As we got up this morning, a little earlier than normal the sun was shining through the curtains.  We were both still a little tired this morning after going out last night, but today we were off to Ocean Park and we needed to set off early to see everything!  After breakfast we set off on the bus number 12 to Admiralty terminus where we could get on the bus to Ocean Park. 

When we got to Admiralty the bus station was busy, today is Sunday and family day, so it was no suprise there was a queue for the buses to Ocean Park.  The bus is a regular bus service that runs to and from Ocean Park and at this time of day there was a queue to get on.  We queued for about 5 minutes as there were plenty of buses waiting to pick people up and the bus soon left for Ocean Park.  The bus travels through Happy Valley then through the Aberdeen tunnel and into Aberdeen where the the entrance to Ocean Park is located.

After getting off the bus there were many people around and we queued for five minutes for our entrance tickets.  We had a special deal from a booklet to get 10% off our entrance fee, making it about 12 pounds for the day.  Ocean Park is visited by many people including lots of Mainland Chinese people come on a day trip, as well as some locals and tourists.  The only problem with this is that they are often quite rude and the Chinese way seems to be to push past everyone else and try to get to the front.

Ocean Park is a mixture of a theme park and zoo, with a number of wildife exhibits as well as rides.  On entering the park the first place to look at was a giant Aviary.  This was similar to the aviary in Hong Kong Park and we took a quick look around, but after our experience in the Hong Kong Park aviary we didn't stick around too long!  Ocean Park is also set on a hill and so walking around is quite difficult and Ocean Park has a number of novel ways to get around.  We walked up the hill and saw the Log Flune ride as well as a ride called the Space Wheel.  Clara wasn't really interested in going on it so I went on on my own.  The ride was quite good and basically was a circle that rotated up into the air and eventually you went upside down.

Next we walked to the Mine Train ride which must be the ride I have been on with the best view.  The ride is situated on the top of some cliffs and looks out over the South China Sea.  I went on this ride too, but it wasn't that good - again Clara didn't really want to go so she took the pictures!  We continued to travel up the hill by taking an escalator up the steep part to the next section.  After taking a walk around a scenic road we eventually got to some more ride.  I went on a ride called the Abyss which is like the Playstation ride in Blackpool Pleasure Beach and consists of a 60m vertical fall.  The view from the top was pretty amazing, but it didn't last long and I was soon plummetting back to Earth!  The ride was actually quite scary, and I think Clara was definitely glad she didn't go on!

I also went on the 'Longest Rollercoaster in Hong Kong' (not hard to be the longest really!) called the Dragon, which had 3 loops and was the best ride there.  As the Dragon was set on a hill at the end of the ride you actually had to take a mechanised pully to pull the train back to the station.

By now the temperature was rising and the sun was beating down and it was very hot.  We needed somewhere to cool down ad so we went into the 'Atoll Reef' a large acqarium that has many fish to see, both from above and below the water level.  It was quite interesting but not really much different to the exhibits you can see in other acquariums around the world.  After exiting it was lunch time so we sat down and ate our lunch we had brought from home, some buns and some fruit.  The food in Ocean Park was fairly expensive by Hong Kong standards, which is very cheap for an English theme park but is limited to burgers, hotdogs and chips.

After lunch we continued to the top of the hill where we looked around the Shark acquarium, complete with underwater tunnel.  Sadly the tunnel was only about 10m long and pretty poor!  There was also a sealion acquarium where we could see the sealions swimming, again from above and below.  We walked past the large outdoor theatre where shows took place every day and decided to have a look at the 5pm show. 

After this we had mostly finished one side of the park.  To get to the other side, which is situated on the other side of a mountain, we had to take a cable car.  We walked to the station and got into the car.  This is Clara's nightmare as she really does not like the cable cars, although the view is pretty amazing!  The cable cars were not busy and we immediately got into a car and started on the trip.  The cars go flat for a while with a good view of the sea and Repulse Bay, a popular beach on the South of Hong Kong Island.  Eventually the cars go up and over a mountain and then take a steep drop over the other side and back to the other section of the park.

This section of the park contains the main entrance but is the smaller part and doesn't have as much to see.  When we got off the cable car we went to the part of Ocean Park that Clara had been looking forward to most, the Pandas!  The Panda house has two Pandas, Jai Jai, a 26 year old female - who is getting very old, and An An, an 18 year old male, who is getting old now, but is still okay.  As Pandas are solitary animals apart from when mating, the house is split into two with one Panda on each side.  Firstly we got to Jai Jai, who was lazing around on a small wooden platform in the middle of her pen.  She didn't move for a few minutes and so we decided to move on!  After reading a poster we saw that Pandas sleep for 41% of the time, eat for 55% of the time and only spend 4% of the time doing other things! 

An An was next, and today we were in luck, as he appeared to be in quite a lively mood!  Clara had told me that often the Pandas are just lying around but today An An was pacing around the pen.  After a while he stood outside the door to his indoor area and the keepers opened it.  The keepers came into his pen and put down some food for him.  After going back inside they opened his door and he came out and started to feed on the food.  It was quite strange watching the pandas at such close quarters, and I thought they looked quite fake in many ways.  We spent about 30 minutes watching An An eating and moving around the pen before we moved oustide to look around the gift shop.  Clara bought a couple of Panda items and then we moved on.

Next was an exhibit on Dinosaurs where there were some fake dinosaurs and some present day animals that are most closely linked to them.  This included some lizards and crocodiles and a few fish, and the exhibit finished with a massive animated Tyranosaurus roaring at us!  Next door to the dinosaurs was the Butterfly house.  This was a large area of trees covered with a net to stop the butteflies getting out.  We walked inside and were surprised at the amount of butterflies around!  They flew everywhere and it was often quite offputting to see them flying towards you!

The next exhibit was about the Amazon and had some of the animals from the Amazon to see, mostly birds, and a 3D amazon adventure (which was pretty rubbish, you put on 3D specs and walked through a dark hall!).  Finally on this side of the park was the Dolphin University.  This is where the young dolphins are trained for the shows that take place in the park.  It was interesting to see them being trained and the method they used to get the dolphins to do the tricks  they did seem to enjoy it though!

After a quick look around some shops we got back into the cable cars to return to the Headland part of the park.  There were a couple of things left for us to see and we also wanted to go see the dolphin show in the Ocean Theatre.  We got there a little early and it was a good job we did!  The theatre was filling up fast, and there was a live Spanish band to entertain us before the show.  The show lasted about 20 minutes and involved 4 dolphins and 2 sealions.  To be honest, they didn't really do too many tricks, but it was quite fun to see anyway.  After the show we went to have a look at an exhibit on jellyfish.  This was new and had large queues earlier in the day, but we managed to get in after a short wait.  The exhibit was quite dark and had lights to light up the jellyfish in different colours.  It was quite hard to move around as it was very dark and there were many mirrors to reflect the glowing jellyfish!

By now it was 6pm and the park was closing soon and the sun going down.  We walked back towards the entrance to get our bus and I took a quick ride on the Dragon rollercoaster once again (it was worse the second time).  We took the escalators back down the hill to the entrance adn got back onto the number 692 bus to Admiralty.  The traffic was quite bad and the journey took quite a long time, but we eventually arrived back at took a taxi home.

We arrived back about 7.15pm thoroughly tired and ready for a rest.  We had a home cooked meal of somerset pork, salad and garlic bread, freshly baked by Polly and slumped into the sofa to rest for the evening!  Tomorrow we are having an easier day, meeting some more family and having a bit of a rest...

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