A combination marine park and amusement center, Ocean Park conveniently is located on the south side of Hong Kong island.
To get there, we took the Ocean Park Citybus 629 from Admiralty MTR station.
After a 15 minutes ride, we found ourselves at the Tai Shue Wan entrance which is near to the park’s Headland.
OK here’s how it goes, Ocean Park’s marine attractions, thrill rides and shows are divided between 3 areas: Lowland, Headland and Tai Shue Wan. There’s two modes of transportation to move between the Lowland, Headland and Tai Shue Wan. The Lowland-Headland is connected by cable cars while, the Headland-Tai Shue Wan is connected by the second longest outdoor escalator in the world which stretches over 225 metres!
These were our tickets to a entire day of fun-filled activities!
That’s Chief (Mr.Parrot) and James Fin H2O (Mr.Shark)! Ocean Park has 6 mascots. Besides Chief and James Fin H2O, there’s a waving sea lion named Whiskers (known as Wai Wai in Chinese), Jewel (a butterfly), Swift (a dolphin) and Professor (a turtle)!
With much stuff going on, we decided to plan which attractions, thrill rides and shows we wanted to catch so we won’t be wasting time running all over the park aimlessly. The map was pretty useful.
Despite ’studying’ the map for few minutes (too distracted), we started our adventure with a terribly wrong choice.
Our first ride was the Space Wheel.
It still baffles me why we went on that monstrous contraption of thrills spills and action before other moderate attractions. Perhaps we were too excited and couldn’t wait to get ourselves in a giddy adventure.
I puked 3-4 times after that damned ride.
That was a really wrong decision, I ended up feeling nauseous and weak the entire outing. Which was pretty upsetting because there’s so much other stuff to do at the Headland! Headland houses many thrill rides, including the Dragon, Eagle, Crazy Galleon, Ferris Wheel, Flying Swing, Raging River, Mine Train, and Abyss Turbo Drop.
I was too weak to go on any rides after the horrifying Space Wheel! Sat at a corner while he tried other rides.
:/
After that hair-raising experience, we hopped on the Ocean Park Escalator to get to the other side of the park. At 225 m (745ft), it is the second longest outdoor escalator in the world and I felt like puking the moment I stepped on the escalator. It doesn’t help that it was a super long way up. Baby laughed at me when I had that manic look, searching for places to vomit!
To make me feel better, he dragged me to watched an ice skating showing with people juggling fire batons, performing acrobats, and dances.
But half-way, we left because I felt like puking. Not that the performance was sucky. It was Space Wheel.
He laughed at me again!
:S
Had to rest at a bench for about 10 minutes before moving on. Lucky the weather was cool and breezy. I felt much better and that was the last time I puked. Thank God.
Eventually we gave up following the map and decided to roam randomly. We found ourselves at the Marine Land. We were hoping to get a seat at the Ocean Theatre but it was totally packed! Well, this show is a family favourite where dolphins and sea lions participate in lively daily shows. Good place to bring your kids and educate them on marine mammals. Probably that explains why it’s so popular. We had to stand all the way at the back. Snap a few pictures and made our way to other attractions.
Ocean Theatre features shows by talented dolphins, sea lions, and a killer whale. How exciting! But we only caught the dolphins. Here’s some shots of the dolphins doing tricks!
Nearby there’s the world-class Atoll Reef aquarium which holds 2,000 fishes from close to 250 species and the unique Sea Jelly Spectacular, where we could interact with 1,000 beautiful sea jellies!
Had to grab a drink near the Pacific Pier. Felt thirsty. Here’s a weird ice drink everyone buys at Ocean Park. A witch hat with a green ice ball!
Since we couldn’t grab a real sea lion to hug, the fake ones were perfect for photo-taking!
(:
Oh there’s plenty of choices for food here. We grabbed some BBQ spring chicken and BBQ sausages from the Light House Grill somewhere near Pacific Pier. Pretty ok but a little over-priced. Hmm there’s McDonald’s with typical hamburgers, french fries and soft drinks at Headland rides. Over at Adventure Land, you can find this stall, Raging River Squid which offers delicious-looking fried squid and drinks. Chinese food is available at Noodle Bar (somewhere along Tai Shue Wan entrance). They serve Chinese soup noodles, wanton, dumplings, Chinese dessert and beverages.
Took a quick stroll to one of the tallest observation towers in Southeast Asia, the Ocean Park Tower! This tower gave us a 360º gently rotating view that enables us to see clear to Aberdeen and the outlying islands. I think my body is better-suited for this sorta ride. sigh. sad. I’m just not made for zany rides.
That was our last stop at the Headland, shortly we boarded the cable cars for a spectacular 8-minute ride over a hill to the Lowland. The cable car system offers a convenient and exceptionally panoramic route between Ocean Park’s Headland and Lowland.
The view of the rocky coastline was spectacular.
The lowland is also subdivided into several areas and attractions. But most of the stuff here are more suitable for kids. We were thrilled only at the Hong Kong Jockey Club Giant Panda Habitat (?????????) where Le Le, Ying Ying, An An and Jia Jia, greet visitors!
Adorable! If you want to see what they are doing now, check out the Giant Panda Live Broadcast!
After about 4 hours here, we rushed off to catch a church service at Cain Road. Yup, to do Ocean Park justice, plan on spending at least 4 hours here, but you’ll probably stay the whole day if you’re travelling with kids.
Note: never NEVER go on crazy rides first and do plan your trip beforehand.
