Peggy is in charge of the blog for the New Zealand trip. If you want Anne's pictures and take on the day, become her friend on facebook. The first day does not start in New Zealand, as we spent three days getting from Seattle to New Zealand, which included an eight hour layover in Hong Kong. Therefore, first post is of our tour of Hong Kong. We took the high-speed train to down town Hong Kong and did a walking tour of the food markets and some of the old buildings. Two of the pictures are of the dried fish markets and a vegetable stall. I could only guess at the identity of many of the items. The third picture is of incense coils that hung from the ceiling of an old church. I decided by the time we left the church that the daily church staff seemed "incensitive" to the issue of second-hand smoke in a public area :)

We also went to a delightful botanical/zoological garden. Hong Kong has many high rises, ranging from very modern to barely standing. However, there seemed to be a lot of repair going on to the older buildings. All in all, the people of Hong Kong were very friendly to us and seemed to be working hard to have a pleasant, livable city.