My world walk Blog China Part Two/ Macau/ #37

My world walk Blog China Part Two/ Macau/ #37

26,000 kilometres have now been walked. I turned that one over on a nice bicycle path near Longtang. Then I had a nice celebratory lunch in a food mall. That day after my 33km day I stayed in a backpackers hostel in Zhuhai, China. It was on the 14th floor of an apartment block and in a semi-swanky area. Surely this can't be less than five euro I wondered, and it was. Thanks to a nice woman who helped me find the hostel within the apartment complex which had no block signage.Next morning I crossed over the border and into Macau which is a former Portuguese colony which has a certain amount of self-rule. It's pretty much a gambling resort for rich Chinese. From memory, it was returned along with Hong Kong the former British colony in 1997. Part of the agreement was that they would remain democratic for a fifty year period, and we are getting towards halfway. China has always considered these places to be renegade breakaway provinces which will one day return to the mainland. I had to go through immigration and all that. They even have their own currency, issued by the Bank Of China. The Chinese are pretty sensitive about this stuff and for the moment are describing it as 'One country, Two systems' In my view, China is playing the clock down well. I'm told that there are no backpacker hostels or cheap accom in Macau. Not really interested in staying anyway, I just came to include it in the walk and I made it, so I moved on. That night I took a ferry to Hong Kong. I had a lot of people there looking out for me, but no concrete plans or offers. I planned to stay for a few days. I got a nice message from the Irish consul staff so have to pencil in a chat and a cup of tea