First off, let me apologize for not posting these stories sooner. I have been pretty busy and I have been procastinating with the school work as well. I plan on getting caught up on both so that I can post about my adventures a lot sooner than a week or more after they have taken place. Enjoy:

After having hiked most of the previous day as well as staying out late, I thought it would be a great idea to wake up early again and go to Macao. Macao is a nearby city that is connected to Mainland China but isn’t technically a part of the mainland. It is where everyone goes to gamble since casinos aren’t allowed in Hong Kong. It was under Portuguese control until 1999. Macao is accessible from Hong Kong only by boat. I met Stephan and Martin, both from Germany, at 8:30 in the morning. If not for Stephan’s phone call, I would have slept well into the afternoon, having for some reason set no alarm to get up in the morning.

We set out on our way and took the MTR to Hong Kong Island. We got off where we thought the Macao ferry left from, but we were wrong. Another foreigner helped us by pointing us toward the Macao Ferry Pier. We thanked her and took a cab to the right location. We bought our ferry tickets and had breakfast at the McDonald’s before boarding the ferry. This was not your average ferry. It looked ready to enter into a boat race. I took several pictures that will hopefully be posted in my webshots soon. The inside of the super ferry was also very nice. It was set up similar to an airplane, except the seats we were in had a good deal more room than coach and were pretty comfortable. Very easy to catch up on some sleep on the way.

We arrived in Macao without any problems and went through customs. We had planned to meet up with several other Germans we knew, but our cell phones wouldn’t work this far out of Hong Kong. Instead, we just walked toward the casinos with no real plan. We ended up watching a crazy fountain performance set to music with fire right outside of a casino/hotel. After this, we walked toward what looked like another main street. We got several good pictures of the Portuguese buildings. Next, we walked around in a Catholic graveyard with a little church in the middle. After this, we stopped by two 7-11’s, which are our new favorite store. We also went into a building that had an arcade right next to an ice skating rink right next to a bowling alley. Pretty cool.

Next, we found a park to explore. In the middle was a pretty impressive statue in a fountain. The park also had some pretty nice views of the buildings in Macao. After this, we set out toward the Macao Tower, which was back toward the ferry pier. We walked for a bit, stopping in random shops just to browse. I bought a weird waffle snack with butter, sugar, and some other things slathered on. Just as tasty as it looked. Not too long after this, it started sprinkling for about the 5th time, but it wasn’t enough to really bother us. We got some good pictures as we got closer to the Macao Tower, which is one of something like the world’s 15 tallest towers.

The ticket to take the elevator to the top was about $9 or so US, so not too pricey for a tourist attraction. They also had options where you could do something of a bungee jump off the side of the tower, climb the mast at the top, or walk around outside one of the observation decks while secured. In the sake of time and our wallets, we chose to just take the elevator to the top. Even with the tower being so tall, it took almost no time to reach the observation decks. I think the elevator moved at something like 5 m/s. Very zippy. The first observation deck wasn’t entirely enclosed, so the rain on the glass made it very difficult to get any good pictures. After this one, we went down to the other observation deck, which was entirely enclosed. Took many pictures of Macao from about 233 meters off the ground. Also got some nice views straight down out of glass panels built into the floor.

After we had our fill of the tower, we took a cab back towards the casinos. Of course I had to go in at least one, since I am not allowed to back home. We chose the Sands Casino, as it was big and looked nice. After exploring the first floor and seeing many games we didn’t understand, we venture upstairs. After a bit of exploring here as well, Stephan and I decided to try the roulette table. The fact that I didn’t know all the rules probably had something to do with me not winning a single spin. However, I wasn’t discouraged, as it was still a good experience to try at least once.

Our pockets a little lighter, we headed back toward the ferry pier. Along the way, we got some good night pictures of other casinos. For some reason, we got a slightly different ferry on the way back, so our seats were not quite as comfortable. Still nice enough to sleep in after a full day of exploring though. I was happy to finally be back at the hall after a second day in a row of being gone since the wee hours of the morning.