Iluvcruising2

Thankyou very much for taking the time to post your wonderful pictures and your great review .Can't wait for our cruise:)

Glad you liked it.

Which Voyager sailing would you be on?

I didn't take any photos of the Casino!

Casino Royale is on Deck 4, under the Royal Promenade. We walked through it a couple of times during the day. I found it somewhat congested, there were many slots and many tables. But during the day, it didn't feel crowded at all. In fact, one time I noticed all the tables empty save one.

There seems to be a caged up area at one corner. There were 2 gaming tables inside. Each time I passed, nobody was playing.

And, on Deck 5, beside the entrance to Cleopatra's Needle, there was this door with a sign called Connoisseur Club. I peeped in and noticed that they were all gaming tables inside!

My parents told me that the casino was rather crowded in the late evenings, after the nightly shows.

There was an earlier question about the casino. My wife and I don't care for the casino. I am looking through the photos to see if I took any of the casino! Check back later.

There is the Buddha.

And we go up a hill.

On a good day, you get gorgeous views of the Hong Kong airport. From this distance, the planes look like toys.

This picture proves that the cable car technology and equipment was not made in Asia! I understand that Leitner Ropeways is a very reputable Italian conglomerate specialising in cable cars, ski lifts and the like.

The cable car ride is breathtaking. Takes about 25 minutes each way.

This is not a trick picture. There are no masts to support the cable car cables across this stretch of water. It looks scary doesn't it?

Here are more pictures from our previous trip to HK, when we went up the Ngong Ping 360 cable car on a very sunny day. The cable car station is just beside Citygate outlets, Tung Chung.

One of the ship's excursions was a cable car ride, lunch at the monastery, and then a cruise back to the ship. All this for almost USD$200 per pax!

It was a gorgeous day. Note that the cable car gets very crowded. Even though we were early ( I think 10am), there were already queues.

This is HK's MTR map.

Tung Chung is the Western most station, on Lantau island. I believe the complimentary shuttle brought the passengers all the way to Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon.

Look carefully and you can see the Disneyland line running from Sunny Bay to Disneyland Resort. Mickey Mouse!

A picture of Tung Chung MTR, with Citygate outlets. This picture was taken from an earlier trip.

The bus ride to the gate was less than 3 minutes. It turns out that the gate to Berth 1 was a very isolated area, not exactly part of anywhere.

Fortunately, they had set up a tent with a couple of security guards. We could hide from the rain in the tent while the guards helped us to call for a taxi.

We had 4 adults and 2 young kids. Originally we thought that we had to take 2 cabs, since the taxis could legally take 5 pax. Well, it doesn't hurt to ask politely, and the taxi driver agreed to take our entire group. Helpful that my 2 young kids were still small and they could comfortably sit on the laps of the adults.

The distance to Tung Chung was further than I had thought - about a 30 minute cab ride. The cost was HK$175. On the way we had to cross very beautiful bridges. Pity the bad weather.

On Day 6, there were complimentary shuttles from the ship to Tsim Sha Tsui. The ride took about 45 minutes. But our family decided to take the shuttle and get dropped off at the port gate, in order to take a taxi to the other side of Hong Kong, namely the Tung Chung area.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tung_Chung

The Tung Chung MTR station is the western most MTR station. There is a nice and big outlet mall called Citygate Outlets. That was our destination for Day 6. The outlet is also beside the Ngong Ping 360 cable car. We had done the cable car ride last year, but my parents hadn't.

http://www.np360.com.hk/en/

The weather wasn't great at all. In fact, it rained the entire day.

Many of us were caught in the rain. Royal didn't provide much shelter from the ship to the bus. This could be improved in the future.

We had room service breakfast and enjoyed the scenery from our balcony. I love it that the Voyager OTS Windjammer had both a fried egg & omelette station. My kids love to have their eggs in the morning. So what we do is to order Room Service, and I would run up to the Windjammer to get the freshly cooked eggs for the kids.

WJ was on Deck 11 Aft. Our cabin was on Deck 7 Aft. It was much, much faster to use the stairs. This running up and down also ensure that I could burn more calories. Oh, all the food!

Things got rather crowded in the Windjammer during peak times. It is not always easy to find an available seat. Oh well, that is the downside of a large ship.

Day 6 morning. Hong Kong. The ship was now berthed at Modern Terminals Berth 1 Kwai Chung Hong Kong.

The Captain had announced that the ship would be repositioned from Junk Bay to the Berth 1 at 4am in the morning. They had to do this because the Berth was not available till then.

This was the view from our aft balcony.

Camera facing left - you can see the railings of the other balcony.

Camera facing out.

Camera facing right - you can see the railings as well as the berth.

Your pics are amazing! Do you mind me asking what kind of camera you're using?

I used the Canon Powershot S95. I find a DSLR hard to handle but a DSLR should give even better pictures.

This link provides a good review.

http://m.cnet.com/reviews/canon-powershot-s95/34154931

Day 6 - Cruise Compass

This picture was taken at about 10:45pm on Day 5, from the pool deck, peering down. You can see passengers unloading off the tender, coming back to the ship. The entrance was at Deck 1.

Went for a walk around the ship after dinner.

Needless to say, the ship was very quiet. 99% of the pax were in Hong Kong.

The rock wall at night. Nicely light. Pity no night climbing.

The pools.

Oh, I found the dessert menu.

Very yummy! The BBB was good, albeit very sinful, calories-wise.

Our fellow Singaporean cruisers must think that we're crazy, to come back to the ship for dinner! Haha. Hong Kong is well-known for its fine cuisine and most Singaporeans would love to dine in Hong Kong. Oh well, we figured it was easier to feed our kids on the ship. Also, we wanted to get back early as the kids had been up since 0700hrs for the Dreamworks breakfast.

Dinner in the MDR was open-seating, till 8:30pm. We go there about 7:45pm. I realised that I forgot to take a photo of the dinner menu for this evening.

This was some Thai coconut fish curry with rice. It wasn't great, at least according to our palates.

This was some beef. Not bad.

Diamond and above means lots of free alcohol!

Not to mention the very nice balcony discount.

Back to the Voyager June 2011 cruise.

That is the Voyager in the distance as the tender approaches.

Yaaay! Welcome back to the ship & dinner.

That's the tender.

Needless to say, Hong Kong at night is spectacular. That is the Legend OTS docked at Ocean Terminal. (June 2011)

These pictures from our Legend of the Seas Singapore to Shanghai cruise in June 2011. For that cruise, the ship only docked at Ocean terminal for a few hours - 5pm to midnight!

But the views from the ship were incredible!

You can see the Star Ferry terminal. Read more about the famous Star Ferries. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Ferry_Pier,_Tsim_Sha_Tsui

As the sun sets, the lights come on. Almost surreal.

The wake of the tender.