NOTE- Just as soon as we get caught up blogging, what happens? Our laptop LCD screen goes out on us! It took us almost all of last week, but we were lucky enough to find a quality repair shop that fixed the problem and did so for less than $30 bucks. Now, back to the adventures.Finally the time arrived for our first vacation. We had planned a trip to go to Macau several weeks prior and after sharing our plans the Grants decided they would join us. We took a private van down to Zhuhai, a Chinese beach-border town. We decided to avoid the pricey hotels in Macau and opt instead for the more reasonable rates in China. This decision proved to have both pros and cons.
Dongguan to Zhuhai is only about a two hour drive. Because it was a Chinese holiday we anticipated crowds. Things went smoothly until we neared the Gongbei Customs. This area is the border crossing location from China to Macau. Warren and Adan booked hotels about a mile away from this spot. After struggling through the thick traffic, we decided to have the driver drop us off on the main drag and we would find our way to our hotel from there.
It turned out that our hotel was down a very popular retail street filled with tens and tens of stores. The vendors sold food, clothes, shoes, and even 2 yuan shops (kind of like one dollar stores). Ultimately we made it to our hotel. Even though it was about 12:30pm, they were kind enough to let us check in early. We took our bags to our rooms and freshened up before heading to Macau.
Chaos at Customs
We quickly understood why many people decided to bite the bullet and pay to stay in Macau. The lines at customs are incredible. We ended up waiting about one hour to cross on the China side. Then once you make it through, things are a breeze with Macau. This process takes about 20 minutes at most. We have included a picture of the lines for you to see.Once we got across and situated it was time to exchange yuan for Hong Kong dollars. Macau does have a currency called Patacas but they are basically equal in value to the HK dollar and used interchangeably in Macau. With money in hand we were ready to start exploring Macau. We decided to walk a few blocks and get a feel for the area before taking the public transit. It sure doesn't take long to see the Portuguese influence that still exists here today after explorers from Portugal landed in the Orient. Everywhere you look street signs, store signs, almost everything is in Chinese and Portuguese.
Senado Square
After wandering for a bit we stumbled upon the famous Senado Square. This beautiful area is home to Macau's largest pedestrian square. It was designed by Portuguese with wavy stone-mosaic walking streets. Businesses line the streets filled with hundreds and hundreds of individuals. Every so often tourists are treated with preserved landmarks through out this path that leads to the ruins of Saint Paul's. The Holy House of Mercy originally built during the 16th century is first, followed by St. Dominic's Church (see picture). The walkway culminates with a breathtaking view of the famous ruins of St. Paul's.
The landmark was originally the Church of Mater Dei built in the early 1600s, but now all that remains is a facade after a fire in 1835 destroyed much of it and the nearby St. Paul's College, what is regarded as the first western-style university in the Far East. The ruins now function symbolically as an altar to the city.International Fireworks
As it turns out, every October 1st, National Day, Macau has a grand finale to a four week-long international fireworks competition. We learned about this event just days before coming. We thought it would be wise to stake out a location early before sunset so we headed down to the Macau Tower to do this and find a nice place to eat. It was no easy task to find us a decent spot and get food for dinner.
Ultimately, Warren and Adan left Terese and Pazi and set out on foot to find dinner while the ladies guarded the seating for the fireworks show. To make a long story short, the two men came back about forty-five minutes later with take out food from a Chinese restaurant. It was quite the task both in having to search high and low for take out food, and then the fact that the staff at the restaurant really knew no English. Both Warren and Adan were very proud of their accomplishments.
We finished dinner right on time and not more than five minutes later the fireworks began. It was a great view seeing the Macau Tower in sight as the fireworks lit up the harbor and the evening sky. We also learned that evening that the Macau Tower is the 10th tallest free-standing structure in the world. It was quite remarkable.Casinos and Cuisine
Day two of the Macau trip started with us meeting for Chinese breakfast. We had various noodles, dumplings, and rolls. The food is light and not extremely tasteful, however it did the job. We set out for our second attempt at the border crossing right after eating. And much to our surprise it was worse. The lines were stacked up twice as long. It appeared that it would take us at least an hour and a half of waiting before we would even make it to the front of the line.
Then Adan noticed something. There happens to be a "foreigners" line at customs. However, the Chinese nationals wanting to get across spilled over so far and crammed each other so tight in the lines, that they seemed to be standing and waiting in this "foreigners" line. Adan walked over and cut the wait of the group in half by seeing that they were obstructing the path for foreigners. Observing this small detail saved us at least thirty minutes.
Within fifty minutes we were through and ready to go. We spent the better part of our day exploring temples, city street ways, architecture,a city garden park, and casinos. The two main highlights of the day would have to be going to the Wynn Casino and eating authentic Macanese food at a nice sit down restaurant.
The casino experience was fun and worth the time. Macau supposedly is the new gambling mecca. In fact more so according to some, as estimates say that Macau casino tables make nine times the money that Vegas tables make. That's major money changing hands! We tried two casinos to get a feel for the way things worked. The Casino Lisboa was the first one we visited. It was not like anything in Las Vegas. High security met you at the door, no hats allowed, only tables with games we all were unfamiliar with besides Blackjack, and high buy-ins. It did not take us long to leave.The next casino was the Wynn. Since it is an American casino, we figured that it would be more Vegas-like. It was indeed. This casino was very high class, several tables, slots, and beverages to go around. Pazi had an itch to try the video slots so she played about 50 Hong Kong dollars. Terese decided to join her and put in about 25 HK dollars. Pazi was playing break even until eventually the house took the money. Terese after about fifteen minutes hit the jackpot. She ended up winning 1,000 HK dollars! She was so excited and rightfully so. Just in case you are wondering the US conversion to what she won is about $140 dollars, but hey she only played about $3-4 to get it.
Dinner was also an experience. We had been told to try the famous Portuguese dishes of Macau and we were not leaving without doing so. Pazi ordered the African Chicken, Adan had Portuguese Bacalhau Cod, Teresa tried Curry Fried Crab, and Warren decided on Portuguese Pork. All the dishes were superb. Although curry is not Adan and Pazi's favorite ingredient, the way it was prepared at the restaurant made it delicious. The food was definitely more than in China (each plate was $12 dollars) but we decided to splurge for the occasion.All in all Macau is a great place to visit. Since we are only about two hours a way we definitely plan on going back again.
