Happy Chung Yeung Day! (AKA Big WAVE Bay Day!)

Holidays in Hong Kong are strange to us.

First of all,

we have NO CLUE what they really mean.

Today was Chung Yeung Festival Day!

Todd asked what exactly the holiday was celebrating.

He was told it was hard to explain,

and it has to do something with dead relatives and graves,

but NOT grave sweeping day! Ok then.   

What it meant to me was ...

ON THIS fine Tuesday, 

(Yah, a lot of holidays are on Tues or Weds?

I love that we move them to Mon or Fri - 3 day weekend!)

Todd would be home to play!  WOO HOOO!!!

Kayla had requested to go to the beach.

Well, it so happened that there was a beach that Todd has been wanting to check out.

We haven't done it yet, because it has been tooo hot,

and it take 2.5 hours to get there!

But, this fine Tuesday was looking for an adventure,

and it was only going to be a balmy 84 degrees F, 

so it sounded perfect!

We actually started the fun the night before.

Todd quickly came home from work, changed and we ran out!

We grabbed some eats from the grocery store for dinner,

and ran to the movies near downtown!

We saw, "The perks of being a wallflower",

while eating our food!

We really enjoyed the movie.

We highly recommend it!

Anyhow, back to Chung Yeung Day!

Early this morning, we set out to find the beach
with the Big Waves!

We had to take our local 'orange' train line from start to finish.

The Orange line ends at Central Station Downtown.

Then we hopped on the Dark Blue line and took it to the end.

Between the two it took about 2 hours.

After we ended up here:

We have NEVER been this far to the other side of HK before.

I like our side of town better.

We needed to catch Bus Number 9 to get to the big waves.

This was the 'queue' for the bus....

 It was SERIOUSLY LONG! 

We got on the 5th bus to arrive after we got in line.

Fortunately, since it was a holiday 

the buses were coming much more frequently 

then the schedule of one every 20 minutes said.

The bus looked something like this one.

Before we got in line, we had to find the facilities,

which gave me a photo opp of the two cuties I was with!

Finally, ON the bus!

We were in the last row on the top story of the bus! 

The bus took us up windy, VERY narrow,

roads through the mountains with sheer cliff-like drops everywhere.

Normally, it doesn't bother me,

but today I was tired and for some reason it seemed way scary!

One of the stops that tons of people got off at was this one.

It made me laugh.

Read the signs...

One is for a 'Rehab", the other a "correctional facility"

There was a third for a County Park, but it still made seemed funny. 

Some pics, with me whining that Kay really should NOT walk around,

while the bus was moving.

I was sure she would magically FLY out or something. 

She seemed a bit put out, but obliged me.

 The views were beautiful.

After we finally arrived at our stop, 

which the bus was going so fast we almost didn't make it off in time.

Remember we were at the very back upstairs on the bus.
Todd had to actually get the bus driver to STOP after starting to go.

Then we walked for about 10 minutes on beautiful, small tree-lined road.

We knew we must be getting close when cars started to line the street!

Cars.  Real CARS!  Weird?!

Yay!!

Todd was excited to see Body board and surfboard rental places along the walk way.

Oh, and we heard the cutest little mewing of a tiny new kitten.

After a little bit we saw a Mommy cat appear,

and the kitten crawled out to her.

They were a distance away and in the shadows,

so it is hard to see.

You will have to use your imagination, I suppose.

Almost to the beach,

but one more potty break.

It was WARM.

There was a LOT of hydration going on.

Of course the potty was up some tall like mountain/step laden path...

Ok, finally, finally we were heading down to the beach!

Woohoo Surfboards!

The beach was beautiful.

The sand silky soft....

 and it even had a little cafe overlooking the water with English food!

Happy Kay!

After a little lunch we set out to play!

 There were some beautiful, natural tide pools and rock formations!

 The water in Hong Kong is VERY warm.

Almost too warm...

It is weird.  

Your feet are SUPPOSED to turn purple upon entering the ocean, aren't they?

Kayla played model for me! 

So cute! 

These girls were saying something about Todd,

while Kayla and I were away....

Little did they know, he could understand! HA!

There were waves and people surfing and body boarding,

but were they BIG waves, not really.

But, definitely would be fun to body board in!

If you look closely,

that is a dead fish between my shadow legs.

GROSS!!!

A little while later, we saw a small child running around with it in his hands.

EUW!

Right before we were about to head back,

Kayla rescued a little crab.

He was wandering right in a walking path.

She bravely and gently scooped him up 

 and set him at the edge of the tide pools by the water.

He was really cute!

You did have to watch out,

as there were monkeys in the trees! 

Only draw back to the beach is the amount of TRASH in the water?

Why would you litter up a beautiful place, where you like to play?

I don't get it.

On our way home,

Central is about half way,

so we decided to stop for dinner.

We were told of this little Mexican place in Central we should check out.

The squids were excited!

Sounded promising,

but alas, we lived an hour from Mexico.

Just didn't cut it!

To make ourselves feel better we stopped at an American BBQ place for dessert.

We already KNEW the dessert would be amazing!

It was fun walking through downtown.

As downtown is all decked out in Halloween decor!

So fun!

The dessert was amazing, as we had hoped!

We ate too much of it.

They were true American style portions,

and we each had our own!

Really fun day!

Now, back to reality tomorrow, booo!