As we arranged on Sunday, today was going to be our day trip to China and see Rodger’s new pub in She Kou. Now that we knew where the International Ferry Terminal was from yesterdays travels, we made our way there without problem for the 11:30 sailing. With our tickets purchased at a cost of £17 return we jumped on the boat and off we steamed. The boat docked and off we went to the Kiosk which said ‘China Visa’. The lady there told us to go around the corner to the immigration enquiries desk as we only wanted a 5 day visitor’s visa. We got to the kiosk and found they were on lunch for another 20 minutes so we waited and read the notice saying that the visa cost was 160Rmb’s (about £15) and was only payable in the local currency. So we asked where the ATM was and it turns out there wasn’t one!! However, there is a money changer so I whip out my ‘Emergency’ US dollars and go and see her.
Hayley then comes dashing up to let me know that the visa charge is 490Rmb’s for UK nationals – this is about £50. We decided this was too expensive for our day trip so we told Immigration that we didn’t want to come into China anymore. This confused them a little and they had a wee chat with each other. The Police supervisor came across and said that we could leave on the next boat but she would have to keep our Passports until the boat arrived in an hour and a half, the lady was true to here word and we were guided towards the boat 3 minutes before it left (having been docked for half an hour!!). We then took the opportunity to remind the Immigration man that we needed our passports and he asked his mate who didn’t have a clue! The little smartly dressed man ran back inside the terminal to get them and appeared again as just as all of the ferry company are getting antsy about the scheduled departure time. Once on the boat we could eventually relax as i) we were not in a Chinese Immigration detention centre and ii) we had our passports back and stood a good chance of getting into Hong Kong again.
Once we arrived, it took a short while to explain to Hong Kong Immigration why we had a Hong Kong exit stamp but no entry stamp to China but when we told them the price of the visa they raised their eyebrows and allowed us back in.
When eventually freed from international no-mans land, we went for lunch at a sushi bar which was amazing and then got the tourist funicular railway up Victoria peak and had a look around for a couple of hours – no passport was needed for this jaunt!! We came down and found a back street noodle shop which fed us for about £3 each - it was amazing how quickly you can master the art of eating noodles with chop sticks at that price!!
Hayley then comes dashing up to let me know that the visa charge is 490Rmb’s for UK nationals – this is about £50. We decided this was too expensive for our day trip so we told Immigration that we didn’t want to come into China anymore. This confused them a little and they had a wee chat with each other. The Police supervisor came across and said that we could leave on the next boat but she would have to keep our Passports until the boat arrived in an hour and a half, the lady was true to here word and we were guided towards the boat 3 minutes before it left (having been docked for half an hour!!). We then took the opportunity to remind the Immigration man that we needed our passports and he asked his mate who didn’t have a clue! The little smartly dressed man ran back inside the terminal to get them and appeared again as just as all of the ferry company are getting antsy about the scheduled departure time. Once on the boat we could eventually relax as i) we were not in a Chinese Immigration detention centre and ii) we had our passports back and stood a good chance of getting into Hong Kong again.
Once we arrived, it took a short while to explain to Hong Kong Immigration why we had a Hong Kong exit stamp but no entry stamp to China but when we told them the price of the visa they raised their eyebrows and allowed us back in.
When eventually freed from international no-mans land, we went for lunch at a sushi bar which was amazing and then got the tourist funicular railway up Victoria peak and had a look around for a couple of hours – no passport was needed for this jaunt!! We came down and found a back street noodle shop which fed us for about £3 each - it was amazing how quickly you can master the art of eating noodles with chop sticks at that price!!
Dave
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