Day 3 - Thursday 16 March - Macau

| | Comments (0)

Woke up at 05:00 but mostly got back to sleep til around 06:00. Got up and spent ages getting caught up with blogging and photos.

Stu woke up sick :( Too many people in this part of the world and too many of them sick. It was inevitable I guess...

We thought we'd get Maccas for breakfast, on account of it should be a lot cheaper than the big buffet breakfast, and that Stu could then have it in the room without him needing to get up and ready first. So I went down to get some. Except I was running very low on cash so tried to pay on credit card. Except McDonalds in the Galaxy Macau do not take credit cards. What century is this guys???? So reluctantly I went and got another 500 MOP out at the ATM (minimum withdrawal at those ATMs is 500) and bought breakfast. And at 134 MOP it wasn't really any cheaper that the buffet *sigh*.

After we got ready we took one of the hotel shuttle buses over to the peninsula. Wandered up past the Lisboa up to Senado Square. Sat around there for a little while and had a guy from Seattle chat to us for a bit.

Macau across Nam Van Lake
Macau across Nam Van Lake

Grand Lisboa Macau
Grand Lisboa Macau

Casino Lisboa
Casino Lisboa

Mammoth tusk carving in the lobby of the Grand Lisboa, Macau
Mammoth tusk carving in the lobby of the Grand Lisboa, Macau

Mammoth tusk carving in the lobby of the Grand Lisboa, Macau
Mammoth tusk carving in the lobby of the Grand Lisboa, Macau

Lobby of the Grand Lisboa, Macau
Lobby of the Grand Lisboa, Macau

Portuguese pavement of a flamingo
Portuguese pavement of a flamingo

Historic buildings and fountain in Senado Square
Historic buildings and fountain in Senado Square

Trees growing out of the side of buildings in Senado Square
Trees growing out of the side of buildings in Senado Square

Senado Square
Senado Square

Senado Square
Senado Square

Then wandered up the square past all the shoe shops and jerky shops, evenutally stopping at Starbucks for a pitstop.

St Dominic's Church
St Dominic's Church

Interior of St Dominic's Church
Interior of St Dominic's Church

Eventually made it up to the ruins of St Paul's.

Ruins of St Paul's Cathedral
Ruins of St Paul's Cathedral

View south from St Paul's Cathedral
View south from St Paul's Cathedral

Ruins of St Paul's Cathedral
Ruins of St Paul's Cathedral

Then continued up to the fortress. There's signs all around the place pointing where everything is, but they dried up at the bottom of the fortress and we ended up turning left instead of right and did a very long wander around the base of the fortress. Which was fine because it had a nice view and there wasn't many people and it was quiet. Oh yes, Stu got a migraine just as we were leaving the hotel so all the people and noises were a bit stressful.

Flowers in a tree next to the Macau fortress
Flowers in a tree next to the Macau fortress

Finally made it to the top of the fortress which was pretty cool.

View north-west from Macau fortress
View north-west from Macau fortress

View to Guia Lighthouse from the Macau fortress
View to Guia Lighthouse from the Macau fortress

South wall of the Macau fortress
South wall of the Macau fortress

Canon seemingly taking aim at the Grand Lisboa
Canon seemingly taking aim at the Grand Lisboa

Panorama view south and west from Macau fortress
Panorama view south and west from Macau fortress

Macau museum
Macau museum

Took the escalators down off the hill then wandered back down the way we'd come. We had seen a 26A on the way up, and thought there'd be a bus stop along Av de Almeida Ribeiro, but we never saw one.

Ended up down at Nam Van Lake so I left Stu to sit for a while and went on a pretty long walk to take photos of bridges and the Kun Iam Statue.

Hotel Lisboa
Hotel Lisboa

Governor Nobre de Carvalho Bridge
Governor Nobre de Carvalho Bridge

Macau Tower
Macau Tower

Macau over Nam Van Lake
Macau over Nam Van Lake

Tree roots along Av. Dr. Sun Yat-Sen
Tree roots along Av. Dr. Sun Yat-Sen

MGM Grand Macau
MGM Grand Macau

Lion outside the MGM Grand Macau
Lion outside the MGM Grand Macau

Kun Iam Statue
Kun Iam Statue

Went and collected the sweetie and headed back to the Star World Casino for a bus back to our hotel.

Sai Van Bridge
Sai Van Bridge

Galaxy Hotel
Galaxy Hotel

When we got back we went downstairs and had a swim in the heated pool. We didn't go in the rapids thingie because frankly it was just too far to walk (my feet were killing me). So we just stayed in the heated pool which was right downstairs from us and that was very nice.

Rooftop heated pool of the Galaxy Hotel
Rooftop heated pool of the Galaxy Hotel

Next we thought we'd get dinner from the Tastes of Asia food court downstairs. But these guys, as well as not taking credit card, don't even take cash!!! You have to use one of their stoopid card systems. I did what any person who was so tired and hungry would do - I lost it. What sort of place doesn't even take cash?? Might be ok if you're local and have the cards they want, but it's really not very friendly for tourists. I had 250MOP in cash that I needed to spend before the next day. And I didn't want to go get a card because you always lose leftover money on those things (it's the principle of the thing). We looked at a couple of the nearby restaurants, but 250MOP might have gotten me a bottle of wine or one dish, but nothing else. And I really didn't feel like walking all the way over to Taipa. So we had KFC. Because they took my damned money and they were right there. But I could barely stomach it. It was all very upsetting.

After dinner I went (by myself, *sigh*) back to the peninsula to take photos of the casinos at night. The Lisboa is a bit insane.

Wynn's Casino by night
Wynn's Casino by night

Hotel Lisboa by night
Hotel Lisboa by night

Wynn's Casino by night
Wynn's Casino by night

Governor Nobre de Carvalho Bridge by night
Governor Nobre de Carvalho Bridge by night

Macau buildings by night
Macau buildings by night

Grand Lisboa by night
Grand Lisboa by night

Hotel Lisboa by night
Hotel Lisboa by night

Grand Lisboa by night
Grand Lisboa by night

Casino Lisboa by night
Casino Lisboa by night

Hotel Lisboa by night
Hotel Lisboa by night

The shuttle bus back from there dumps you right at the very southern end of the Galaxy resort, but I didn't want to walk through the shops again, and you can't walk over to the Parisian or the Venetian without walking All The Way Around the streets and front entrances (another couple of kilometre walk) so I didn't bother going to see them either. Oh well. Guess I'm never going to see those at night. Just walked around the outside of our hotel. At least it was peace and quiet. Collapsed into bed about 21:30.

The Parisian by night
The Parisian by night

Leave a comment