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| Ruins of St. Pauls - Macau |
Laura and Scott had very kindly got us tickets to see Cirque du Soleil at the Venetian Hotel, Macau on Wednesday. Again, we had a rather late start, and Adam and Zara said they'd meet up with us later, as Adam was feeling a bit delicate after our late night in Wan Chai.
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| Sunset over Macau |
As Macau is a different country we had to take our passports to the ferry port, and we boarded a hydrofoil for the hour long journey. I had no idea what to expect from Macau, apart from what Laura had told us. It was a Portuguese colony and so quite different in character from Hong Kong, but like Hong Kong, is a Special Administrative Region of The People's Republic of China. The first impression, from the hour long queue at passport control, wasn't good - but when we did get through, and got a taxi into the old part of town that started to change.
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| Don't ask! |
As we walked around the old town we could have been in Portugal and the feel was very different from Hong Kong. We sampled the egg tart, a local speciality which is really delicious, and something which looks a bit like a sheet of beef jerky, but made of pork and beef and very sweet.
We visited the ruins of St. Pauls and the nearby fortress where we had fantastic views of the sunset and the city starting to light up. We were now running rather late and had to grab a meal as quickly as we could - Scott and Laura went on to the Venetian Hotel ahead of us as they had to pick up the tickets. After some delay we managed to get a taxi to the hotel and then navigated through the huge building, through the casino, and on to the Zaia Theatre, with about 5 minutes to spare before the Cirque du Soleil show started.
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| Cirque du Soleil |
And what a show! The whole production was even more spectacular than I could have imagined, with performers flying in an out through the air in all directions. There were floating spacemen, upside down flying bicycles, acrobats, jugglers, giant globes, chinese dragons, fireworks - I can't even begin to describe it. If you get the chance, go and see it.
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| Grande Canal Shoppes |
After the show, we strolled around the complex, through the 'Grande Canal Shoppes' upstairs, with a recreation of Venice, complete with canals and gondolas, and then back through the casino. The view of the hotel was even more spectacular outside in the dark.
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| Escalators to the casino |
It was now 11pm and Sally and I decided to take the ferry back as the others went on into town. With a very late night the night before, and an hour long ferry crossing back to Hong Kong ahead of us, we were feeling a bit knackered. Our tickets were for a ferry scheduled for 12:45, but luckily we managed to get standby seats on the one leaving at midnight.
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| The Venetian Hotel |
It didn't take long to get through passport control (although I think the guy on the desk didn't quite believe that the picture on Sally's passport was of her) and we caught a taxi back to the apartment. We fell into bed exhausted after a long, but very enjoyable day.
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