Trip Reports Archives - asthejoeflies

Mar 20 2018

11 Hong Kong Disneyland Tips and Tricks for 2018

I’ve visited Hong Kong Disneyland three times over two separate trips semi recently (2015 and 2017). The first time I went I hadn’t been to any Disney park in over fifteen years. We had a short and sweet visit with our almost 2 year old daughter. This time we went back with our now 4 year old daughter and almost 2 year old son in tow. Each time I’ve visited I’ve found my friend Leslie’s Hong Kong Disneyland advice to be super helpful.

Let’s take a look at Hong Kong Disneyland in 2018. A few things have changed, mostly for the better. I’ll have my full thoughts on the park later but overall I found the park to be fairly underrated. Yes, it’s smaller than other Disney parks, but I kind of loved that. So let’s take a look at tips and tricks to make the most out of your trip to Hong Kong Disneyland!

1. Now is the perfect time to go

For a number of reasons, now is a great time to visit Hong Kong Disneyland. In the past, the majority of crowds have hailed from mainland China. However, less mainlanders visit Hong Kong these days (for a variety of reasons). On top of that, the opening of Shanghai Disney draws people away from Hong Kong. That means you have fewer crowds to deal with.

On top of all that, Hong Kong Disneyland improved greatly since my visit in 2015. The Ironman Experience, Mickey and the Wondrous Book, and Fairytale Forest have all opened. With lower crowds it’s easier to get your kids into Trials of the Jedi Temple.

Since our visit last year, a lot of new attractions have opened or are set to open in 2018. The new Karibuni Marketplace introduced new characters in the park (in Adventureland), and a new Moana show is slated to open on May 30, 2018!

Oh, and did I mention that a one day ticket only costs ~$75 USD? And due to low attendance, Hong Kong Disneyland seems to run promotions every year. Currently until July 15,2018 you can get a two day ticket with two $15 HKD vouchers (worth about $4 USD) for $689 HKD (~$88 USD).

2. Avoid Chinese holidays and weekends, don’t worry so much about Hong Kong holidays

Despite the decrease in mainland Chinese tourists, they still compose a large portion of Hong Kong Disneyland visitors. So you want to avoid visiting on mainland China holidays (here’s a 2018 calendar). In 2015 I visited the day after New Year’s and the park felt completely packed. This year I went on Easter Monday (a public Hong Kong holiday, but not a mainland China one) and experienced a very small crowd. The longest I had to wait for any ride was 20 minutes and that was by choice due to the kids’ schedules.

Native Hong Kong residents like to get out of Hong Kong during the holidays, another reason not to worry too much about Hong Kong holidays. On the other hand, mainland Chinese like to visit on weekends so you want to avoid those.

3. Use the differences between HK and US time schedules to your advantage

Hong Kong people operate about an hour or two later than your average American. That means they wake up later, eat lunch and dinner at 1:00 and 7:00 PM respectively, and stores stay open much later.

That means if you get to Hong Kong Disneyland at park open (rope drop) you see even shorter lines than you would at the Disney parks in America. And park open in Hong Kong (10:00 AM) is pretty late to begin with. 9:45 AM is around when they start letting people into the park. If you eat lunch at 11:30 or noon and dinner at 6:00 PM you’ll avoid large lines. Then go ride when the majority of people in the park eat meals!

Visiting Hong Kong? Disney fan? Here are 11 Hong Kong Disneyland tips and tricks to help you make the most of your HK Disney visit! — The Mickey MTR is cute, but it takes awhile to get there

4. Budget in and be prepared for the long travel time to get to the park

It takes quite a bit of time to get to the park from the city. So if you’re not staying in a Hong Kong Disneyland hotel, make sure to budget an hour or more for travel. You often are traveling in the thick of rush hour (which starts later than in the US, see above). Be aware that the long travel time might make you want to just do the park for one day. While I think the park can justify two days (we did it), traveling 2+ hours to get to and from the park might make a second day not worth it for your family.

5. Most visitors go to Fantasyland or Tomorrowland first

Fantasyland and Tomorrowland have the largest concentration of attractions. They also are the most iconic parts of Hong Kong Disneyland so most visitors go to those lands first. I visited Toy Story Land at 11:00 AM and all three rides had a wait time of 10 minutes (both days).

So you can adopt two strategies. Strategy 1: Visit the other lands first. If you choose this tactic I recommend you make the Toy Story Parachute Drop your first ride of the day, it has the slowest load times in the entire park (36 people every 5 minutes, compared to Ironman which at capacity can accommodate over 200 visitors every 5 minutes).You can hit all of Toy Story Land in the first hour and then visit Mystic Manor and Grizzly Gulch Mine Cars. Then hit up Fantasyland and Tomorrowland later.

Strategy 2: Rope drop and get all of Fantasyland and Tomorrowland done before the park fills in. Just be aware that Toy Story Land gets super crowded in the mid afternoon, so make that your third stop. Definitely use Strategy 2 if your kids want to participate in Trials of the Jedi Temple. Either way, download the Hong Kong Disneyland app and keep an eye on wait times, just in case the park gets busy.

6. Use Fastpass for rides in this order: Ironman Experience, Winnie the Pooh, Space Mountain

Hong Kong Disneyland operates on a paper Fastpass system like Disneyland. You take your ticket to kiosks, scan it, and receive a paper Fastpass with a return time. You should be able to use Fastpass at all three rides it’s available for in a single day: Ironman Experience, Winnie the Pooh, and Hyperspace Mountain.

If you want to ride all three rides, I suggest you Fastpass them in that order unless you have young kids (in that case prioritize Winnie the Pooh). You could probably ride some of these rides multiple times on most days, since like I said before, park crowds generally are low.

As an aside, the Ironman Experience rules. Think a little bit of Soarin mixed in with a lot of Star Tours but Ironman flavored. Fun moments, exciting action, a little bit of humor – this ride is unique to Hong Kong Disneyland and definitely warrants your time.

7. Don’t miss Mystic Manor

Ghosts occupy a pretty negative place in Chinese culture, so Hong Kong Disneyland went a different direction with their Haunted Mansion equivalent. I totally loved Mystic Manor. It’s got a great storyline and some scary moments. It also is a lot more colorful than the Haunted Mansion which is a welcome change. Like the Ironman Experience, this unique experience qualifies as a must see. I won’t spoil the storyline here, though will do so in a later post.

8. Mickey and the Wondrous Book is a sight to behold – make sure to see it

I wrote awhile back about the impressive Disney Cruise Line entertainment. Mickey and the Wondrous Book, a show unique to Hong Kong Disneyland (sensing a theme?), continues that great tradition. The top notch story follows Mickey as he visits characters from various Disney stories.

Disney presents the show in both Cantonese and English, alternating between the two and using subtitles. The Cantonese => English translation was pretty good, my Chinese isn’t good enough to say anything about the other direction. It’s also pretty hilarious hearing Mickey, Goofy, and Olaf speaking in Cantonese (they get the cadence of these characters down pat).

I also appreciate how the show highlights some lesser heralded Disney properties like The Frog and the Princess (my favorite performance from the show for the record). The music in the show is great, my daughter and I are still singing it five days later. Don’t miss this show and beware of long lines, get there about 15 minutes before showtime to avoid them.

Fun fact: the title song in the show, Happily Ever After, was adapted to make the theme song for the Magic Kingdom’s new fireworks show in Orlando. That fireworks show happens to be my favorite of the nighttime spectaculars.

While you’re at it, Festival of the Lion King is worth your time too, but you can also see that in Florida.

9. Bring cash and try something new to eat

As a miles and points geek I always hope to pay with credit card, but like much of Hong Kong plastic doesn’t go as far in Hong Kong Disneyland. You can use credit card at a lot of stores but places like the eateries don’t take them. You can also use an Octopus card. I highly recommend getting one if you’re spending time in Hong Kong, they make life so easy.

Like much of Hong Kong, you can see 3-D models of a lot of the food. Hong Kong Disneyland food is pretty good and draws from a variety of cultures. Pick something that looks good to you and try it. And remember to eat earlier!

10. Be strategic about visiting characters by using the Hong Kong Disneyland app

All Disney parks post characters at the front of Main Street to cut down on lines. People stop to take these pictures and delay going on rides. Well, in Hong Kong Disneyland, these lines get crazy! Skip those and be smarter about meeting characters.

Download the Hong Kong Disneyland app. It will have a list of all characters that could possibly appear in the parks, but not all characters appear every day. If you don’t see meeting times that character isn’t appearing anymore that day. There are some regulars but others rotate (like Woody was there our first day but Jessie and Buzz took his place the second).

After the park opens, the app populates with the meeting times for each of the characters. Meeting a ton of characters is pretty simple: show up and line up 5 minutes before a character is supposed to appear. You’ll guarantee seeing that character and have a short wait time to boot. My daughter and I spent our second day just meeting characters, and though we missed Mickey and Minnie, we got to see a ton (including the aforementioned Jessie and Buzz). And with the new spot in Adventureland, you’ll have a lot more chances to meet characters!

11. Get stickers, stickers, stickers!

Almost every cast member in the park, from Guest Relations to custodial staff, carry stickers with them. It’s a lot of fun for kids to ask for these stickers and the cast members are super friendly about it. Think pin trading but free.

There are some really cool stickers to collect. If you’re feeling particularly forward, you can even ask cast members to see what stickers they have (they usually have more than one type). Asking for stickers doesn’t get old for kids, or even some adults.

Final Thoughts

Hong Kong Disneyland may be overshadowed by Shanghai at the moment, but you should definitely visit. With the news of Disney investing more money into it, now’s the time to go before it gets too popular. Hopefully these tips can help you maximize your experience.

Have you been to Hong Kong Disneyland? If so, please share some of your experiences and tips in the comments!

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Feb 15 2018

Daring to Disney: When a Disney annual pass makes sense

Trying to figure out whether an annual pass makes financial sense for your Walt Disney World trip? Are there times when it’s better to buy one than individual tickets? This post will explain what you need to know to make the best financial decision for your Disney World vacation.

Update: With the new 2019 ticket prices going into effect as of 3/12/19 and the new annual pass prices going into effect 6/18/2019, this is an update of my article from 2016 about how an annual pass often makes financial sense. Since Disney World has gone calendar based, I can’t account for every single ticket available. What I’ve done is used the median ticket price for calculations. I’ve updated the Annual Pass calculator with these median prices – add in your trip lengths and options to see if buying the Disney Annual Pass makes sense for you! The annual pass has gone up a LOT, so it’s starting to make less financial sense. Scroll to the bottom.

So I mentioned in my last post that I saved money by staying off site, but I should have saved more. It’s downright shocking to me, but it would have made a ton of sense to buy an annual pass on my Disney World trip. Haley Bach (a Disney Expert who is going to be on the next episode of the Observation Deck!) summed it up perfectly with this tweet:

@asthejoeflies 😱 yeah, ticket math often makes an AP a good call.
— Resist Vote Vaccinate not feeling calm rn (@BachFancy) January 11, 2016

So what ticket math would make an annual pass a good call? I think I read somewhere that if you are spending at least 12 days in the parks over a calendar year an AP is probably worth it, but to me, it’s even less than that. Towards the bottom of the post I have created a simple tool that you can use to calculate costs for your own situation if you want to skip ahead!

What you get with an annual pass

The basic Disney annual pass is called the Disney Platinum Pass and costs $1191.74 (after-tax) for a 366 day period (so you can use it from 6/18/2019 – 6/18/2020, wait, do you get 367 days in a leap year!?). Here’s what you get:

Unlimited admission to the four Walt Disney World theme parks (Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and Animal Kingdom)
Park hopping privileges (you can go to multiple parks in the same day)
Free theme park parking
Free Disney Photopass downloads
10% off merchandise
10-20% off dining depending on location (excludes quick service, thanks Haley!)
Various discounts on lodging

Let’s take these one by one before we go through the ticket math, in order of importance in my mind from least to greatest.

1. Lodging and dining discounts

For discounts on lodging and dining, my guess is take it or leave it. There are often sales during off periods available to everyone of up to 30%, I read online AP discounts are usually up to 30% as well on hotels. My guess is during peak times you’re probably looking at paying close to the rack rate anyway, it’s just simple supply and demand. I’d love to hear people’s experiences in the comments though. Dining discounts can add up, Disney annual pass holders have had a running 10% discount for a few months. Penny pinchers bringing their own food obviously might not save as much with an annual pass.

2. Park Hopper

Park hopping is great, but to me it’s usually more of a luxury than anything else. If you are staying for a week, like we did, spending one day per park is definitely enough. If you’re thinking about getting an annual pass, then you definitely have the time to spread things out and visit one park per day. I’d say the only exception is dealing with the Magic Kingdom and young children: taking the ferry or monorail across the Seven Seas Lagoon adds like 15-20 minutes to your commute each way and makes going back home for a nap really annoying. The luxury of park hopping to Epcot for dinner is very tempting. But I still think it’s a luxury (more on that later).

When does a Disney annual pass make financial sense? Compare the features your family needs for your next Walt Disney World vacation and save money on your travels with this free tool. — Disney’s professionals probably wouldn’t get the hand in the picture

3. Photopass downloads

Free Disney Photopass downloads are another luxury, but you can glean a lot of value out of this benefit. Unlike Memory Maker (subject of my next post), you don’t get automatic downloads of your friends and family pictures. However, that’s pretty easy to circumvent – anyone who is linked as family and friends to your My Disney Experience account effectively receives your Photopass privileges. You can download their photos as if they are your own.

If you don’t want to make people your friends and family, grab a Photopass card (say, from a character meet and greet or something). Scan the same Photopass card for whatever photos they take. Then link all those Photopasses to your account and for a little extra work you should be able to download everyone’s photos (in theory at least).

4. Free theme park parking

If you’re saving money by staying off site, free theme park parking is huge – $25 a day adds up quickly. Doesn’t mean anything if you’re staying on site, but it adds up quickly if you’re trying to save money by staying off site. Sometimes it might make sense for at least one person in your party to grab the annual pass just for this benefit.

Why the math on my ticket meant I probably should have bought an annual pass

Of course, getting admission to all four theme parks for a year is great. And that’s where the ticket math comes in.

Here’s a quick tip that a lot of first time Disney goers might not know: as long as you have at least one unused day left on your ticket, you can use the value of your ticket to “upgrade” to a more expensive ticket at any time. Put a pin in that and we’ll get back to it.

Anyway, let’s take a look at my costs compared to an annual pass (note these were prices from Jan 2016):

Item	Our Trip	Annual Pass
7 park days	$335	Included
Park hopper	$65	Included
Parking	$120	Included
Memory Maker/Photopass	$169	Included
Total Cost	$689	$749

As you can see, with all the things I ended up tacking on to my tickets, I spent only $60 less than I would have spent if I had gotten an annual pass. That year, I visited Orlando again for FT4RL4, so bought another ticket – that cost more than $60. So you can see how ticket math can really hurt you. And even if I hadn’t visited a park, I probably would have gotten close to $60 back with the dining and merchandise discounts.

I would have spent less money if I had bought an annual pass in 2016.

Is an annual pass the right decision for you?

Should you get an annual pass? In my case, I think we should have bought at least one annual pass. There are also some pretty easy rules of thumb.

You should almost always buy an annual pass if:

You plan to visit the parks on three separate occasions in a calendar year
You plan to visit the parks for at least twelve days total across two trips

However, if you want to mess around with some calculations yourself, here’s a simple tool I made. You can input trips you plan to take and ticket types you plan to buy, along with Memory Maker and parking. At the bottom of the table, you’ll see how much you will save with an annual pass or how much more you’ll spend. The tool is in beta so please let me know if you see any errors! You can either click the link below or I’ve embedded the tool at the bottom of the post.

Update 10/16/2018: Since I obviously can’t account for all of Disney’s variable pricing, I’ve done my best to take the AVERAGE ticket prices for the year. So this Annual Pass calculator tool should be in the ballpark, but if your number is close, you might want to throw your actual dates into Disney World’s website.

Disney Annual Pass Calculator Tool!

If you want to go deep down the rabbit hole, check out this very amazing and very in depth spreadsheet made by Touring Plans forum user JJT. It includes a bunch more options plus info on ticket discounters.

Note: Only use the tool if you’re not a Florida resident, since Florida residents get discounted rates on everything.

Upgrading your ticket

As I mentioned above, as long as you have one unused day on your ticket, you can upgrade it to a more expensive ticket. This includes adding park hopper options, water park options, or even upgrading to an annual pass.

If I had figured all this out about the annual pass before I had gotten to the parks I probably would have upgraded to an annual pass on the first day. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize this until day six, meaning I had already paid $120 for parking.

But if you have a trip planned and you’ve already bought tickets but want to upgrade them, you can totally do it before you pay for all the parking and make it worth it. You can upgrade at the ticket booths at the park, but that of course would require you to pay for one day of parking. You can also do it at any Disney hotel or at guest relations at Disney Springs. I think if you bring your parking receipts they can be applied to the cost of the pass as well.

Final Thoughts

If you’re going to Disney World for close to a week, you should definitely think about upgrading to or buying an annual pass, especially if you are going to have to pay for theme park parking. The math often makes it worth it – feel free to use my table if you’re too lazy to do the math yourself!

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Can’t get enough Disney? Check out our Disney planning podcast, Disney Deciphered (latest episode embedded below)!

Other Posts in this Series

Flights, Hotel, and Car

Making Disney Dining Reservations

Saving Money on Disney Tickets

Using Touring Plans (the non-touring plan parts)

Optimizing a visit using Touring Plans’ touring plans

Saving money by staying off site

When a Disney annual pass makes sense

Touring Epcot attractions with a toddler

Touring Animal Kingdom with a toddler

One perfect day at the Magic Kingdom

Dining Reviews

Tips for parents of toddlers and infants

Things I wished I knew before I went to Disney

Aug 31 2017

Free Chicago Kids Activities

This summer, my daughter and I spent a long weekend in Chicago. While we didn’t plan it this way, we ended up spending the good part of a day bouncing between Chicago kids activities without having to pay any admission fees or cash.

We stayed at the Hyatt Place Chicago/River North. From there we walked to Millenium Park and checked out some of the art work. Obviously, the large metallic bean aka The Bean highlighted this portion. We then made our way over to the nearby Maggie Daley Park. After taking our fill of the various playgrounds there, we walked up the Lakefront Trail to the Navy Pier.

Since it was Thursday night, the Chicago Children’s Museum offered free admission, which we took advantage of! We finished the night with a stroll down the Navy Pier and then back to our hotel. No admissions fees and about three and a half miles of walking!

Here are my recommendations if you’re going to check out some of these free activities, and a couple extra that we didn’t make it to.

Millenium Park

Millenium Park sits at the top of my Chicago free kids activities list. As I mentioned, one of the most iconic Chicago landmarks, “The Bean”, resides here. (Officially, it’s called Cloud Gate.) But besides the bean, Millenium Park offers a lot more art to look at. There are rotating contemporary art exhibits to go along with various free standing architectural works such as the Millenium Monument.

Better yet, kids can play in Crown Fountain, two fifty foot tall glass towers that act as a very stylish and architectural water park. Be sure to have your kids stand in the correct spot when the faces on the fountains open their mouths – and bring a change of clothing for them!

Keep your kids entertained in Chicago with these FREE activites. There's plenty of fun to be had without hurting your wallet! — Crown Fountain in Millenium Park is a ton of fun for kids

Maggie Daley Park

Right next to Millenium Park lies Maggie Daley Park. In my mind, I actually just think of the two as one giant park. Maggie Daley Park houses a fun labyrinth of outdoor playgrounds that should keep toddlers and school age kids entertained for hours.

One great feature of this set of playgrounds is how well they are delineated. Trees and shrubbery separate all of the playgrounds. A winding but simple set of paths leads from one playground to the next. This demarkation helps to really give each playground a sense of seclusion, it’s not like one gigantic play area where kids are all on top of each other. Instead, each playground feels like its own separate entity which helps to contain the insanity. Plus each section feels “new” to the kids.

As far as playgrounds go, the playgrounds on offer at Maggie Daley Park are pretty great. There’s a sunken pirate ship, small sides, super large slides, climbing structures -plenty of fun stuff for your kids to play with!

Chicago Children’s Museum (Thurs nights)

Chicago boasts a great Children’s Museum, and though it usually charges an admission, the museum offers free admission on Thursday nights. We took advantage of this and had a great time.

As you might imagine, a huge crush of people entered the museum at 5 PM when admission switched over to free. Pretty much like every free admission to a museum you’ve ever seen! However, we found that by 6:30 most of the crowds had cleared out, so it’s not like you’re contending with huge crowds the entire time.

As for the museum itself, it’s your typical large metropolitan children’s museum, which is to say it was pretty great. We would gladly have paid admission to go during regular hours, but it just happened that our only chance to go was Thursday night, so that worked out!

Navy Pier

The Chicago Children’s Museum resides at the Navy Pier, a very popular Chicago tourist destination. The Navy Pier is one of those places where there’s a lot to see and do, but while it’s technically free, you’re likely to spend some money here. Whether it’s grabbing a bite to eat, watching a show (the Madagascar musical was on when we visited), or riding the Centennial Wheel, chances are you might find yourself forking over some dough. Still, it’s a great place to visit with a great vibe for kids and parents alike.

Lincoln Park Zoo

While we didn’t make it on this trip, the Lincoln Park Zoo is a great place to take your kids. It stands as one of the few free zoos in the United States. The 35 acre zoo holds a variety of animals, including lions, tigers, bears, penguins – all the hits. If your little kids are like mine, they’ll probably love this zoo.

Final Thoughts

One of the toughest things on vacation is saving money on sights. Sometimes, with kids, it doesn’t feel like it’s worth the investment. Luckily, Chicago has some great free activities that are great for kids. I’m sure I missed some, do you have other fun things for kids to do in Chicago? Let me know in the comments!

Jul 12 2017

Preparing to travel alone with a preschooler

Disclosure: Included in this post are links to products that my family uses or has used happily in the past. They only include what I would recommend to other family travelers. All links are Amazon Affiliate links and may earn me a commission if you purchase through those links. If you’d like to see other family travel gear I recommend, check out this page. Thanks for your support.

My 4.5 year old daughter M and I head out to Chicago soon for a fun little daddy-daughter weekend. We plan to spend a night in the city on our own using a Hyatt credit card free night and then will meet up with some friends for the weekend. This will be our third time traveling together alone (fourth if you count my flight with the two kids). Might be the last for awhile since her brother just turned two and I can start taking him on solo trips. Now that we’ve done this a few times, I’m beginning to pinpoint what makes travel alone with kids difficult for me as a dad. So let’s a take a look at what preparations I need to make to travel alone with a preschooler!

Preparing to shoulder 100% of the “mental load”

A coworker shared a comic with me the other day about the “mental load” many moms bear. (By the way, don’t click on it expecting a funny comic like I did! It’s just a straight up essay with pictures – not even any satire 🙁 sadface). The comic introduces this concept of “mental load” in a household. I’ve found this concept very useful and I’ve been thinking about it a lot. Basically, there is a huge burden in keeping track of everything that goes on in a household and while raising children, mentally. Then you put the work of the actual tasks on top of that mental burden and those two things add up to be quite a job. It’s a good concept, in my opinion. Here’s a stay at home dad’s take on it (in response to the original comic). Lifehacker even shared some tips for how to relieve mental load from the more burdened partner.

One of the many challenge traveling alone with kids is preparing to shoulder 100% of that mental load. Jess definitely carries more than 50% of the mental load in general, so when I travel alone with the kids I need to mentally psych myself up for taking on her (bigger) percentage completely. What that means for me is mentally going through the various aspects of the trip and calculating the best way to get through them. I’m rarely a planner, but I make an exception for traveling alone with the kids (and Disney World).

Now if I could offer a word of advice to parents considering traveling alone with their kids: if you don’t know how to shoulder 100% of the mental load at home, you’re in a tough spot if you have to do it on the road. Act accordingly.

Booking flights, hotels, and transportation

Since we don’t travel as much as we used to, I’ve found my miles and points accounts building. So I’ve quickly learned to adopt Freequent Flyer’s spend cash last mantra. Obviously, I still care about my cents per point value, but I’m always looking to redeem points first. To that end, I booked our outbound using United miles (12.5K per ticket) and our return using Jetblue miles (about 11,000 points per ticket). These are prices I can definitely live with, especially given the constraint I put on our flights. I couldn’t leave too early in the morning and didn’t want to deal with a connection since I’m traveling alone with a preschooler.

Getting ready to travel alone with a preschooler isn't easy, but in this post I help you think about what you need to do to get ready for a great trip! — Can’t say I’m thrilled to fly the friendly skies again, but gotta do what you gotta do (Photo Credit | Pixabay)

For hotels, I booked the one night I needed at the Hyatt Place Chicago/River North using my Cat 1-4 certificate I get from the Hyatt credit card. While I could have stayed at the Hyatt Regency or even used points to book the Conrad or the Park Hyatt, I don’t need frills when traveling alone with a kid. I just need a good location and I needed to use that free night. Note, I don’t actually think of this night as “free”. I paid $75 (the annual fee) for this room, so about 50% savings.

As for transportation, I’m not renting a car since we plan to link up with our friends after that first night. To save time, we’re going to Lyft to and from O’Hare, which costs more but M and I only have about 24 hours on our own so I want to make the most of it. I’ll be bringing along our mifold booster – no more bulky car seat huzzah!

Luggage and stroller

M and I will have to duke it out tonight. She wants to bring her Trunki, which we love but I sort of regret ever buying. Is it super cute? Yes. Is it super annoying to deal with a little kid trying to drag that through the airport? Also yes. But I don’t want to bring more than one suitcase, so we might just end up bringing that. Sigh.

I also decided that since we’ll be doing a couple of miles of walking each day, I’ll still need M’s stroller. Our Uppababy G-lite has taken a beating over the years, but it’s still ticking and still our favorite stroller to travel with. Small and compact wins the day when you’re traveling.

Entertainment and snacks

Now that M’s older, I’m not super worried about keeping her entertained on the flight anymore. Chicago’s pretty close by, so I’m just running with our tablet (a Nexus 7 from like 5 years ago that I rooted), my phone, her Kidzgear kids’ headphones, some coloring books, and a couple of real books. Shouldn’t be an issue. United also has that personal device entertainment stuff so I might use that on my laptop in a pinch.

In terms of snacks, I’m just grabbing two small tupperwares with goldfish and crackers – again, shouldn’t be a major issue. 3 hour flights seem like a piece of cake after Hong Kong. If you want to see other stuff I’ve used in the past to keep the kids entertained, I’ve included my favorites on my Family Travel Gear page.

Wallet

I always like to empty out my wallet before a trip, though that presents some conundrums. What if I find a MS friendly location? What if something goes on sale and I need to buy it online?

My general theory is that vacation is vacation, so I don’t want to be bound by hacking or deals. Still…I don’t like missing deals. One thing I know people do (and I should get around to) is use 1Password or equivalent to store all their CC info electronically, which covers online deals. Generally, I carry whatever card I’m meeting min spend on and a couple of others just in case.

On this particular trip, I’ll probably cut down to three cards: Jetblue Plus card (working on Mosaic status), AMEX Delta Plat business (sign up bonus), and Chase Sapphire Reserve (all around card). I’ll throw my Priority Pass card in there as well for lounge access and call it a day. Hopefully I don’t miss out on any deals, but if I do, hey, I’m spending some quality time with my daughter.

Final Thoughts

I love traveling alone with my kids and can’t wait to take H on his first solo trip in the future. M and I have done this so many times, it’s old hat now. Sure, I may have to take on 100% of the mental load (for one kid, obviously Jess also takes on 100% of the load for H since he’s staying behind), but it’s well worth the experience. I can’t wait to show M “the giant mirror shaped like a bean” and the other adventures awaiting us in Chicago!

How do you prepare to travel alone with your kids? I’d love to hear everyone else’s thought processes/tips/ideas in the comments!

Jun 15 2017

Hong Kong Revisited: Hong Kong Hello Kitty Dim Sum Review

One of the things we definitely wanted to try this visit to Hong Kong was Hello Kitty Dim Sum. Despite bending parenting rules and dealing with jet lag, ultimately we needed to take this trip to the restaurant for the kids. (Is what I tell myself). I cannot tell you why this restaurant exists, but I can tell you a little bit about it. So let’s take a quick look at the Hello Kitty Dim Sum restaurant. I’ll also toss in a bit about the pop up Hello Kitty supermarket at the end as a bonus!

Location and Ambience

If you’re coming via MTR, either take the West Rail (purple) to Austin or the Tsuen Wan line (red) to Jordan. We actually hung out at Ocean Terminal and Harbour City beforehand, so we just walked up Canton Road. It’s possible to walk a long portion of this inside the Harbour City mall, so if you’re prone to overheating it might be worth budgeting a little extra time to navigate that maze.

Did you know there is a Hello Kitty dim sum restaurant in Hong Kong? And the food is pretty good! Learn about what to order and more in this review. — If you’re staying where in Tsim Sha Tsui you can probably walk to the restaurant

I’ll be honest, I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I wasn’t really blown away by the decor and ambience of the restaurant. I found it…fine? I don’t know what I expected I guess! More pink, maybe? The tables and chairs have nice Hello Kitty decorations and the restaurant features a couple big Hello Kitties but nothing wowed me. Just don’t expect to be taken to a dreamworld of magic or anything like that and it will be fine, haha.

Food and Price

Simply put, the Hello Kitty dim sum restaurant offers good (but not great) food at a bit of an upcharge. I didn’t find the prices exorbitant, maybe $1-$2 USD more per dish.

What really impressed me was the presentation. I expected the dishes to be cute and the definitely were. But everything is just done so clean and neatly – it really is amazing to see. Obviously the steamed pork buns (char siu bao) stand out the most but everything looks pretty. And even though I prefer fried turnip cake (lo bak goh), I can’t say I minded the gigantic Hello Kitty shaped one. Those two dishes plus shrimp dumplings (har gao) I would recommend everyone try. Other than that, order what you might normally get at dim sum.

My dad also ordered this like ground meat thing that was shaped like a Hello Kitty bow. It tasted fine but um…let’s just say ground meat is better off misshapen. It looked weird!

Anyway, I definitely enjoyed the food, flavor did not take a back seat to presentation. You can get better dim sum, for sure, but you’ll probably need a Michelin starred dim sum restaurant to surpass this by a large margin. If you’re into Hello Kitty or quirky food, the food quality and presentation definitely justify the upcharge.

Hello Kitty Pop Up Supermarket

Very quickly, currently Hong Kong features a pop up Hello Kitty supermarket at YATA. It’s right outside of the Hong Kong University MTR station on the newly expanded Island line (light blue). You can buy regular groceries but you’re probably there for the specialty Hello Kitty items. You can buy cookie cutters, molds, lunch boxes, Hello Kitty Pocky-like snacks, ET CETERA. Honestly, it’s pretty awesome. Check it out before it pops…down?

Final Thoughts

One thing I love about Asia is you get these crazy things that are tough to find in the U.S. (though there was a pop up Hello Kitty food truck by my house a few months ago!). If you or your kids enjoy Hello Kitty stuff, do yourself a favor and go check out the dim sum and the pop up supermarket. Like everything in Hong Kong, they’re easy to get to. Unlike everything in Hong Kong, neither was super crowded! The products sold at both are good quality and worth checking out. Enjoy!

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