last day in macau

on our second and last day in macau, line and i woke up late. darn! we were so beat the previous day that i woke up at around 10 a.m. with not much time to lose, i immediately hit the shower and woke up line as soon as i finished.

 quarter to 12, line and i were again ready to explore macau

by this time, we’ve already packed our bags and on our way to check out of the hotel. as we’ve done the previous day, we left our bags at the hotel counter upon check-out. that way, we didn’t have to pay for an extra night [lest you forgot; we’re budget travelers, hehe…]

prior to leaving the hotel, we agreed to do the following:

macau: day 1 [2 of 2]

an hour or so into our exploration of macau, line and i were led from one alleyway to another. in one alleyway, we were led to this:

one of the buildings near the fountain above

L: the plaza where the fountain is located// R: alleyway

if i’m not mistaken – line and i chanced upon macau”s residential area

wall art

a little further, we came across this uninteresting building

as it turned out, the building is one of macau’s historical places. this place has been turned into a museum and people are welcome to check out the place free of charge.

 to see more of this place, check out my previous entry entitled “Lou Kau Mansion”

insert vetlongwalks here…. hehe, habit – but pay attention to the nice flooring though

i want these wooden frames in my house, but how???  

gate of an apartment???

ah sweets………..

 

a closer look

 

ice cream… line took this pix for jenny

starbucks — haha, if i didn’t come to macau, i wouldn’t have tasted starbucks’ coffee. hehe, i’m such a cheapskate that i avoid paying for highly-overpriced coffee drinks if i can help it. in this instance, however, line and i had to get coffee to ward off the cold [we had the coffee for breakfast the following day, though, not on this day. plus blame it on my tendency to buy something that’s familiar, starbucks lang ang familiar na coffee shop.] 

back at senado square

taking photos of the photographer

another pix of line [or at least part of line] in action..

another shot of me in senado square on our way back to the hotel

we left senado square and headed to the other part of the city where modern buildings take center stage

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the side of casino lisboa. from this angle, the structure looked as if it were about to fall…[although, it’s not that apparent in this picture. but it does look that way to me when i saw it then.

another shot of casino lisboa. sorry, this pix is a bit dark. promise, the succeeding pix are much clearer..

metropole hotel. our home for the night. booked this hotel through www.directrooms.com @$77/night.  senado square, the ruins of st. paul, the casino area [casino lisboa, the wynn, and other casinos] are just walking distance from the hotel. roughly 5 to 15 minutes walk.

vetlongwalks at the hotel lobby… after 3 hours of walking, line and i decided to wait out the remaining hour at the lobby. hehe, kapoy na lakaw. nalukop na namo ang senado square and the casino area with only the porkchop sandwich to sustain us.

our room… gahi ang bed.  i didn’t mind kay anad ko ug folding bed, hehe. although nagsakit ang likod ni line the morning after.

disposable slippers provided by the hotel [don’t mind the feet, though] /room’s carpet

another side of the room and our gubot things…

an hour after we checked in, line and i were once again ready to hit the streets of macau. take note; we didn’t have a decent sleep the night before and yet we’re ready to make the most of our limited time in macau [we arrived in hk midnight of dec. 27. stayed at the airport until 2 a.m., left for macau at 7 a.m.]

the top of casino lisboa [front view]

line in front of casino lisboa

my turn

 casino lisboa minus the “piña-like” top

another side of casino lisboa. yup the casino is just one humongous building

at this point, line and i decided that we explore the casino area some more once we got back from coloane. coloane is another island in macau. haha, we were determined to find the church of st. francis xavier. hehe, suckers kaayo me sa princess hours. the church is where prince gian and princess janelle were wed. 

in front of hotel lisboa, there’s a bus stop for buses to macau’s two other islands [coloane and taipa]. we took the one going to coloane[ bus 21A as the church of st. francis xavier is in coloane island. the fare from lisboa to coloane island is 5 MOP [macau pattacas]. travel time from lisboa to coloane is roughly an hour or so [kalimut ko sa exact time.]  bus travel was a pleasure as there were many beautiful sights along its route. one of them is taipa island’s The Venetian [another humongous and beautiful casino].

of course we didn’t know where st. francis xavier was and we were so proud to ask around, thus we ended up getting past our right stop. we ended up at Hac-Sa Reservoir BBQ Park. at the end of this street, one can find a famous Portuguese restaurant. The place was jam-packed, thus – line and i didn’t check out the resto. Plus when i mistakenly reached their kitchen i saw the preparation of a “lechon de leche” hehe, nothing wrong was done. place was clean, i just didn’t like seeing the preparation of the dead little pig [lechon de leche], hehe…

at this point, my cam started to act up. thus, i don’t have much pix. i still have to borrow pix from line. hehe, sorry.

anyway,  after trial and error bus rides and lengthy walks, we finally found the church…

vetlongwalks again!!! 🙂

notice the arcades of white and yellow arches at the sides of the church. under these arches are open air restaurants serving Portuguese and Chinese food.  i didn’t see these food establishments at the time of princess’ hour’s shoot, though. we didn’t eat here since we didn’t like the resto’s selection. plus it was already past 7 that we were afraid that there wouldn’t be any bus going back to macau proper.

as it was already past 7 pm, the church was closed. line spent several minutes here taking lotsa pix. after we had enough of the church, we decided to explore the area. the area was spookingly quite. i think people there retire very early. we found one little bakery and bought some tuna sandwich. around 8 p.m., we decided to leave the area and head back to lisboa. to complete our “saag experience” of the day, we again took the wrong bus and ended up at macau’s port area. it was night time and the area had a “dangerous” feel to it. we walked some more [hehe, me not wanting to take a cab kay mahal], checked the numerous bus route posters found in bus stop waiting sheds. we rode the bus which we thought would take us back to lisboa. we passed by one casino, which i couldn’t remember now, when the bus driver started to talk to us in rapid chinese. as we knew nothing of their language, we could only give him a blank stare for a reply. he got exasperated with us until one lady talked to us in english. she asked us where we were headed and then gave the driver instructions of where to drop us off before she got off the bus. apparently, the bus wouldn’t be passing lisboa’s front area. thus, we had to walk some more until we reached the familiar lisboa. hehe, the night lights were truly impressive and we were  confident that we’ve reached the right area this time as we could now see the “piña-head” of lisboa. before we head back to the hotel, we had dinner at one local restaurant. the staff didn’t speak english, thus line ended up pointing at pictures on the menu.

view from the restaurant where we ate.  darn, succeeding pix were truly blurry as my cam would conk on me from time to time

macau at night

lisboa at night [one side of it]

wynn and lisboa from afar. the pix doesn’t do justice to the place. but the whole casino area lit with beautiful lights was truly magnificent, reminiscent of las vegas

wynn’s lake show poster

the show was truly beautiful. the water show runs for about 5 to 10 minutes. it was really a nice show to cap our day. all the saag-saag forgotten.

click on this link to see the video of the lake show…

enjoy macau!!!

will post about our last day in macau soon. be featuring the ruins of st. paul and the museum of art…

for other travel stories, visit my other site —> HERE.

Lou Kau Mansion

On our first day in Macau, line and i searched for the famous Ruins of St. Paul. However, our poor sense of direction led us to this seemingly uninteresting building.

We soon learned that this uninteresting building is one of Macau’s famous historical places: The Lou Kau Mansion.

Click on this link to know more about the mansion.  

we got so fascinated with the place that i think we spent almost an hour here. i swear line used up most of her cam’s memory in taking all these high-resolution pictures [although the ones used here were resized for easier uploading.] 

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*all photos used here are Line‘s. used with her permission.

for other travel stories, visit my other site —> HERE.

macau: day 1

line and i arrived at the metropole hotel around 10 a.m.  of dec. 28, 2007 – 4 hours earlier than our scheduled arrival. upon the advice of the man at the front desk, we left our bags at the hotel baggage counter and decided to begin our exploration of macau.

we got guide books, pamphlets, and maps to help us explore the area. these materials were free and available at the hotel’s front desk counter.

pamphlet of macau churches

inside the above pamphlet: brief background of the churches [ex. the church of st. paul]

the chapel of st. francis xavier [location sa korean tv soap princess hours]. located in another island of macau; coloane village.

a guide on what’s to be expected in macau for the whole month of december 2007. published by the macau government tourist office

the exhibit that we missed!!!!

me with a street map of macau; darn – i misplaced the map.

fully armed and ready, time to hit the road!

buildings galore. really, really,  nice buildings…

buildings and reflections

side view of the macau post office

facade of macau post office building

santa casa da misericordia

senado square: love the place… the shops..

centro de turismo de negocios

macau btc: inside this building, there are two computer units where tourists can use the internet for 30 minutes free of charge [hehe, the guard on duty when we went there was a filipino]

still at senado square [senado square is just 5-minute walk from where we stayed – metropole hotel]

vetlongwalks: haha, my trip isn’t complete without my mark

the best shop name: pretty [hehehe.. priming ang drama!!]

mannequins

more shops

line buying lunch

pork sandwich @ 8 pattacas [hehe, it’s actually porkchop sandwich — as in PORKCHOP! in between sandwich buns]

drinks @ 10 pattacas each [line’s green tea tastes like grass, hehe – she bought another iced choco and threw the green tea. my iced choco is quite okay. not impressive, though]

this is where we had our lunch before we decided to roam some more while enjoying our sandwiches

macau’s wet market: inside this building

nine west, mango, and more…

 alleyways as we search for the ruins of st. paul

don’t know the names of these places. but it’s here that you’ll find interesting local products

macau’s dried products [from fish to nuts]

weird flattened turkey

more meat products

dried seahorse

local shops

after two hours of walking, line and i decided to hit back to our hotel

the sights we saw on our way to the hotel

yagit me

david beckham

little crocs

shop window  

building

another one

line

she took most of the pictures used here … mat salam line^^

wooh, this post has turned out to be a lengthy one. am not even finished with day 1…

will post more pix when i find the time… enjoy macau!

a taste of macau

line and i left the hostel in hongkong december 28 at a little past 7 o’clock in the morning. from the chungking mansions along nathan road, we hopped on a cab headed for the hong kong/china ferry terminal.

location map: paid HK$20 for the cab fare [courtesy of this site]

when we got to the china ferry terminal, the first boat that we saw bound for macau was sched to leave at 8:00 in the morning. thus, line and i readily went to the counter of First Ferry Macau to get a one-way ticket. the ticket cost us HK$133. click this for hk-macau ferry schedule and fare table of First Ferry Macau.

we then proceeded to their immigration to have our passports stamped. at this point, the events happened too fast. there were so many people at the terminal and at the immigration counter that we never had the time to take pictures of the area. besides, we were a bit cautious of being reprimanded again for taking pictures. we didn’t want what happened at the immigration line in hk to happen to us again. thus, we checked the premises for warnings against taking pictures. scanned the area and spotted several notices prohibiting the taking of pictures within the premises. anyway, as there were several people before us at the immigration counter, line and i practically had to run the stretch from the immigration counter to the passenger waiting lounge of first ferry in order not to miss the ferry’s boarding. if i’m not mistaken we barely had 5 minutes to reach the waiting lounge.

moi on a walkalator going to the boarding area

seat 40R [ferry is similar to our own ocean jet/supercat fastcraft]

these are the seats that cushioned our butts for 60-75 minutes – the sailing time from hk to macau.

had to make my mark – LOL!!

vet: line, pwede guro ta picture dinhi oi!. dali wala may tawo.

line: bitaw. pwede na guro take ug pictures dinhi. ako pud.

we headed again to the immigration counter to signify that we’ve entered macau and had permission to stay until january 27, 2008.  as soon as we were cleared by immigration, line had her dollars converted to pattacas – macau’s currency [MOP], then we left the airport for our hotel.

outside the macau ferry terminal

macau snapshots….  

as soon as line was satisfied with the shots she’d taken, we hopped on a cab to take us to the metropole hotel.

we booked an overnight stay at the metropole hotel via www.directrooms.com. we paid US$77 for the standard twin room accommodation.

check-in time at the hotel is 2 p.m. we arrived a little past ten in the morning, thus line asked if we could check-in earlier. the front desk, however,  advised us to just leave our bags free of charge and wait for the 2 pm check-in time. that way, we didn’t have to pay for extra charges.

with 4 hours to kill; line and i left the hotel and began exploring macau

random shots again…  

at the hk airport, line had hello kitty noodles. now, hello kitty on a billboard..naglipana ang hello kitties sa hk ug macau…

mc do in macau signage [the resto: a very small place within a building]

a closer view of hello kitty… on the way to senado square

more of our macau trip on the next entry….

photo credits: line

pre-departure

december 27, 2007 is a red-letter day in my calendar. my beautiful uterus concurs with the resurfacing of moderate R.E.D. flow.

notwithstanding my beautiful u’s ill mood, i still couldn’t contain my excitement. in a few hours, i’ll be off to my first ever out of the country trip. yay!!!

The Passport