The Constant (Failed) Dieter

Saturday 6 July 2019

Travel Log: Under the Pale Grey Sky (Day 6)

Previous Day: A Long Walking Day in Macao

Destination: Hong Kong & Macao

Duration: 9 Days 8 Night (Nov 24~Dec 02, 2018)

Day 6: Exploring the Las Vegas of the East

We had breakfast in Hotel Metropole like yesterday and this time we ordered pancake for lil one and dumpling with meat & vegetable to share among ourselves since the portion was big. We were going to explore the “Las Vegas” portion in Macao today (What to do? Cannot afford to go to the real Las Vegas!).

Pancake with Salad

Dumpling Soup

According to comment from Tripadvisor, there was free shuttle bus to get to the Las Vegas of the East from Senado Square where the bus departed from Grand Emperor Hotel. However, by the pain of wondering around & inside the hotel – I must say that this was NOT TRUE! The bus stop was not at Grand Emperor Hotel but at around 100m to the left of the hotel! Save yourself some time by going straight to the correct bus stop! This was the bus schedule -> Link.

Inside the Grand Emperor Hotel when we were lost...

The Carriage in front of Grand Emperor Hotel

The Bus Station is actually 100m away!!!

This is the correct bus station!!!

We finally managed to get on the City of Dreams Shuttle bus and off to Cotai area. On the way we could see Macao Tower before crossing a bridge to Cotai area which had a completely different vibe to the historic center. The shuttle stopped at the City of Dreams building (新濠天地). We did not realised there was a Hard Rock Shop inside the building thus we did not get to buy the t-shirt from there. In fact, we simply took some pictures at the COD lobby and left to walk across to the Venetian Macao which is just across the street.

Macao Tower

Crossing the Bridge to Cotai

Look! Eiffel Tower!!!

Inside the City of Dreams Building with a Robot!

Fooling around....

The Building Exterior...

The Venetian Macao looked like a replica of St Mark’s Square in Venice completed with the Campanile and Bridge of Sighs (Here is a comparison with the real St Mark’s Square in Venice)! The grand ceiling greeted us once we walked into the Venetian Macao which I think was an imitation of the ceiling in Doge’s Palace.

Venetian Macao!

Replica of St Mark's Square

They even have a Campanile!

Christmas Deco with Eiffel Tower at the back... this is so wrong! =P

The View across the Street

Nice View!

Christmas Train!

Once inside, you either could gamble or shop till you drop. The Venetian housed a huge shopping mall with high end brands completed with Venetian building design, indoor canal, gondola and even an artificial sky! Since we were not big shopper during travel (A great excuse of being too poor to buy branded stuffs!), we simply wondered around to take pictures.

Majestic Interior awaits you!

Built from the "Donation" from Gamblers & Tourists no doubt! LOL!!!

Gondola!

By some luck we stumbled upon Lord Stow’s Bakery which was famed for their Portuguese egg tart thus we made a brief stop at the café to wolf down more tarts! The story I heard was Lord Stow & Margaret used to be husband & wife but got divorced thus they had different brand now. The egg tarts looked & tasted great – a much better version if compared to Koi Kee but I still preferred Margaret’s as it had the homely taste whereas Lord Stow’s seemed to be more commercialized. Not to mention Margaret’s had a creamier & buttery taste. However I must say the Lord Stow’s café environment was much nicer since we were sitting right beside the canal with the gondolier serenading the passengers. =P

Egg Tart anyone?

Relaxing beside the Canal...

Look Ravishing huh?

We continued to explore the place and eventually crossed to the Cotai Centrale & the Parisian inside the building itself. Unfortunately that was not really what we wanted as we preferred to take pictures from outside thus we were looking for an exit with much effort.

All the Shops are inside a Venetian design house...

Gorgeous view huh?

Christmas Tree at the back along with Clock Tower!

With ARTIFICIAL Sky!!!

We are kind of LOST!!!

And we walked straight to Parisian with the link inside...

We finally managed to exit somewhere near the Rialto Bridge replica & backtracked again to the Venetian to cross the ‘Rialto Bridge’. =P

Tu-tu Train!

I think someone's finger is obstructing the camera!

Crossing the Bridge

Why there are always stairs?!

Hello from afar!

Rialto Bridge & the Campanile

Then we finally got to the Eiffel Tower before getting into the Parisian which had a lovely lobby decoration. We were wondering around and found the Entrance to the Eiffel Tower but it seemed to be quite expensive to just enter the ‘fake’ tower so we abandoned the plan.

Eiffel Tower!

Parisian Lobby

Beautifully decorated!

We continued on to Studio City which was famous on their 8-shape Ferris wheel. We went up to the level 3 Garden to take a closer look at the Ferris wheel and took a short break there. We were lost on what we should do and hb ended up googling for food (what else?).

Hei Lin Café in Taipa Village was our destination but we would need to backtrack all the way to Venetian again to walk to the café. It was quite a long walk (2km) but along the way we managed to take more pictures again from different viewpoint of the Las Vegas Strip.

Studio City!

Studio City in Lego!!!

A Flying Machine? =P

8-Figure Ferris Wheel

Backtrack to Parisian

and Venetian

To start our long walk to Taipa

We finally reached Hei Lin Café (喜蓮咖啡) and managed to grab a table since it was not peak hour. We ordered their recommended dishes of deep fried curry puff (咖哩角), deep fried wonton (炸云吞), red bean milk (紅豆冰), oxtail macaroni (牛尾汤通粉) and minced beef & potato with rice (免治牛肉饭).

Hei Lin Cafe

The oxtail macaroni soup was really appetizing with the tomato based broth whereas the curry puff & wonton ware okay. The star of the bunch was the minced beef & potato with rice – it was so scrumptious until one could not stop eating! Yummy!!! The red bean milk drink was really thick as well.

Curry Puff

Fried Wonton

Red Bean Milk

Oxtail Macaroni Soup

Minced Beef & Potato with Sunny side up - this is the BEST!!!!

The sky has started to turn dark after we finished our meal, we walked to Beach Avenue overlooking the wetland in Avenida da Praia where five beautifully pastel painted nostalgic historical houses located. One of them was supposed to be a small museum but it was already closed by the time we arrived. Thus we simply marveled at the night view of the ‘Las Vegas’ across the wetland as well as took tons of pictures of the five beautiful building there.

At Beach Avenue...

Olaf?

The Lights seem to make thing somber..

Nostalgic Houses

Does this remind you of horror movie?

Cotai at Night!

Be Scared! Be very scared!

2018 is coming to an end!

After that we walked up some stairs to take a peep at “Our Lady of Carmel Church” before exploring the bustling street. There was supposed to be a famous café for pork chop bun there - Tai Lei Loi Kei (大利來記豬扒包) but unfortunately it was closed. =(

What else? More Stairs!

Our Lady of Carmel Church

Let's join the Crowd!!!

Oh no! It's CLOSED!!!

The Historical Museum of Coloane & Taipa was under renovation with the whole building wrapped with tarp! However, we did stumbled upon another Macao Light Festival “testing” at Pak Tai Temple. There was also the yellow painted Starbucks in the area for some photo-shooting as well. =P

Seriously?!

Finally something pretty!!! =)

Walking around with no destination in mind...

Yellow Starbucks!

In order to get back to our hotel, we needed to walk all the way back to Studio City for the shuttle bus. Thus this time we took the long flat escalator route behind the Venetian before taking more pictures of the little Las Vegas at night. The Eiffel tower was glittering with lights but I guess it was still not as spectacular as the real one (link). We waited at Studio City for quite a long time before the shuttle arrived to get back to Senado Square thus this ended another long day in Macao. =)