKG-PVG-LAX -- December 8, 2016

Our final morning in Hong Kong before the long journey home. The last time we stayed at Hyatt Regency, breakfast was included in their lounge and it was wonderful having all the food choices there with the view of Victoria Harbor. This time around, we had to decide on where to have breakfast. There are many restaurants including a few Hong Kong style cafes around the hotel. One is the famous Tsui Wah, and the other one is the Ngan Long Cafe (Silver Dragon), both on Carnarvon Road around the corner. After checking out Tsui Wah, we ended up at Ngan Long which seemed to be a little cheaper and with better reviews. We had been here in August but they ran out on the things we wanted when we were there late that time. Hopefully, they will have everything this early in the morning when the four of us decided to have HK style breakfast while MOR and BIL wanted to have noodles from Kai Kee Noodle across the street. (Ngan Long -- 4~6 Carnarvon Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, Hong Kong). This restaurant is at the basement of the building but the store front is big and easy to find.

Comparing to other restaurants in Hong Kong, this is a spacious and clean place and the service was very good. At least the waiters and waitresses do not have the 'rude' attitude that seems to be the norm in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong style ice-milk tea.

Hot milk tea, excellent!

Hot pineapple bun with creamy butter, $25.

SIL had the set breakfast plate.
$37 HKD including drink.

Ngan Long's famous pork chop bun. Another specialty of this restaurant, $25.

Menu, in Chinese, but the pictures should help. Not sure if they have English menu.


A good breakfast!

Then we went back to the hotel to finish packing and checking out. Taking the free airport express shuttle to the Kowloon Station was easy. We just had to go down to the basement and waited for the bus to come. This is the second stop of the complimentary shuttle, so usually it would still be empty with plenty of space on the bus. Don't expect the driver to help with getting your luggage on the bus though because they won't. In fact, my complain of these buses was that the drivers were very inconsiderate and offer no help at all to the passengers. Some hotels may have bell boys who assist passengers getting their bags on the bus if you are lucky.

A photo of the Star Ferry on the wall of our hotel room with a Star Cruises ship in the background.

In about 20 minutes we arrived at the Airport Express Kowloon Station where we checked in at the airline counters. We won't see our luggage again until we get to L.A.
We got a good discount getting the train tickets for the six of us together. Make sure you ask for discount if you have more than two people together.

Then we went downstairs to get on the train to the airport.

Inside Airport Express. This is such a fast and convenient way. Wish we have that in L.A.



We arrived early and they still have not posted our boarding gate yet so we just waited at this 'comfort' area until we found out where we should go.

Having a quick lunch at the food court from Cafe de Coral before our flight.

Quite decent!

Baked pork chop rice

Our flight was to get to Shanghai first and again we had to board at the remote gate. We said goodbye to our family members who were taking different flights to their destinations around the same time. Until we meet again on our next trip together!

Boarding China Eastern Flight MU 504 Hong Kong to PVG.

Leaving HKIA.




Here, an aerial view of Kai Tak Cruise Terminal.

A meal of spaghetti on this flight.

After about two and a half hour we arrived PVG and again, we had to go through that dreadful transit process. This has to be the worst security check of all airports. Well, Istanbul was terrible as far as checking passports three times with detailed questioning before boarding but here it was the actual security check that drove us crazy. We had our battery pack confiscated because they said it did not have the power printed on the pack. Fine, but that was something we bought in China and didn't have a problem with it in and out of China twice already! They practically ran the x-rays at least twice on each person's bags and also going through the bags by hand. Just make sure you have enough transit time if going through PVG.

China Eastern Flight MU 577 PVG to LAX pushing back.

Once again, we sat at the back of the plane, the first two-seater row.
These are good seats, but I found it very bumpy throughout the flight being at the back of the plane.

For some reasons, the flight map kept telling us that we were at Hongqiao airport instead of Pudong.

Meals on MU flight.

Chicken noodle


fish with rice

After about 10 hours, we were finally flying over California.

L.A. Downtown

and touched down in LAX.

Ah, Norwegian Air, we would be flying that in May from Copenhagen.

This concluded my trip report on this adventure. What a wonderful time we had on this journey. I am so thankful that my health problem did not occur while we were on this trip but a couple of weeks after we got home. It wasn't fun spending nine days in the hospital during Christmas but certainly better than having to have emergency surgery in a far away foreign country. God is good!

2 comments:

  1. Thoroughly enjoyed your posts as we are going on this itinerary in February. One of our Cruise critic members posted the link.
    I will have to read some of your other posts as I have time. Thanks for sharing. Dorothee

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for reading, Dorothee, and the kind words. Have a wonderful cruise in February! Let me know if you have any questions I will try my best to answer.

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