Adventures in Asia: Macau

I knew the trip from Hong Kong to Macau was only one hour long, but I didn't realize how fast these ferries go!  The distance is something like 60 or 65 kilometres, so presumably the catamaran tops out at somewhat higher than that speed per hour.

Once in Macau we went through immigration . . .

. . . and found the row of shuttle buses the casinos run.

We found ours, which took us to the famous Venetian resort.

At one time it was the largest building in the world, although it has slipped down the list since; I think it remains the largest casino in the world.  No matter what, it is huge.  By far the greatest part about the public areas of the hotel, in my opinion, was the lovely classical music playing constantly.  It gave the place a really elegant feel.

It was now 23:00, but we took a few minutes to walk around anyway, marveling at the number of shops (over 600!) and the "canal" running through the mall's "streets."

We did not see any gondolas operating, but I gather you can take gondola rides through the mall at certain times.

Our room, the lowest class available, was spectacular.  

We felt like royalty.  The bathroom is bigger than my bedroom back home.

Although we were late going to bed last night, I was up early this morning, eager to start seeing Macau.  I left Andrea to sleep and walked over to Taipa Village.  To do this, I exited the Venetian, took a footbridge over the street, and walked/rode people movers along a covered, open air walkway.

This walkway ran between a Chinese military training base and a reservoir or lagoon.  I could hear music and marching commands over the walls of the military compound (later I was able to glimpse soldiers marching in formation), and saw statues of water buffalo in the reservoir to my right.  These buffalo seemed so lifelike that I was momentarily hopeful they were real (you can just see them through the railing below).

The village dates back to Portuguese colonial times, and is made up of blocks and blocks of little alleys and walkways.  It's very quaint.  As elsewhere in Macau, Portuguese is evident on many of the official signs.   

I also encountered a fascinating multilingual poster encouraging mutual support for neighbors!

At this time of day most of the shops and restaurants were closed, but there were lots of people out, including elderly people walking and talking to neighbours; uniformed children going to school; and adults scurrying to work, mostly, it seemed to me, towards the casinos, which must be the dominant employer in Macau, I assume.  I bought some breakfast to take back to the room and headed back to the Venetian.

We ate breakfast at the table in our room, looking out at Macau below.  We were 19 floors up, looking north over the military complex and reservoir, the village, and the residential area of Taipa.  

Macau is basically made up of two islands, Coloane and Taipa, and the peninsula of Macau itself.  Originally the Portuguese were just in Coloane and Taipa, before acquiring the peninsula as well.  This history is similar to the British in Hong Kong beginning with Hong Kong island before acquiring Kowloon and leasing the New Territories.  The Venetian is along what is known as the Cotai Strip.  Cotai is a mash-up of Coloane and Taipa, and is entirely reclaimed land.  

After breakfast we walked through the Venetian again, over to the Sheraton, St. Regis, and other casinos until we reached the City of Dreams.  

From City of Dreams we took a shuttle to the ferry terminal, then took another to the Grand Lisboa casino.     

Other than being somewhat iconic, Grand Lisboa was convenient for us because it's close to some of the most interesting old colonial parts of Macau (on the peninsula).  

The streets themselves are pretty neat here, as they are artistically cobbled, with designs such as squid, seahorses, ships, and so on.  

There are also many old European style buildings.

I really found these blocks to be an interesting blend of Asian and European, unlike anything I've seen elsewhere in the world. 

St. Paul's ruins are probably the most iconic historical site in Macau.  The church was begun in 1602 (I was amazed to learn how long ago the Portuguese colonization of Macau began), but was destroyed by fire almost two hundred years ago.  Today the church's facade still stands, and nothing else.

While walking these old streets, I bought two of Macau's most famous foods: an egg tart, from a cafe called Cafe e Nata Margaret's, and a pork chop bun from a nondescript place near St. Paul's.  Both were good, although different than I expected.  For some reason I expected the egg tart to be less eggy and more custardy; and the pork chop bun is literally a pork chop on a bun, bone and all!  The bun reminded me of European baguette, and the pork chop bun struck me as a similar type of food as the Vietnamese sandwich.  Anyway, I enjoyed both of them.

While in the Largo do Senado, the old main square, I bought a postcard from a street vendor.  When I asked where to get a stamp, the man took another postcard, this one depicting the square, and showed me which building was the post office.  I found this pretty amusing, but also rather ingenious.  Here's the post office: 

From Largo do Senado we walked towards Hotel Sintra, where we could catch another casino shuttle.

The shuttle took us back to City of Dreams, from whence we walked back to the Venetian.  We had a late checkout of 14:00 and we wanted to maximize enjoyment of our lovely room, so we ate lunch in the room, and showered in our marble shower.

At 13:45 we headed downstairs again to catch another casino shuttle, this time back to the ferry terminal for our catamarn back to Hong Kong.  

Once in Hong Kong, we rode the MTR back to Plaza Hollywood, and caught the shuttle back to the Sapphire Princess to be on board by 17:30.