Month: March 2006

Arrived in Macao in Midnight

The flight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Macau took about 3 hours and 35 minutes, a little bit shorter than originally scheduled. However, we still arrived in Macau at wee hour of the day, at 2.30 midnight.

Macau International Airport is a small airport with just limited flights and airlines servicing. Our flight was the last flight scheduled to arrive for the day – all the following inbound and outbound flights are for the next morning. So most shops, including duty-free shops and establishments were closed, and the airport was almost empty except for immigration officers, security officers, money changer and a information counter staff. Of course, outside of airport, there were taxi drivers who are waiting for expected customers.
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AirAsia Service Standard

We boarded AirAsia flight AK50 scheduled at 10.30 pm to Macau. The flight was delayed for about 20 minutes, much shorter than I thought. It seems to me that AirAsia’s flights have became much punctual nowadays, as some of the passengers who took the AirAsia’s flights regularly told me. When I travelled to Sabah, Malaysia in 2001, the flights that we took were delayed for 3 hours – to and back!

When on the plane, the chief stewardess apologized for the delay, and then the pilot repeated the apologize again for the flight delay. It would be better if they can replace the apologize with some hot drinks or snacks. 🙂
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Travel Itinerary Plan?

Travel itinerary in Hong Kong and Macau? What’s the places that you plan to travel? That’s among the first questions that pointed to me when I met up with my family to catch the AirAsia’s flight to Macao.

But I don’t have any plan to visit what places or fixed itinerary in mind, although I do have some ideas about what’s the more popular tourist destinations in Hong Kong and Macao that consider to be ‘must-visit’, such as The Peak, Avenue of Stars at Tsim Sha Tsui Promenade, “World

KLIA Low Cost Carrier (LCC) Terminal

Since 23rd March 2006, all domestic and international AirAsia flights will be at LCC (Low Cost Carrier) Terminal of Malaysia Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA). The LCC Terminal is located about 20 km away from KLIA main terminal building. The two terminal are actually using the same runway for aircrafts’ taking off and landing, so why the two terminals are built so far apart is beyond my comprehend.

Worse still, if you go around the two KLIA’s terminals with its shuttle bus, it costs RM 1.50 1 way per person (free until 30 April 2006). For comparison, shuttle bus between Singapore Changi Airport Terminal 2 and Budget Terminal is free. Anyway, the shuttle bus service is located at Platform 8, bus station at Ground Floor, Car Park C, KLIA.
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Rushing to KLIA

I late for my appointment for SITA installation of Juniper Peribit at JAL office in Changi Airport. So the whole installation only finished at about 2pm. Initially still thinking of taking SMRT Buses service 858 to Woodlands Regional Interchange then transfer to bus to Johor Bahru, so now looks like I am running out of time.

I took a taxi from Changi Airport to Woodlands Checkpoint. The journey took me about half an hour and it’s low human traffic at checkpoint, so I was able to clear both Singapore and Malaysia customs by 2.50pm. The taxi ride costs me a hefty SGD $23.00, including surcharge for hired taxi from airport.
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Fastest Way to Go to KLIA from Singapore

Our Air Asia flight to Macau is on 10.30 pm at Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) newly opened LCC Terminal on Thursday 30th March 2006. I work half day on the day, and worse still, I need to go to Changi Airport at the south eastern tip of Singapore for SITA’s Juniper Peribit installation between 1pm to 2pm. So I have to rush to KLIA from even further place.

I have tried to figure out what’s the fastest way, most convenient and cheapest way to go from Singapore Changi Airport to Kuala Lumpur. There are several ways and methods of transport that comes across my mind: take a bus and/or MRT to Johor Bahru, transfer to express coach to Kuala Lumpur, or I can go to Golden Mile (Beach Road) or Lavendar Street terminal to catch a express bus directly from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur. I even consider to take the KTM train to KL or Nilai to connect to bus service to KLIA, but the train schedule doesn’t fit.
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Booked EastSpider Hotel with HostelWorld

After searching around the web and forums such as Virtual Tourist, I finally made the reservation of the hotel, or rather hostel that we’re going to stay in Hong Kong. It’s EastSpider Hostel, which I booked from HostelWorld.

It’s a hard decision to select the hotel to stay, as I am travelling with my parents. so it’s not advisable if the conditions and safety of the hotel is too bad. And Chungking Mansions and Mirador Mansions are notoriously cheap yet cramp, dirty and safety standard in doubt.
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Lonely Planet Hong Kong & Macau Travel Guide

Bought Lonely Planet Hong Kong & Macao Travel Guide at MPH for SGD $35.70, due to hand itchy. Expensive, but cheaper if compare with Lonely Planet guide books on other more exotic destination.

I personally prefer Lonely Planet as I feel that it’s more straight to the point and simple. For in-depth reading and detail background information about a destination, I would look to The Rough Guide or Footprints Travel Guide, which usually bulkier than Lonely Planet. For Hong Kong and Macao, I found a lot of guide books written in Mandarin and Cantonese too in National Library of Singapore, which provides lots of useful information from different perspective from English guide books.
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Hotels in Hong Kong

Been busy with works lately, I just had some time to browse and search for hotel to stay in Hong Kong. Singapore-based forum Hardwarezone has a few long and detailed threads about tips and information of visiting Hong Kong. In those thread, forumers recommend lots of hotels to choose from.

Free and Easy package to Hong Kong seems like a more common choice, where travel agency or tour operator will arrange for you the air tickets and accommodation so that you no need to worry about how to get there and where to stay. Some Free and Easy package even include airport transfer to hotel, so you’ll be sure you will reach the hotel.
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