Saturday, August 19, 2006

Travelog # 3 - Macau

Last December (Dec 2005), I went to Macau for a short business visit and was able to squeeze one half day of touristy stuff. Here are some sights from that trip..

Macau was a Portuguese colony till 1999 and was transferred to China as one of the two special administrative region (other one being Hong Kong). Even though it has its own currency pegged to Chinese Yuan (CNY), Hong Kong and Chinese currencies are also widely accepted in all places.

Macau is touted as the Las Vegas of east and it does seem to live up to its tag (for good or bad). Several large casinos attract large amount of tourists via Hong Kong and main-land China. One drive across Macau would reveal a frenzy of construction activity. Our guide told us that few more bigggg casinos are coming with they are adding 10,000+ hotel rooms.
Boat that tooks us to Macau from Hong Kong Airport
Macau is just a boat hop away from Hong Kong. In fact, we flew in to Hong Kong and took this boat right from the Hong Kong Airport jetty for a 40 minute ride.

Macau Tower and the Bridge
Macau Tower the most visible and most visited place in Macau.

Night View of Macau Tower
Macau Tower by night from the ground. We had some kind of a private party organized for us and had the Tower all for us exclusively for an evening.

View down from the top of the Tower
A glass floor at the observatory point.. Seen similar stuff in CN Tower, Toronto as well.

Chinese 'poikkal Guthirai'?
Chinese 'Poikkal Guthirai' and artists

Ruins of St. Paul's Cathedral
Ruins for St. Paul's Cathedral is a major tourist attraction

Huge Incense being hanged
Chinese temple with giant incense coils..

Statue of Christ
Statute of Christ Mother Mary (thanks to Patrick) in front of a old Portuguese Church

Portugese house/s
Old Portuguese house/s now a tourist spot


More photos in flickr

14 comments:

  1. Ram,

    Great pictures.

    - Sriram

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  2. Ram, Awesome pictures. What kind of food do they eat in Macau, I wonder.

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  3. Pictures are so nice... Good work.

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  4. Ram,
    Seshu of http://www.tiffinbox.org/will be at Chennai for next few weeks.You may want to set up a podcast interview with him.

    RR

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  5. Ram,
    you have traveled extensively.. but can't you differentiate between a man and a woman?.. The statue is that of Mother Mary .. certainly not Christ. :-)

    -Patrick
    Charlotte, NC

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  6. Awesome pictures,Ram, especially the one of poikkal kudhirai.

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  7. pretty pictures and loved the one with poikaal kuthirai!and what colourful costumes!

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  8. Sriram, Sridhar, Raj & Usha

    Thanks..

    Nithya
    Food is all Chinese with few vegetarian options..

    On my vegetarian friendly scale.. (of 1 - 10).. Macau would be around 2-3 (with 10 being most friendly..)

    Raman
    Portugese language still 'officially' followed but I understand, it is being slowly phased out..

    RR
    I checked out the tiffinbox site.. and thanks for the lead.. pl. give me some more info on this guy..

    Patrick
    Sorry.. I stand corrected..

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  9. The Macau Tower shot was brilliant in composition :)

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  10. Ram,

    This reminds me of my macau experience years ago. At the time, they didn't have the macau tower. Must be newly constructed I assume. That bridge looks just as beautiful as it did before. Thanks for sharing the pictures.

    Did you have issues with ppl not speaking english there :) ?

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  11. Prasad
    Don't know when the tower was built.. there is lot of construction activity going and wouldn't be surprised if the tower is a recent additon..

    My stay there was limited and interactions were with my colleagues only.. so language wasn't a problem..

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  12. Hi ,

    I plan to visit Hongkong and macau next month. can u tell me the places to visit.


    sankari

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  13. Sankaari
    Good time to visit HongKong / Macau.. the weather would be farely decent. I have pretty much covered the places I went during my trip.. One place I did not go was Casinos.. but they have larger casinos than Las Vegas.. so that might be good addition..

    If you are a vegetarian... you might have to look hard to find a place to eat..

    Otherwise, Macau is a fairly contained place and easy to get around in Taxis.. which ply by the meter.

    Have fun

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