TRIP + PLATE + 365 days
There is no more Hong Kong institution than the cha chaan teng. Not the harbor view, not the night market, not even the dim sum — the cha chaan teng is where Hong Kong actually lives, every morning, every afternoon, and late into the evening. I visited three of the city’s most celebrated examples during … Read more
Most Hong Kong itineraries are built around the harbor view, the Peak, and the temple circuit. The Mong Kok Flower Market and Bird Garden belong to a different category — experiences that have nothing to do with the tourist circuit and everything to do with how the city actually lives. I visited on the afternoon … Read more
The Hong Kong Museum of Art sits on the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront in a position that most museums would envy — directly on Victoria Harbour, adjacent to the Cultural Centre, with the Hong Kong Island skyline visible across the water from its upper floors. I visited on the second morning of my January trip, … Read more
Temple Street arrives in layers. The first thing you notice is the smell — grilled meats and incense mixing in the narrow lanes before you’ve seen a single stall. Then the noise — vendors calling, Cantonese opera from somewhere deeper in the market, the general compression of sound that a covered street market at full … Read more
There are things you think you know about Hong Kong before you visit, and Victoria Peak at night is one of them. The photographs are everywhere — the illuminated skyline spread below, the harbor reflecting the tower lights, the density of the city visible from above in a way that makes it look almost unreal. … Read more
There are places in Hong Kong that look exactly like their photographs, and places that don’t. The Monster Building Hong Kong is emphatically the latter — not because the photographs are dishonest, but because the scale of what you see when you walk into the inner courtyard and look up simply doesn’t translate to a … Read more
The Hong Kong Observation Wheel (香港摩天輪) is a 60-meter Ferris wheel located on the Central Harbourfront — the reclaimed land waterfront on Hong Kong Island, adjacent to the Central Piers area and the AIA Vitality Park. It opened in 2014 and has become one of Central’s more distinctive landmarks, visible from the Tsim Sha Tsui … Read more
Some transport experiences are purely functional. The Star Ferry is not one of them. I crossed Victoria Harbour on the Star Ferry on the third morning of my January trip — from the Tsim Sha Tsui pier to Central Pier 7 — and the ten minutes on the water gave me a perspective on Hong … Read more
Hong Kong International Airport is one of the best-connected airports in Asia — and getting from the airport to the city is straightforward once you understand the options. I used two different routes on my January trip: the A25 bus on arrival to Tsim Sha Tsui, and the A11 bus on departure from Central back … Read more
Causeway Bay (銅鑼灣) is where Hong Kong goes to shop. Not the tourist shopping of Tsim Sha Tsui’s Nathan Road or the luxury retail of Central — something more democratic and more local than either. The neighborhood on Hong Kong Island’s northern shore, a short MTR ride east of Central, has the highest retail density … Read more