Full circle travels to Hong Kong

Four decades after I first visited anywhere outside Western Australia, I finally got to return to Hong Kong

At the age of nine, all I’d seen of the world was Perth - my sprawling home city, which had just reached one million inhabitants back then - and the south-west of Western Australia, staying in coastal and forest towns and with my grandparents on their farm.

Then, I flew to Hong Kong.

I’d never been on a plane - and funnily enough, I don’t remember anything about the flight. What I remember, and what my childhood diary absolute confirms impressed me the most, is that Hong Kong was a city full of high-rise buildings and apartment blocks. At the time, Hong Kong’s population was more than five times as many, squeezed into a footprint significantly smaller than spread-out, suburban Perth.

We stayed at a Holiday Inn - exactly where is lost to history - but I can still remember looking out the window and having my young mind boggled by the multi-storey buildings around me. I was particularly taken by the washing hanging on balconies or on contraptions attached to windows.

Take two

Fast forward almost exactly four decades, and in November just gone, I flew to Hong Kong with my fourteen-year-old son. I had tried to return to Hong Kong in the past, but my plans were thwarted several times, notably by the SARS virus in 2003 when flights I’d booked were cancelled by the airline and I had to change my itinerary entirely. But this time, my son and I were landing to spend a week staying with dear friends who’d recently moved to Hong Kong to work in an international school.

These friends live in Discovery Bay, not far from the airport, so it wasn’t until our second day that my son and I took the ferry across to Hong Kong Island and we could really see the scale of the place.

Of course, we’ve been to big cities, but something about the skyline of Hong Kong as we approached across the water made us both sit up and take notice. We wandered the island and both kept stopping to take photos of the buildings; some of mine are above.

We ended our day riding the Peak Tram, just as I had in 1985. Our tickets cost a little more than back then, and the view was filled with even more buildings - see the video below - but looking back at the postcard in my diary, it was already pretty full back in my childhood!

Honestly, it was a thrill to return to Hong Kong after all these years. It’s always held a special place in my travel-loving heart, because it was the first time I felt that flush of excitement you get from seeing something for the first time; that frisson of newness that travel so often provides. It was even better to do so with my teen in tow, and with the rationale of visiting dear friends as well - it was really the perfect trip.

Of course, there was much more to my Hong Kong experience and you can hear more about it in Episode 328 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast.

Click here to listen on Spotify

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What about you?

Where was your first trip beyond your home country, and have you returned? Tell me all about it!