Jessica and James visited Hong Kong twice in 2017 and had a chance to sample various food offerings in the city.  Despite the number of establishments that we tried, we were only able to try out only a small sample size of what the city has to offer.  Some places we visited were exceptional; some were good, and some were marginal.  Here is run down of the places we tried this year:

• Caprice, Four Seasons Hong Kong, IFC complex, Central – French: This is a two Michelin star restaurant.  We ate there on lunar New Year’s eve.  We selected the New Year tasting menu.  While the food was reasonably good, it wasn’t as good as we expected.  For similar price, we liked the tasting menu at L’atelier de Joel Robuchon (three Michelin star) at Landmark better, which we had tried the prior year.  (For good afternoon tea, try La Salon de the de Joel Robuchon, also at Landmark).  The tasting menu we had was about HK$1,800 per person.
• The Dining Room (南小館), Hysan Place, Causeway Bay – Shanghainese: This is a casual restaurant, but offers a good mix of dishes from south of Yangze River region.  It’s not expensive.   Soup dumplings, wontons in chili oil and shitake mushrooms buns are good standard fares.  James also liked the Onion Noodles and fried bread.  Jessica liked the fried small fish and double broil chicken soup.  Prices are moderate, with meal for two between HK$250-400.
• Tsui Wah (翠華餐廳), Hong Kong style Tea Café: Tsui Wah is a chain “Hong Kong style ‘tea
  

  Tsui Wah Hainan Chicken Set

  café’ that serves specialty Hong Kong café dishes such as Macaroni & ham soup, crispy bun with condensed milk, or satay ramen noodles for breakfast; Fish ball and cake rice noodle, shrimp with shrimp roe over dry noodle, and Hainan chicken for other times.  Of course, all meals should be paired with a HK style milk tea.  No gourmet meals, but reasonable HK style comfort food.  (Some shops also offer HK style pastries like cocktail bun, pineapple bun and egg tart.)

 

• Nobu, Intercontinental Hotel, Tsim Sha Tsui, 18 Salisbury Road – Japanese: This is a renowned restaurant and expensive in general.  We went for the Sunday Set Lunch, which offer a seven-course meal at a reasonable HK$495 per person.  Selection choices include salt & pepper prawn, Beef Toban Yaki, and Sea Bass Fillet for main course; sides dish choices include smoked duck, Shrimp Tartar with caviar, scallop sashimi, Lobster lettuce cup.   Dessert choice were Apple crepe soufflé and shoyu caramelized banana split. All the dishes were prepared well, well worth the price. Plus a great view while you eat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Ichiran Ramen, 440-446 Jaffe Road, Causeway Bay – Japanese Ramen: Ichiran is a popular ramen shop in Japan that has carried over in Hong Kong, with two locations.  The offering is basic, with customer selecting the portion/level of ingredients (such as pork, salt, garlic, spice), noodle texture and a few add-on options, such as hard-boiled egg, mushroom fungus and dessert.  However, the soup base and noodle is done very well. The restaurant setting is another unique part of the restaurant, where each customer sits in a segregated stall space.  Price is not inexpensive, with base noodle at HK$89 and can easily go up to HK$150-175 with add-on for each person.

 

 

 

 

 

• Tasty Congee and Wonton Noodles (正斗粥麵專家) – IFC Complex, Central – HK style Congee, noodles and dim sums: This is one of four largest local brand for congee and wonton noodles.   Have not been able to find any place else in the world that can cook similar style of noodles and congees.  James normally don’t eat congee, but will make an exception here in Hong Kong.   The restaurant also serves other dumplings and dim sums as well.   Prices are moderate, with dishes going from HK$50-100 for most items.

 

• Fook Lam Moon (福臨門), 34-45 Johnston Road, Wan Chai, +852-2866-0663 – Hong Kong dim sums and specialties, 2-Star Michelin: Fook Lam Moon first open in 1972 and is an offshoot of a successful catering business that began back in the 1940s.  The restaurant signature dishes include braised abalone, crab and suckling pig dishes.  This restaurant is on the high-end, and while one can dine around HK$200-300 per person with basic dishes, it can cost upward of HK$2,000+ if you select some of the signature seafood dishes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Alto Bar & Grill, 18 Tang Lung Road, Causeway Bay, +852-2603-7181 – steak and seafood: This was a restaurant found being recommended online.  The restaurant is located on the 31^st floor of the V Tower in Causeway Bay and offers its patrons a great view of the city and Victoria Harbor on one side and Happy Valley on the other side.  Its signature dishes are the grill meats, mostly steak, from US, Argentina and Japan (Wagyu beef).   The Argentina ribeye we ordered was prepared very well.  Some of its side dishes were pretty good.  The black truffle fries were excellent.  We also ordered the grilled asparagus, foie gras, Caesar salad, all were above average. The ice cream was good as well.  Prices are moderate, expect to spend HK$500-600+ person.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Bo Innovation, 60 Johnston Road, Wan Chai, – Chinese/Asian Fusion served in western presentation style, 3-Star Michelin: Self-described as “X-treme Chinese cuisine”, Chef Alvin Leung put in some modern twists on Chinese food, such as Duck Foie Gras with Chinese mustard green and walnut and scallops with Shanghainese jolo sauce, peas and woba crispy rice.   The results are surprisingly good and worth to try.  The staff and service was also first rate – before every course, our server provided an explanation of the dish and also explain the way to eat it.  We had the Lunch Taste Menu, an 8-course meal at HK$850, a very good price.  –  For more information, check the below article on the restaurant.  (http://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-drink/article/2079030/restaurant-review-bo-innovation-wan-chai-old-school-modern-hong)

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Butao Ramen, 18 Tang Lung Road, Causeway Bay – Japanese Ramen: Another popular ramen chain in Hong Kong that was started locally.  The restaurant offers different type of base soup ramen and also a choice of add-ons as well.  It is widely acclaimed for its authentic ramen style.  Price points are fairly high, with a base bowl of noodle going for HK$89-96.
• Tim Ho Wan (添好運) – Olympian City, IFC, North Point – Hong Kong style dim sum: This could be cheapest one star Michelin restaurant in the world. The restaurant was started by a former chef at 3 Michelin star Lung King Heen at Four Seasons Hotel in 2009.  The restaurant’s menu consists of classic Hong Kong style dim sum: Shrimp dumpling, beef balls, chicken feet with black bean sauce, glutinous rice with chicken, fried turnip cake, BBQ buns, etc.  The quality of the dim sum at Tim Ho Wan is exceptional, in both the North Point shop and the Olympian City shop we visited.  Both times we ordered 6 to 7 items with a total bill less than HK$150.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Mixan Sense (米缐陣) – JP Plaza, 22-36 Paterson Street, Causeway Bay; noodles/rice noodles, dumplings and specialties dishes: A casual mall chain eatery that offers a variety of noodles and simple dishes. James had an early dinner one day by ordering the afternoon tea special – rice noodle with fish cake and fish ball with milk tea. An ok place to have a quick bite, but nothing too exceptional.  Would recommend other chain restaurants.
• Pacific Coffee – Peak Tower; best view of a coffee house: The Pacific Coffee at the Peak Tower may have the best view of any coffee shop in Hong Kong – where you can get a cup for HK$35, sit down and enjoy their drink while looking down the northern half of Hong Kong island, Victoria harbor and Kowloon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Hong Kong Macau Yet Shun Milk Company (港澳義順牛奶公司) – 506 Lockhart Road,
  

  Double Skinned Milk Dessert

  Causeway Bay.  HK style sweet milk and soup dessert: The place to go for local style double skinned milk dessert, which is milk in a custard form.  Have not find this dessert elsewhere outside of Hong Kong/Macau.  The place also serves other local style desserts such as red bean soup and other custards, as well as local light food such as egg sandwich, sweet crispy bun, etc.  The desserts are the choice when you come here.  The place is usually packed right up until typical closing hours at mid-night.

• Dragon Noodles Academy (龍麵館) – G/F Man Yee Building, No. 68 DesVoeux Road (entrance on Pottinger Street), Central:   Wonton noodle in Lobster soup and Lobster tail noodle soup are a couple of its key dishes. Made with Lanzhou style noodles, it provides an alternative to HK style noodles.  But what the noodles good is the lobster broth that is a cut above.  Aside from noodles, lunch offering include dim sum offerings such as turnip cakes, shrimp dumping, spring onion pancakes, lobster spring rolls, etc.  Two other restaurant specialties are the Peking Duck and 8-Treasure Beggar Chicken.  Prices are moderate, but a noodle soup and a dim sum can set one back HK$200.
• Cafe Matchbox (喜喜冰室) – 57 Paterson Street, Fashion Walk, Causeway Bay (next to Excelsior Hotel); Hong Kong classic cafe dishes and drinks: The café we visited is in the tourist part of Causeway Bay, but it still serves many locals customers.   The offerings are fairly standard for a HK tea house, but the décor brings you back 50-60 years, and they play 70s HK pop songs in the background.  A good place for a simple breakfast or take a break with a nice cup of coffee or milk tea with a pineapple bun with butter.
• Toast Box – Times Square, Causeway Bay.  Classic Singapore dishes: Toast Box is a Singapore chain restaurant that serves Singapore kopitiam food – Kaya toast, soft boil eggs, laksa, curries, and Nasi Lemak; and beverages of a variety of Nanyang coffee (kopi) & tea (teh) – served with a long sprout pot that are poured from 2 feet away.  Nothing fancy, just basic food for a quick bite. Inexpensive/moderate price, noodles around HK$40.
• Snake Royal Two Shop (二王蛇) –  No 24 Percival Road, Causeway Bay.  Snake and Smoked meats: This shop specialized in the snake soup but also has a good smoked meats rice dish, which we had.  It’s a tiny shop – tables normally would be used commune style, which people sharing tables.  The smoked meat rice bowl was indeed very good and price is reasonable around HK$55 for the rice bowl.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Ho Hung Kee Congee and Noodles (何洪記) – Hysan Place, Causeway Bay.  Classic HK congee and noodle dishes, one-star Michelin: Similar to Tasty Congee and Noodles, Ho Hung Kee is one of the four largest local brand congee and wonton noodle shops.  Its flagship store used to in a tiny storefront in a block by Times Square mall in Causeway Bay, but it has now in much larger space in Hysan Place. The core offerings is similar to Tasty with a variety of congee, wonton, noodles and dim sum – and similar pricing as well.  This store did earn a Michelin star in 2014.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Wong Chi Kei (黃枝記) –  500 Jaffe Road, Causeway Bay;  Classic HK Congee and noodles dishes. This is another major local brand of congee and wonton noodle shops. The offerings here is a bit wider than in Tasty and Ho Hung, including afternoon tea type offerings with milk tea.  Prices are slightly less.
• Tott’s and Roof Terrace – Excelsior Hotel, 281 Gloucester Road, Causeway Bay; view of Victoria Harbor and Kowloon.  Contemporary western: This Excelsior Hotel restaurant located on the top floor of the hotel with a spectacular view of Victoria Harbor and Kowloon.  Jessica and I have dined here a few times and also enjoyed the food here.  On this visit, we tried their current 4-course tasting menu: Roasted Beetroot salad, Scallops with ham & edamame, choice of confit and roasted duck or steam rouget with mussels for main course, and chocolate fondant with ice cream for dessert.  Both main courses were good, although both of us lean toward the duck.  The chocolate fondant was excellent.  Prices are not cheap but less expensive than many similar restaurants.  (The 4-course tasting menu was HK$698.)

 

 

 

 

 

• Man Mo Cafe – No. 40 Upper Lascar Row, Sheung Wan.  French – Cantonese fusion dim sum: This was a place that James found online and thought to give it a try.  Named after a temple located nearby the restaurant, it’s a small dim sum shop but the offerings are a variant of what one will find in a typical HK dim sum store, with offerings such as Truffle Brie dumpling and Foie Gras Xiao Long Bao or desserts such as Egg Lemon tart or Nutella Ball.  Prices is slightly higher than typical dim sum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Social Place (唐宮小聚) – 139 Queens Road Central, Central, 2/F floor the L Place; 30 Canton Road Tsi She Tsui, Kowloon. Contemporary Dim Sum: One of our friend took us to this relatively new restaurant located in Central.  The décor of the place is a more contemporary style with open kitchen and long rectangular tables for commune style dinning.  The restaurant also offers a healthier type of dim sum, using rice bran oil and the freshest ingredients.  Variants such as mushroom bun is shaped to look like a shiitake mushroom. In addition to traditional type of dim sum, the restaurant also offers steam lake crab (in season) and modern dessert such as crème brulee and cream soup dumpling shaped like a pear.   Price is moderate around HK$30-50 for most dishes.
• Kau Kee (九記牛腩) – 21 Grough Street, Central; Beef Brisket and Noodles: This shop is said to serve the best beef brisket/tendon in Hong Kong. There is a line typically at all hours.  The offerings are around beef briskets/tendon – noodles or hor fun with soup or curry.  James had the brisket with wide noodles and Jessica had the brisket with hor fun. The unfortunate part of eating at this place is that all other beef brisket/tendon soup and noodles just don’t seem to taste as good.  Price is moderate at around HK$40 for a bowl of noodles.

 

 

 

 

 

• Lady M –  1-3 Cleveland St (Fashion Walk), Causeway Bay; Western bakery & desserts: Lady M is a New York City patisserie that is known of is Millie-Crepes cakes.   The Causeway Bay shop is a popular tea time location, with lines start forming shortly after lunch time.  Having some milk tea while nibbling on the cakes is a relaxing way for a breather.  A slice of a cake cost about HK$50-100.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Ying Jee Club – 1/F Nexus Building, 41 Connaught Road, Central.  Contemporary Chinese. Specialties are in seafood, specifically abalone and shark-fin soup:  This is a relatively new high-end Cantonese restaurant.  We tried one order of tasting menu, which James and Jessica shared and also ordered a couple recommended dishes (such as the crispy chicken) that wasn’t on the tasting menu.  The staff was very good in splitting the tasting menu portions for us.  Each of us probably would not be able to finish a full tasting menu plus the extra dishes we ordered, so the split turned out well for us.  Tasting menu was HK$1,780 per person.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Jaffe Road snacks shops: For a quick bit on the local street food, there are a number of shops along Jaffe Road (East Point) area of Causeway Bay that offers fried fish ball, beef ball, shui mai (pork dumpling), egg balls, juices, boba tea, fried chicken steak, cheese cake, etc.   Jessica always get a bottle of sugar cane juice from one of the vendor when we are in town, and James always will have a few fried fish balls.  Something everyone should at least try once.

 

 

On a trip back to Jessica’s hometown of Kunming in the Yunnan province this past spring, we decided to make a side trip to Li Jiang, where its Old Town Lijiang is an UNESCO Heritage Site, famous for its waterways and bridges in the old city that has left intact as it were from the Qing dynasty time period, in style if not in substance.  The town was an important point along the old tea horse road as well as the ancient Southern Silk road.  The majority of people in Lijiang are of Naxi heritage, an ethnic minority in China.  Thus, the architecture style and culture of Lijiang is somewhat distinct from the rest of China.

We took an early morning flight from Kunming.  At the airport by the departure gate, there were touts taking reservation for cars, hotels, and tours for Lijiang.  (This is not unusual in airports here.)   The price quoted for the transfer from the airport to our hotel sounds like a decent deal based on amounts that hotel had mentioned to Jessica, so we signed up for a car.

The flight was a short one, approximately 45 minutes in the air, but it was bumpy.  We met our car guide coming out of the airport security area, who escorted to our waiting car in the parking lot.  The guide rode with us to the hotel, and he pitched various tour options we can take during the ride.  Jessica has been to Lijiang before and has ideas on where we can and should go on this trip and some idea on costs.  She ended up negotiating a package for the next day that would give us a private car and driver to take us to a few selected spots in the area.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our hotel, Bayan Tree Lijiang, is considered to be one of the best five star hotels in the area.   The hotel is layout with receptions, restaurants, spa services and shops at the center plaza of the resort, with the two story buildings and villas for the accommodation spread out to the left and right side of the plaza.    Straight ahead from the central plaza is a small lake with a view of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain.  There are about 100 units at the hotel, including villas and spa suites, where you can get a full service massage treatment in your room.  The buildings in the hotel complex are built in traditional Chinese and local Naxi style.

As our room was not ready when we arrive, we decided to leave our luggage at the hotel and walked over to the nearby Shuhe Ancient Town, another of the old towns in the region that has retained the town’s layout and look from the old days.   It was about a 10 minute walk away by foot from the hotel.  The area around the hotel was very quiet, at least at that early morning hour, with light traffic and not too many people walking about.   We walked through a tree arcade canopy that led us to the entrance of the town.  It was only about 9:00AM, most of the shops were just starting to open up.  Shuehe has the feel to be a “living town”, that is, there are still people living in this town or nearby and the activities of the town seem to support the livelihood of the people living within its walls.   The main features of the old towns in the region are the canals and rivers running through the town, which was an important conduit for everyday life.   The restaurants and ‘cafes’ in the town highlighted special region food.  At that hour, we saw a number of the restaurant people washing and preparing the vegetables along small canals that runs by along the building.   The quiet street scenes bring about the thought of slow, lazy small town vibe with focus on simple daily routines.  Of course, here the draw is still tourism.

 

In the town’s center plaza area, there were a number of vendors selling vegetables and fruits.   Shuhe also has numerous “inns”.  These inns are more hostels/bed & breakfast than modern hotels, but we did see people staying there, including a number of foreigners.   In the old days, these inns served the large number of travelling merchants through the area.  Today, these places definitely provide an option for the visitors to live close to the ‘locals’.

 

 

Shuhe itself is fairly compact.  We were able to walk through the main portion of it in a little over an hour.  We stopped at a restaurant by the river for our brunch: Soybean milk, fried dough stick and rice noodle soup.  The fresh rice noodle is a specialty of the area.  The ones people cook here are made fresh daily, not the dry version that we normally see elsewhere.   We sat on an outside deck at the back of the restaurant with a view of the creeks and hills behind the town.    After eating, James dozed off for a few minutes while Jessica was checking out online chats on her smartphone.

We left the restaurant around 11:00AM and walked around the other parts of the town we haven’t seen and also did some light shopping in a few stores.  We picked up some small locally made small souvenirs and around noon, started looking for a place for lunch. We settled on one that Jessica though looked reasonable ‘clean’.    Local cuisine leans toward the spicy side.  Since James doesn’t handle spicy food well, we picked out a couple of more basic dishes that focus on the local ingredients that is light on the spiciness side, including a fish from the local river.

When we finished, it was around 1PM and we decided to head back to the hotel, hoping our room would be ready.   When we got back, our room was still not ready, so we went over to the library area and check things on our iPads.  Finally after 2PM, our room was ready and the staff drove us to our room in the golf cart.

Our second floor room came with a view of the Dragon Jade mountain as promised.  It had a fairly large balcony with a couple of chairs and table.  The room itself was fairly large; there is a sitting area with a large sofa on one end and TV and large desk on the other.  The bathroom was large, with a double sink, a tub and a separate shower.   The bed is situated when you can lie there and see the full window view if you choose.

After settling in, we decided to splurge a bit and headed to the spa to get a massage, a famous treatment at Bayan Tree resorts.   We selected to go with full body massages along with a sand scrub.    The private massage room was laid out in a very calm and smoothing environment, with soft music playing in the background and curtains drawn. There was a separate private shower and changing room, where we change into appropriate attire (they even provide disposable underwear to use.)

As the masseurs began, they asked us how much force we prefer and also told us as they move to different areas of our body.  After some light massages, they started with the scrub.  It was James’s first time doing a scrub; he was surprised with the hot materials.  After the scrub, we went to the showers to wash off the materials and return to finish off the rest of the massage.  The two hours went by fairly quickly, almost feel too short.  Afterwards, the staff led us to a sitting area where they had tea and snacks prepared for us to unwind before leaving.

We headed back to the room to relax further.  Originally, we had thought of heading out into town for dinner.  However, since James’ stomach was not doing well, we decided to stay at the hotel for a bite.  We chose the hotel’s western style restaurant.  Its menu wasn’t extensive but had some dishes that seemed to be worth trying.  One was the mushroom soup made with local wild mushrooms.  The Yunnan region is famous for its wild mushrooms, so we both ordered one.  Jessica went with a grill local fish along with a garden salad while James ordered a pizza with Cesar Salad.   However, they ran out of Cesar Salad dressing, and James switched to a Tuna salad, which turned out to be more Tuna Tartar with a few pieces of leaves than a salad.  But it turned out to be not too bad.

The next day was to be our big touring day, with a tour to the Snow mountain first and then to a couple of other sites before heading over to the Lijiang Old Town in the afternoon.   Our guide arrived as scheduled, and he first brought us over to a shop where we bought a couple of cans of oxygen and rented a couple of jackets for the trip to the mountain.  But just as we arrived near the gate to the mountain park entrance, it was announced that the cable lift up to the mountain was closed for the day (likely due to wind).  There was an option that we can just go to the plateau at the lift’s base.  However, Jessica thought that there wasn’t much to see there, so we headed back.   After returning our jackets (unfortunately, can’t return the oxygen), we started our drive to Lashi Lake, which is located north of Lijiang at about 2,500 meter elevation.  The drive took us up the hill a bit where we could see the vast plain of the Lijiang and surrounding area.

At Lashi Lake, the main attractions was hiking the mountain trails or for most people, taking a horse ride through the historic Horse Tea Trail led by the local guides.   We chose a tour that includes one of the longer horse treks up the mountain and then a boat ride in the nearby wetland park.   We were paired with a couple of small local horses and began our trip first through the streets of the local town.   While one guide led our two horses, we rode with a caravan of other riders.  The guides sing songs as people did in the old days as they rode through the tea trail.   As we go up the mountains, we moved along a wear worn path through the forest and pond.    This is where each group traveled along at more varied pace and also destinations.   Our guide pushed ahead a bit faster than most and we pass some of the slower moving packs.    While the ride was far from serene given all the other packs that were going up and down, it gave us some views of the mountains and valleys in the area.   James’ compliant was that it would have been better if we could have stopped at various points to enjoy the view more and take pictures.

We rode all the way up to near one of the top valley plateau where one of the source lakes for the rivers in the area is located.  The water in this alpine lake is crystal clear and cold.  There is a stable like structure near the shores, but that is about all the sign of civilization.   This is the area where it would have been nice to have a picnic.   We walked around for about 20 minutes before we started back the trip down the mountain.

After arriving back at our starting point, we took a shuttle to the estuary for our boat ride.  The estuary is a protected national wetland park, where numerous birds, ducks, geese, etc. could be found.   The area is said to have over 57 kinds of birds, including the protected black-neck Crane.  Winter is the best time to see the birds as that is when most birds can be found frolicking in the area.

The water level where we passed through was very shallow and filled with alage and other water plants.  The boatman used a stick to push the boat forward more than paddling.  Our boat ride was a relatively circle near the shore.  We saw a bunch of duck and geese in the area, but were not really able to get too close to them.

After we got back on shore, our driver took us to the Jade Spring Park in Lijiang, not too far from Old Town Lijiang.  As we hadn’t really eaten anything all day, we stopped off at a bakery to grab a few items along the way as fillers.   The park itself was quite nice.  It has many local varieties of flowers and plants and is set into a serene and calm layout, with walkways meandering through the ponds in the garden.  The most famous is the Black Dragon Pool.  There is a Pavilion set in the center of the pond.  This pond could be beautiful when it is filled.  However, Yunnan region has experienced drought condition the past three years.  The pond was almost bone dry when we were there.  There was only a small puddle at one end where a small number of fish were present.  Jessica said that this pond typically filled with fishes and water.

After leaving the park, the driver took us to the entrance of Lijiang Old Town.  It was about 1:30PM and we set to meet the driver back around 5PM to bring us back to the hotel.

Lijiang Old Town is much bigger than Shuhe, with wider streets, cleaner atmosphere, more picturesque and many more attractions.  But this is outwardly a more a tourist location than a real living area.  With a KFC and Pizza Hut right at the entrance street probably elicit that feeling.  We didn’t have a plan, but just wandered through the different streets looking at anything of interest, and to pick out places where we may want to eat.   There were many restaurants inside Old Town.  Some can be call bars as they have music and are catered to tourists.   There was also a plaza area where a number of vendors sold specialty snacks, from grill meat and fish to dumplings and Chinese sandwiches to sweet crepes and cakes.   James was itchy to try, but with his stomach still recovering, he had to hold of.   The shops are mostly selling basic souvenirs, though some are locally craft products.   We walked around a couple of hours until we got to a more remote part of the Old Town and were a bit lost.  After a few attempts, we finally got back to the path we recognized and start thinking about where we should eat and rest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We decided on a restaurant that had a large seating terrace next to a canal that served a mix of items.   Along with juice, coffee and cake, we ordered the some fried small fish and rice noodle soup, two local specialties.  The small fried fish was especially good.  We sat in the shades as we munched and did some people watching.  We meandered through our food for over an hour before we decided to head back.

 

On our way back to the hotel, the driver took us to a large show room that sells mostly jade jewelry.  The place was about half a football field long, lined with rows and rows of counters with all sorts of jade products.  This was one of the side trips for our ‘tour’ package.   It can be a bit inconvenient but probably saved us a few bucks.  Jessica looked at a few things and asked about a few items, more to get some prices than to really buy them.  But this place we went to does offer something that is hard to beat:  It will buy back any Jade piece you buy there at the cost you had purchased at any time.

We returned back to our hotel just after 6PM.   Because both of our stomach wasn’t feeling too great, we decided to just get some light bites from room service and watch some movies to get ready for our return the next day.