Guangzhou & Shenzhen – Towers, Traffic and a Little Work

After Guilin and Yangshuo, I continued south to Guangzhou before crossing into Hong Kong. After Hong Kong and Macao, I returned to Mainland China for another stop in Shenzhen.

 

 

Canton Tower ice-cream and Guangzhou 

 

The two cities ended up being very different experiences. Guangzhou was about shopping, meeting an AIESEC friend and continuing my slightly obsessive tour of China's skyscrapers. Shenzhen, on the other hand, was mainly about client visits with my sales colleagues.

But naturally, I still managed to squeeze in another tower.

Guangzhou – A room with a tower

My hotel experience in Guangzhou started with a little negotiation. I had somehow ended up with a room that was almost without a window—not quite what I had in mind. So I headed back to reception and started negotiating with the staff. Between English and a translation app, some back and forth eventually got me what I wanted: a proper room with a window. And that window turned out to be well worth negotiating for.

 

 

Room with a view

 

 

Canton Tower (600 m)

 

 

My hotel couldn't have been much better located: it was directly across from the Canton Tower. So instead of a room without a window, I ended up with a room looking towards one of Guangzhou's most famous landmarks. 

 

At 600 metres, Canton Tower dominates the Guangzhou skyline and is one of the tallest towers in the world. Having looked at it from my hotel, obviously I also had to go up it.

I explored pretty much every level accessible with my ticket, working my way higher and higher above the city. At the top, I also took a ride on the Bubble Tram—a series of transparent cabins that travel around the edge of the tower rather than up and down like a traditional cable car. It's essentially a Ferris wheel lying on its side, hundreds of metres above the ground.

 

 

Bubble Tram ride - takes about 20 min

 

 

Glass walk - only glass and air beneath me

The skyscraper that had actually been on my original China list was CITIC Plaza. Completed in 1997 and standing about 390 metres tall, it was once Guangzhou's tallest building and briefly one of the tallest buildings in the world.

 

 

black left: IFC (439 m), middle back: CITIC Plaza (390 m), 

grey right: Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre (530 m)

 

Today it has been overtaken by several newer towers and has lost some of its importance on Guangzhou's rapidly changing skyline. So rather than making a special trip there, I simply spotted it from high above the city.

Sometimes skyscraper sightseeing can be efficient.

Shopping at ground level, drinks on the 107th floor

Before my Canton Tower visit, I had spent the previous afternoon and evening doing something much more practical: shopping for new sneakers at an outlet mall.

 

 

Outlet Mall

 

But the evening ended considerably higher above ground.

I met Linda, President of AIESEC Alumni Mainland China, for drinks at the Rosewood Guangzhou, located in the upper floors of the Guangzhou CTF Finance Centre.

The building rises 530 metres above Zhujiang New Town and is Guangzhou's tallest skyscraper.

 

 

 

 

 

We headed all the way up to Too High on the 107th floor. From there, we had a spectacular view across the Pearl River—and directly towards the illuminated Canton Tower on the opposite side.

 

 

Pearl River

 

It was one of those moments when Guangzhou's scale really became apparent: a 600-metre tower on one side of the river while we were having drinks near the top of a 530-metre skyscraper on the other.

 

with the sparkling lights - choose a color

 

After Guangzhou, it was time to leave Mainland China temporarily and continue to Hong Kong and Macao.

Shenzhen – A work stop in the middle of the trip

After Hong Kong, I crossed back into Mainland China and arrived in Shenzhen. This stop was different from most of the rest of my China trip because I wasn't primarily there as a tourist. I joined my sales colleagues to visit three clients.

 

  

Spacious room at the Sheraton Shenzhen Nanshan

 

 

View from my window

 

My colleagues also made sure that my introduction to Shenzhen included some local food. On the first evening, they took me to a local fish and seafood restaurant near Shahe West Road. There wasn't another foreigner in sight, and with my colleagues doing the ordering, it was the perfect opportunity to try several dishes I probably wouldn't have known how to order by myself.

 

 

The following mornings started early. Getting to our clients meant spending around 1½ to 2 hours on the road and in Shenzhen traffic. By the end of the day, my colleagues were understandably exhausted.

I wasn't quite finished yet. There was still another skyscraper to visit.

A skyscraper all to myself

I took a DiDi to Shun Hing Square, also known as the Diwang Building. At 384 metres, the tower was the tallest building in China when it was completed in 1996. It held that title only briefly before newer towers overtook it.

 

 

KK100 (442 m) - second tallest

 

Today, Shenzhen has grown so dramatically that Shun Hing Square is no longer even among the city's very tallest buildings. That alone says quite a lot about how quickly this part of China has developed. 

The observation deck sits high above the city, and when I arrived in the evening, I had it completely to myself. Apart from the staff, there was nobody else there. After the crowds at so many of China's major attractions, standing almost alone high above Shenzhen and watching the city light up below me was quite an experience.

 

 

Noone here

 

 

Get your pictures done

 

From up there, the endless skyline gave a sense of just how enormous Shenzhen has become.

 

 

 

 Shenzhen at night

 

 

 

 

 

Ping An IFC (592.5 m) - 

tallest skyscraper in Shenzhen, fourth tallest in the world

 

I had taken a DiDi to get there, but afterwards I switched back to the metro for the journey to my hotel.

Towers, traffic and too much luggage

The next day it was back to another round of client visits. After lunch, however, my time in Shenzhen was coming to an end, and I headed to the airport for my flight to Shanghai.

There was just one final consequence of several weeks of travelling around China: my luggage had become considerably heavier than when I arrived. Eight tea cups and two teapots from Chengdu, tea, souvenirs and everything else I'd accumulated along the way eventually caught up with me. At the airport, I paid a rather substantial amount for extra luggage. All those little souvenirs apparently aren't quite so little when you put them on a scale.

 

 

Then I boarded my flight to Shanghai. After temples, pandas, river cruises, high-speed trains, Hong Kong, Macao—and more skyscrapers than I could count—I was heading towards the final part of my journey.

Next stop: Shanghai.

 

 

Macao – No Cash, No Gambling, No Problem

After several days in Hong Kong, I decided to make a day trip to Macao. And just like travelling between Hong Kong and Mainland China, going to Macao means another border crossing, another passport check and another Special Administrative Region.

 

 

I chose to travel there by ferry from Hong Kong Island and return by bus across the spectacular Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macao Bridge. That way, even the journey itself became part of the experience.

From Hong Kong to the casinos of Macao

The trip started at the Hong Kong–Macau Ferry Terminal on Hong Kong Island.

Before boarding, I officially had to exit Hong Kong, including another passport check. The ferry was completely full, and I was surprised by how many of my fellow passengers were elderly Chinese travellers. I spent my last Kongkong cash on it - 192 Hongkong Dollars.

 

 

Catching the ferry

 

 

Rainy outside - not much to photograph

 

The journey takes about an hour, and on arrival in Macao it was time for yet another immigration procedure before I officially entered the territory.

And then I encountered my first problem: money.

Macao has its own currency, the Macao pataca (MOP), although Hong Kong dollars are also widely accepted. My plan was simple: withdraw some cash, use it to pay for transport, food and souvenirs—and gamble away whatever was left.

The ATM had other ideas. No money.

Fortunately, I could pay directly by card for food and souvenirs, so the lack of cash wasn't initially a major problem. And Macao's casinos provided the solution to my first transport challenge.

Many of Macao's large casinos operate free shuttle buses connecting the ferry terminals, border crossings and casino resorts. Rather than looking for the most direct connection into the historic centre, I simply boarded one of the casino buses. It wasn't necessarily the fastest way to get where I wanted to go, but it had one advantage: I got to see more of Macao along the way.

 

Casino buses

 

And eventually, of course, I had to go inside one of the casinos.

 

 

MGM

Before visiting Macao, most of my images of casinos came from movies: glamorous gaming tables, elegantly dressed guests, crowds gathered around roulette wheels and dramatic poker games. The reality looked rather different. The casino I visited was huge, modern and surprisingly automated. Technology seemed to be everywhere, and many of the games involved far less interaction than I'd expected.

 

 

Grand Lisboa

The crowd wasn't particularly glamorous either. Instead, I saw lots of elderly, very ordinary-looking people sitting at the machines and tables. It felt much more like an everyday activity than the glamorous night out portrayed in movies.

 

 

Sands

 

At some stations, free food and drinks were available for gamblers, adding even more to the impression of a highly organised operation designed to keep people playing. Photography wasn't allowed inside, so this is one part of my Macao trip that exists only in my memory rather than my photo collection.

And thanks to the ATM, I hadn't even managed to withdraw the money I'd planned to gamble away.

Portuguese Macao – And another attempt to get money

Outside the casinos, Macao looks completely different. For more than four centuries, Macao was under Portuguese administration, and that history is still clearly visible in its architecture, street names, churches and public squares. Unfortunately, by this point it was also raining.

I walked through the historic centre towards the famous Ruins of St. Paul's, probably Macao's most recognizable landmark. What remains today is primarily the elaborate stone façade and staircase of the Church of Mater Dei, which was largely destroyed by fire in 1835.

 

 

Ruins of St. Paul's

 

Even in the rain, the combination of Portuguese architecture and Chinese surroundings made central Macao feel completely different from both Hong Kong and Mainland China.

I wandered around the surrounding streets, browsed souvenir shops and picked up a few things to take home. Fortunately, paying directly by card worked without any problems, both for souvenirs and food.

 

 

Döner or Egg waffle? That's the choice.

 

Then I tried another ATM. This time things got more interesting. My phone told me that I had withdrawn money, while the ATM itself gave me a rejection message—and no cash came out. Not exactly the combination of notifications you want to see. I spoke to the staff about it, and they gave me their contact details. If the money really had been debited from my account, I could contact them afterwards to sort it out. So I still had no cash, but now I also had the possibility that I'd paid for cash I hadn't received.

 

 

Money - no money

 

By late afternoon, it was time to think about getting back to Hong Kong. I decided to return by bus rather than ferry because I wanted to cross the Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macao Bridge.

There was just one problem. For food and souvenirs, my credit card had worked perfectly well. But when I wanted to buy the bus ticket, I discovered that they accepted only local currency or Weixin Pay (WeChat Pay). Local currency was precisely what two different ATMs had failed to give me.

I had used WeChat Pay throughout Mainland China without any problems, but getting it to work in Macao turned out to be another story. So after travelling around Macao without really needing cash all day, I suddenly found myself trying to persuade a payment system that had worked perfectly well in China to cooperate again.

After some experimenting, I finally managed to get WeChat Pay working in Macao and bought my ticket. Problem solved.

 

Got the ticket

 

in the queue waiting for departure 

 

At least I could get back to Hong Kong—even if I never did get the cash I'd originally planned to gamble away.

55 kilometres across the sea

The journey back to Hong Kong was more complicated than simply boarding one bus in Macao and getting off in Hong Kong.

I caught the bus at one of the casinos, and we first drove around collecting more passengers. Eventually, we reached the Macao border terminal. Here, everyone gets off the bus with their belongings and goes inside to complete Macao exit formalities. You enter the terminal on one side, pass through immigration and emerge on the other. And here's something worth knowing: don't be surprised if the bus waiting for you afterwards isn't the same one you arrived on.

 

 

The bus I came in and the bus I left in

border terminal

The system is designed to move passengers rather than keep everyone attached to one particular vehicle. Once everyone was through immigration, it was finally time for the part of the journey I had been looking forward to: crossing the Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macao Bridge.

The entire system stretches for around 55 kilometres, linking Hong Kong, Macao and Zhuhai across the Pearl River Estuary. It is the longest bridge-and-tunnel sea crossing in the world. And it isn't actually one continuous bridge. The main crossing combines approximately 23 kilometres of bridge with a 6.7-kilometre undersea tunnel. Two artificial islands connect the bridge and tunnel sections. The tunnel allows major shipping routes across the Pearl River Estuary to remain open for some of the world's largest vessels. The whole project took years to construct and finally opened in 2018.

 

 

the bridges

 

Driving across it gives you a much better impression of its scale than looking at it on a map. For long stretches, you're surrounded almost entirely by sea before the road eventually disappears into the tunnel and then emerges again towards Hong Kong.

For someone who finds major infrastructure projects fascinating, this was definitely one of the highlights of the day. Reaching Hong Kong didn't mean simply driving straight into the city. At the Hong Kong Port, it was time to get off the bus again and take everything through Hong Kong immigration.

 

The process was remarkably similar to the one in Macao: enter the border terminal on one side, complete the immigration procedures and emerge on the other. And once again, don't become too attached to your bus. After immigration, passengers were sorted onto different buses depending on their final destination in Hong Kong.

Eventually, I was back in the city.

Macao – Was it worth the day trip?

Yes—but not necessarily for the reasons I had expected.

The casinos were interesting to see, although the modern, automated reality was very different from my movie-inspired expectations. The Portuguese heritage and the Ruins of St. Paul's gave Macao a character completely different from nearby Hong Kong.

But some of my strongest memories are actually about getting around: using free casino buses, failing repeatedly to get cash, finally making WeChat Pay work in Macao, passing through multiple immigration controls and crossing 55 kilometres of sea on one of the world's most extraordinary pieces of transport infrastructure.

Macao is only about an hour from Hong Kong, but crossing between the two makes you very aware that you're moving between two separate Special Administrative Regions, each with its own immigration system and currency.

And doing the journey as a loop—ferry to Macao and bridge back to Hong Kong—turned out to be a great choice. Instead of simply visiting another city, the journey itself became part of the sightseeing.