the peak in hongkong

after we put up with snoopy under the hongkong sun, we then head to the peak in hongkong island from sha-tin by train. we changed trains twice while squeezing with the hk people in a busy late afternoon on a saturday. well, that must be during their peak hours and we were heading to the peak during a peak hour! making our experience an overdose of "peakness". LOL i can't believe i'm trying to pull a joke here.

this is the sky terrace in the peak where you can get the best view of the famed skyscrapers in hongkong island and the kowloon peninsula across. but we only had this so-called best view for a split second because as what karina had put it, the peak turned on their fog machines full blast somewhere.

getting here was an integral part of the experience of the peak. let me retrace our steps before our excitement had died down due to this extreme fogginess.

this is the mtr route from sha-tin to central. during this train ride, we didn't seem to mind that we were standing the entire time for we found some interesting scenes while inside the train. scenes not typical back home. :D 

notice that train routes cross the victoria harbour and i expected that they're made up of bridges of some sort. well, to my surprise and utter awe! routes go through under the sea which we only realized while we were in the peak because we tried to remember if there was a time we went across the harbour and all we could remember was the darkness in the subway.

in the central station, we exited through J1 which is nearest to the peak tram terminus, another element of our total "peakness" experience.

finally after half an hour of being underneath the darkness, we emerged to central's preview of its magnificence, their skyscrapers! here's what you might see while you make your initial ascent to the peak. well, you can skip the jump shot part.

we were ecstatic that we were at last out in the open and did several failed jump shots to celebrate! this is the island tram that goes around of course, the hongkong island.

this is st. john's cathedral, a landmark that you shouldn't miss on your way to the peak terminus. if you're not seeing this, surely you're heading to the wrong direction.

until you get to the peak, you will be having diagonal views like this one. i never expected that ascent will commence even before getting to the peak terminus. insert catching of breath here... anyway, near that red taxi was the queue for the ticket counter of the peak terminus.

this was the thick queue of people while waiting for the peak tram and actually this was another queue apart from the queue for tickets which we did first. influx of people is expected at this time because many tourists would likely go to the peak late in the afternoon and catch the hongkong skyline before it gets dark and in a few minutes time, another breathtaking night view will unfold. though unfortunately, this was not our case. ;(

we seemed to be losing the race of scoring seats in every ride that we took that we were once again standing inside the peak tram.

the little consolation for ourselves that time was these diagonal views of the buildings.

that track is for the peak tram. i did try to take a shot with the tram on it but i somehow failed. boo! notice the buildings are almost covered with fog. ;(

we wanted to cherish our time there in the sky terrace to get our money's worth so we read on the peak tram's history. hehe

there's another shot of skyscrapers almost covered with fog along with our itinerary here.

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The Peak Ticket Prices
Peak Tram (One Way) with Sky Terrace - HK$53/Adult,  HK$24/Child and Senior
Peak Tram (Return) with Sky Terrace - HK$65/Adult, HK$31/Child and Senior

Peak Tram (One Way) - HK$28/Adult,  HK$11/Child and Senior
Peak Tram (Return) - HK$40/Adult,  HK$18/Child and Senior

For the updated rates, visit the peak tram's website. 

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