The world's longest escalator

Today we went back to the visa office and picked up our passports. I just love having a passport full of visas and stamps from different countries. I feel so worldly...

After the visa office we walked across town to the world's longest escalator. The kids were losing it a bit by the time we got there. As a charter member of the bad mothers club, I bought them sugary drinks and ice creams to keep them going at intervals over the course of the day. It changed the tone a couple of times.

The escalator itself is really a series of travellators and escalators. Each section moves downward in the morning and upward in the afternoon so people who live in the "mid-levels" of Hong Kong can use it to commute downtown to work. The kids felt kind of ripped off when they saw it wasn't just one long escalator stretching in one unbroken line up to the clouds, but by the time we got to the top half an hour later, they were suitably impressed by the magnitude of it. It would be a real rip off for all the restaurants and shops along the route if no one could get off to frequent them. I saw my first Krispy Kreme outlet in Asia on the escalator route as well as restaurants of all kinds. We ate Mexican.

We walked back down, passing through the botanical and zoological gardens on the way. Alan had his heart set on a ferry ride, so we took one across to get back to the Kowloon side to catch our commuter train home. They are dirt cheap. It cost $1 canadian for the four of us to take the ferry across the harbour. The same trip by subway is about 4-5 times as much.

Tomorrow we are going to see a big buddha.