Tuesday 29 September 2990 Onwards: Homeward Bound O

For no particularly good reason it felt like we were on the homeward leg of the holiday to Melbourne even before we got to England. Maybe it was the thought of there only being one week left of the entire holiday, maybe the thought of two long haul flights coming up within days of now.

The 200km drive down the A1 to London Heathrow was uneventful, as was customs, as was duty free (albeit my buying five bottles of Grand Reserve Rioja), and onwards to Hong Kong.

At Hong Kong we popped up to Mong Kok for an enjoyable tour of the flower, bird and goldfish markets before being taken to another traditional Cantonese restaurant in Sheung Wan.


Indigo, pictures standing in-front of the flowers giving her Chinese name, Dzi-lan

It was very busy as today was the 60th anniversary of communist rule in China. So the harbour had a massive fireworks show. The TV coverage showed a military parade of the type I’d last seen in the 80’s Soviet era. The locals showed no apparent emotion or opinion either way, though I did note that the editor of the South China Morning Post that day did note the need to cleanse the Party of corruption. The next day I picked up the bottle of Sean Thackrey Orion 1994 that I’d ordered two weeks beforehand, the culmination of three years of searching for his wine. Patrick had helped me get to the vendor’s office by hailing a taxi for me. The journey through Mid-Levels, Sheung Wan the opened out to the vistas of Central yet again reinforcing the dynamism of Hong Kong. It really is a special place. After picking up new glasses for Pat we went back to the MIL’s and then by bus to the airport. Wing Hei cried as we walked to the departure gate checkpoint.