At last the long awaited family holiday to Hong Kong has arrived.

We’re travelling Garuda to Hong Kong, which gives us the fortunate bonus of  a stop over in Bali on the way home.

It also meant we transferred in Jakarta on the way there. What a horrible airport. Maybe it was just my experience though. Firstly, there must have been heavy air traffic, because we had to circle above the Java sea for about 45 minutes before we were allowed to land.

When we did eventually land we taxied for what seemed like hours. We disembarked onto the tarmac and into a bus. The bus ride was at least 15 minutes. Into the terminal – and an another security check. Jakarta is one hour behind Perth. That’s very puzzling seeing it’s west of Perth – and Bali (east of Jakarta) is the same time as Perth. It meant our layer-over was 1 more hour than I expected. The terminal was hot and not bar to be seen. The “gate” was shared with at least one other flight, which meant there was few seats available. And of course another security check. We had to quickly drink the water we’d bought. We were called to board about 45 minutes early – to allow for the bus ride to the plane. Goodbye Jakarta!

Hong Kong airport, on the other hand is a delight.

We arrived at 5.30am. We were all feeling remarkably fresh and decided to start the adventure by catching public transport to our hotel. Again it was a delight. The train was fast and efficient. There was a free shuttle bus that dropped us at the door of our hotel.

We arrived during the breakfast service and decided to check-in and have breakfast straight away. Breakfast was very good with a large variety of food and a cute young chef at the egg station 🙂 . After breakfast we all had a quick nap before exploring Kowloon.

We finished the day having a Tsingtao or two, while the kids explored the Temple St markets.

Next stop Disneyland.