Day 48: The Long Journey Home

We left Salt Lake on a Wednesday and arrived in the Philippines on a Friday because of the 14-hour time change.  Going home we left on a Wednesday and got home on the same but very looonnnnng day (another 24 hour voyage, in fact).

Checking in to China Airlines in Manila...ready to rock and roll!

Sam had to snap a photo of this ancient plane in Taipei

The Hello Kitty wing of the Taipei Airport speaks to my generation.

The Lego station in Taipei...very kid-friendly airport!

Things got a little crazy on the 14-hour flight from Taipei to L.A.  But we survived!

Last photo of the trip!  Everyone had blood-shot eyes and was loopy by this point. 
Home sweet home...Salt Lake City Airport.

When people ask, "How was your trip?" I honestly don't know how to describe it.  Amazing?  Challenging?  Incredible?  Sad?  Insane?  A blast?

The only simple way to put it:  Life-changing.

Days 45-47: Last Days in Manila

I had mixed feelings about leaving Manila.  On one hand we couldn't wait to get back to the land that we love.  To eat fruit without soaking it in bleach first.  To drive my own car without traffic!  To drink pure water straight from the tap.  On the other hand, I knew I'd miss the simple life and all that uninterrupted time with the family.  I'd miss every day being an adventure.

We tried to fill our last days with all our favorite things:  the pool, church, Heat (the amazing buffet at the hotel restaurant), and friends who became dear to us in such a short amount of time.

Last time in our magnificent pool

Farewell meal at Heat

Saying goodbye to pals at the orphanage

Day 44: Final Day in Hong Kong

 

This morning we went to Chinese Arts and Crafts, a store I'd briefly read about where I thought we could pick up some Chinese items for our home.  We experienced sticker shock as we realized the least expensive item in the store was 3,000 USD with some items costing over $5,000,000!  Our shopping excursion quickly turned into a museum, eyes only experience and we loved it.  Next stop was a Vietnamese restaurant called Nha Trang.  We showed up five minutes before they opened and there was already a line...a good sign!  We were not disappointed.  All six of the dishes we ordered were amazing, made with fresh vegetables and unique spices such as lemongrass.  The kids loved it too.  None of us had ever had Vietnamese food and we are hooked!  Our plan for the afternoon was to hit the goldfish market, the flower market and then see the Hong Kong LDS temple.  No one warned us that traffic and the crowds on Saturdays are pure insanity.  We only made it to a produce market, the goldfish market then threw in the towel and headed for the airport.  Walking the streets of Hong Kong with our luggage was one of the craziest things I've ever done.  Hong Kong streets make New York City seem like a ghost town!  We were bummed to miss the temple but happy to enter the relative calm of the airport. 

Day 43: Language Barriers, Parks, and Egg Rolls

A real playground!  We hadn't seen one of these for a long time.

Monkeys galore

We thought we might melt

"Reptile House."  I think.

Beautiful gardens in the middle of the city

--> Jacob had to work this morning so the kids and I ventured out without him.  We hailed a cab and told the driver we wanted to go to Hong Kong Park.  Unfortunately the driver only spoke five words of English; Hong, Kong, or park were not three of them.  He had me use his walkie-talkie and I tried my three words on the taxi operator.  We all wondered nervously where we'd actually end up.  He dropped us off at the Botanical Gardens and Zoological Park (hey, close enough!) and it was great.  Monkeys galore, a beautiful fountain that we wanted to swan dive into, and beautiful plants and flowers were the highlights.  We caught a cab back, but I realized as I tried to explain where "back" was that I didn't exactly know.  I knew the road and the cross streets but he needed a street number.  He was so friendly and was obviously relieved when we found the Starbucks where Jacob was working.

In the afternoon we got on the MTR which took us under the harbor to Nan Lian Garden, an incredibly serene and picturesque garden.  Connected to the garden was a stunning monastery.  It was closed to tourists but the exteriors and the koi ponds alone made us feel like we'd left behind the busy, western city and arrived in the heart of China for awhile.
We caught a cab to the Temple Street Market.  The boys picked out small golden Chinese dragons and Anna chose a jade elephant for their souvenirs of Hong Kong.  Lucy went with chopsticks.  I had read about a highly-recommended northern Chinese food restaurant and after searching long and hard we found the narrow staircase that led to it.  It opened up to a large dining room packed with only Chinese people.  I felt like all eyes were on us as we were shown to our table.  We had no idea what to order so I leaned back and ventured to ask the family with children next to us what they recommended for kids.  I got lucky because they spoke English and recommended some amazing items on the menu.  Egg rolls, orange chicken, pot stickers, fried apples, and a few unknown dishes were are delectable.  We rolled out of the restaurant and took another cab under the harbor and back to the M.A. (mini-apartment).

Day 42: Ocean Park

Happy, hot camper

Ocean Park is located on top of a mountain with incredible views on all sides

Beautiful reprieve in the middle of the amusement park

View from the Ferris Wheel.

We had too little time in Thailand;  we could have stayed for two weeks and loved every minute.  I didn't want to make the same mistake in Hong Kong so I booked us for four full days.  After day one we were wondering what we could possibly do for that long with kids.  The problem had nothing to do with a lack of things to do.  The problems were 1-the crazy-high cost of everything, 2-the intense summer heat and 3-we were all petering out on playing tourists, especially in a big city.  We shook it up by hitting Ocean Park, a huge amusement park just outside of the city.  It was actually reasonably priced (cheaper than Hong Kong Disney), and the kids loved it.  The heat and the lines made you want to cry (Jacob at one point in the day declared he would never go to an amusement park again) but the kids all claim it was one the highlights of the whole Asian experience!

Day 41: Hong Kong-Victoria Peak and Junk Boat

At night the kids go to bed, Jacob goes to work, and I play travel agent.  I found $75 round-trip tickets to Hong Kong and couldn't get them out of my head.    Only a two-hour flight away and China was calling our names.  We booked them for our last weekend in Asia.  It must have been really late at night when I booked the flights because I scheduled us to leave at 7:15 A.M. from Clark Airport, 1 1/2 hours away without traffic 9 and there is almost always traffic).  We woke up at 4 A.M. and got on our way.  As the plane descended we could see the famous Hong Kong skyline and it was amazing.  We took a very clean and efficient train to our AirBnB apartment I found online.  The apartment's hallway was a cultural experience in and of itself.  The ceilings were about 6 feet high and smells of Chinese food (good and bad) permeated the place.  The apartment had a tiny kitchen/living room area with two tiny bedrooms, and a toilet/sink/shower room where you stood next to the toilet, turned on the shower and everything got drenched.  A first for me!  At least the apartment was clean, fit all of us, and saved us a grundle of money in one of the world's most expensive city.


We dropped our luggage and walked next door to a noodle shop where we ate some very authentic Hong Kong food:  dumpling soup, fried veggies on noodles, and other unidentifiable foods.  It was all decent and our hungry kids gobbled it up (they've learned to eat what they get on this trip).  We had to get the spunky server in the picture!

 

We walked from there on cool elevated pedestrian walkways to the tram which took us up to Victoria Peak.  We were all tired of getting our pictures taken, evidenced by the quality of many of the photos for this trip! 

We decided to walk down instead of take the tram.  When we started getting attacked by mosquitoes and the heat overwhelmed us, we hailed a cab to the waterfront.

We took a ferry across the harbor which divides Hong Kong in two.  All websites recommended taking a Junk Boat ride so walked to the port, paid, and got on.  Men dressed in pirate attire helped us on board and we sailed out into the harbor, techno-Chinese music pumping from hidden speakers.  As the sun started to set, the sky scrapers lit up one by one.  Stunning!

We deboarded, found a McD's, I'm sorry to say, because we knew it was safe and cheap (did I mention Hong Kong is EXPENSIVE?).  We took our dinner back to the harbor and ate it while watching the famous laser light show on the sky scrapers.  A ferry and cab ride took us back to our mini-apartment and appreciated beds.

Day 37: Good-bye to the Beach and Chocolate Hills

Breakfast at the Anatasila

Anna and the Starfish

Quite the variety!

Jacob and Samuel, snorkeling buddies

Typical huts along the road in the jungle

The crew in the jungle

The thought of leaving our beach paradise to return to the city made us all want to cry.  We woke up early on Saturday, ate a quick breakfast, and headed to the beach for one last time.  Jacob, Anna, Samuel and William expertly put on their snorkel gear and swam out to sea.  They spotted jelly fish, a lion fish (most poisonous fish in the sea, oh my!), and starfish of all kinds!  Anna brought back a selection of her findings and had me snap a photo before putting them back in the water.  Lucy, who had had enough of snorkeling, and I built a sandcastle and decorated it with seashells.  It was promptly washed away.  After a couple of hours we dragged ourselves up to our room, showered, packed, and headed towards the Chocolate Hills that Bohol is famous for.  We had hired a tour guide, a man who had graduated from the island's naval academy in engineering but made more in the tourism industry (about 50 USD a day).  We dug the seat belts out of the crevices of the van and drove about an hour uphill through the jungle.  As we pulled into the parking lot what must have been a monsoon arrived.  This Utah desert girl had left our umbrellas back in Manila but we made a dash for the lookout spot anyway.  It was a view worth getting soaked for.  Then it was back to the van for a beautiful jungle drive to the airport.

Day 36: Snorkel Time

Friday morning we grabbed our snorkels and headed down to the beach to meet our captain, a Filipino version of Jack Sparrow.  The lovely white banca boat took us an hour away to Balicasag, a small island that's all about snorkeling and diving.  We got of the big banca boat and got on a much smaller one, driven by our snorkeling guide, Allan.  This man has been voted the Munns' Family Favorite Filipino.  He spoke about ten English words which he repeated over and over.  "RELAX!"  "BALANCE!" "One by One!"  "Swimming?"  "Careful baby the mask,"he admonished me repeatedly as I swam in the water, holding Lucy's rejected mask and snorkel.  He knew his stuff, taking us right to a gold mine of fish and handing us bread to feed them.  We saw parrot fish, a lion fish, rainbow fish, sea turtles, clown fish.  All the kids got into it, even Lucy who caught on quickly.  White sand, blue water, sunny skies.  Dreamy!