Hong Kong Getaway Part 1

Prepping for the Trip

My sister and I started planning for our trip to Hong Kong three months ago for our birthday. We normally plan for a trip longer than three months every time we travel to allow ample time to save up for our pocket money and research online for rave reviews regarding top spots to go and suggested hotel accommodations for tourists. We just thought about heading to Hong Kong last January and from then we started researching for travel agencies that offers HK tours only because we already booked our flight.

It wasn't easy really because it is such a risk to entrust your good money on travel agencies you just recently stumbled upon online. Most of the travel agencies we came across online wants upfront bank deposit/payment and rarely accepts Paypal payments except for this travel agency called SPF Travel & Tours which we found 100% legit.

Payment via Paypal is an excellent mode of payment because it takes 28 days (Paypal policy) before the payment clears thus gives the client enough time for disputes in any case there'll be. It may be a hassle on the travel agency's part because it takes almost a month before they get paid, however, on the other hand, I thought, it is still a win-win situation because both parties feel safe.

We waited in vain before the payment cleared so we decided to contact the travel agency after 28 days just to make sure that they already received the payment. We got the travel voucher as soon as the payment went through sent via email. You can check out SPF Travel and Tours website for travel packages to various countries including HK.

We availed their 4 Days/3 Nights Free and Easy package which includes the following:

• 4days / 3nights Hotel Accommodation
• Daily Hotel Breakfast (6:30-10:00 AM)
• Roundtrip Transfer (Airport-Hotel Airport)
• Compulsory Half Day City Tour

At the Holiday Inn Manila Galleria, We booked 
a 2 Twin Executive Non Smoking Room

23 April 2015
Pre-Departure

Holiday Inn Manila Galleria

We came from the North so we needed to at least come down to the South couple of days before our flight so we could get some rest. We took the 7AM trip to Manila via Victory Liner for 450php each. A seven hour trip is exhausting plus the hot temperature down South will surely wear you down. I grew up in Manila so I am sort of accustomed to the scorching hot temperature there but If you stayed up north for almost four years now a 25 degree Celsius and up temperature is already a killer. My sister arranged all the hotel accommodations while I took care of the flight and all tour arrangements with the travel agency.

photo courtesy of m00nchildr0cks

We stayed overnight at the Holiday Inn Manila Galleria in Ortigas and availed our employee room benefit. We haven't stayed at the Holiday Inn Galleria before but we already stayed at the Crowne Plaza Manila Galleria years ago and we enjoyed our stay there so we decided to come back and stay at the Holiday Inn for a change. We were assigned an upper floor room that overlooks the Ortigas business district and we were happy with our stay as well because it was an executive room with a living area which is big enough for two persons. IHG properties never fails to amuse us amenities wise compared to other hotels we stayed at during our travels abroad. We missed the metropolis so much and all the hustle and bustle there is. We even went to Megamall to grab some Subway sandwiches for dinner.

24 April 2015
Tune Hotel Aseana, Paranaque

We switched from Holiday Inn Manila Galleria to Tune Hotel for our flight the next day 25^th of April due to its proximity to the airport (NAIA T3). Tune Hotel is just 3KM away from the airport as per my sissy's research which is an advantage because our flight is at 7:25AM.

In my assessment, Tune Hotel is perhaps a 1-2 star hotel good for overnight stays or layovers because there's nothing fancy about this hotel. Their rooms are too cramped up in my opinion, it's air-conditioned though with a ceiling fan, hot & cold shower, flat screen wall mounted tv with several cable channels & an in room safe, unlimited free wifi access. The wifi username is your room number whilst the password is the last name of the person who booked the room. Not much amenities except for one 1-2 pieces of soap, a tube of shampoo & conditioner in one, no toothpaste nor toothbrush, 3 towels and that's it. They don't even have any tea pots, coffee cups nor complimentary coffee or tea, no fridge neither and you need to head downstairs if you need hot water (the staff at the front desk could get you hot water from their pantry). The good thing was, at least the hotel has a lift which made hovering from your room to heading downstairs easier. 

at the Tune Hotel Aseana, Double Room: a/c controls, 

takeaway menu, in room safe, toilet & bath, fire escape plan, 

room key card

The most painful part was they don't have any in room phone in case there's something you need to request from the front desk. Their wifi by the way is only limited to 3 gadgets and the good thing was we only have 3 gadgets; a couple of mobile phones and a laptop. My wifi access did not work outright that we even needed to go back downstairs to advise the fron tdesk their wifi is only working on one gadget. The good thing was we're only sleeping over for our early morning flight because we can't endure the no tea pot/hot water for tea or coffee. Geez. Unfortunately, we're staying over again once we land back to Manila from HK. At least we now have an idea to collect the toiletries from the hotel we'll be staying at in HK once we fly back home and stay at Tune Hotel once again.

We're not picky travellers really but you always expect basic amenities every time you stay at any hotels worldwide such as basic toiletries for the correct number of occupants in the room. I mean do you expect two persons to share  one set of toiletries? A shampoo & body wash dispenser would be better.

arrival/departure card

Departure

25 April 2015

Manila – Hong Kong via Cebu Pacific

All our bags are packed and we're totally ready to go! Today is also payday so we're happy to bring in more cash to HK 'cuz we already changed the rest of our PHPs to HKDs whilst staying at the Holiday Inn Galleria. We bought some HK dollars via Sanrees Money Changers at Robinsons Galleria by the way because they offer reasonable exchange rates there. Going back, we left Tune hotel around four past in the morning via a colorum/private car arranged by the guard at the hotel. The driver was nice so I asked how much they charge from the hotel to the airport so he said they only charge 250php which I think is just really the minimum rate for cabs near the airport nowadays. It was a breeze because there was no traffic since it was still early so we got to the airport in less than 10 minutes. We gave the cabbie driver 300php which already includes the tip because he did not ask for any additional and instead just helped us unload our luggage unlike the driver who drove us from Holiday Inn Galleria to Tune Hotel who seemed pretty nice at first but as soon as we alighted from the cab, he asked for 'additional' money on top of the already arranged non-metered fare. Imagine our cabbie fare from Holiday Inn was less than 250php and we gave him 270php even asked if we could round it up to 300php?? Wow. Alligators in the metropolis. People who travel out of the country save up for their trip. These unscrupulous cabbie drivers are friggin' leechers.

Cebu Pacific bound to HK, yes we sat right
next to the entrance/exit door lol.
photo courtesy of m00nchildr0cks

Anyways, we lined up at the check in counter around 5AM and took some time to check because of the quite long queue already considering it's still pretty early. What might've consumed our time partly was we did not pay our travel tax first prior to check in so it was a hassle that we needed to go to the travel tax counter first before we could get our boarding pass of course. We only paid the travel tax at 1,020php roughly I think and they no longer charged for terminal fee which is good. I've heard about this in the past and I think they have already pushed through eradicating the terminal fee. They should have done this a long time ago anyways because other countries DO NOT charge for using their airport terminals as it is a basic service that every country should offer at no cost.

So there, we checked in our luggage and passed through Immigration. The stupidest thing we did was we forgot to withdraw funds from an atm machine prior to passing through the immigration counter. When we finally thought about it the IO no longer allows my sister to go out of the boarding gates premise which we forgot once you already reaced the boarding gates to our dismay. After all the bickering we just decided to withdraw money from an atm machine once reached HK. We were so problematic prior to boarding the plane because we just have enough money for 1-2 days in HKD because the rest our money were stuck in our atm cards.

the perks of sitting right next to the window
photo courtesy of m00nchildr0cks

7:25AM past our plane departs bound to HK. Whilst my sister was busy taking aerial shots as our plane takes off I felt dozing off due to tiredness prepping up for our early morning flight. I think I slept for the most part and woke up few minutes before we landed at the HK International Airport.

Related Posts:

Hong Kong Getaway Part2

Hong Kong Getaway Part3

Hong Kong Getaway Part4

Hong Kong Getaway Part5