Our Manila-Macau-Hong Kong Trip - A Dreadful Experience

We're presently in Hong Kong and staying at the Ah Shan Hostel. We got in from Macau yesterday early morning, about 3 am. Why? Here's the story.

We were booked on the Cebu Pacific flight to Macau from Manila on flight 5J362. We are PAL flyers and so we were at the airport about 3 hours before our scheduled departure which was at 7:30 pm. To my dismay, even at 3 hours prior to ETD, the check-in counters were still not open. They did when we, the passengers on that flight who were already there, decided to line up after an hour of waiting. I believe they were forced to open the counters because many of us went to complain about it. I mean it did say on the ticket to be at the counters at least 2 hours prior to the departure. It was disappointing enough that we had to wait for us to get checked in but it was equally disappointing that we were not able to find any seat at the NAIA International Airport.

Apparently, the Cebu Pacific delay had started in the morning. It was 7:15 pm when they announced that our flight would be delayed. The reason they gave was because of overbooking. Actually, it really meant they oversold tickets. I wonder why airlines would do that? So, anyway, they tried to bribe some of us to stay by offering a two way ticket with a confirmed flight the following day and an overnight stay at a hotel. I was telling my husband that if they would offer about 100 dollars or so, I'd grab it. We couldn't just take the opportunity because we had a confirmed booking here at the hostel.

Finally, at 8:30 pm we were allowed to board the plane only to find out that there was another delay. The captain had announced that we had to wait for some documents before we could take off and it meant another 40 minutes of waiting. It took 1.5 hours for Cebu Pacific to fix the delay.

The flight lasted for almost 2 hours. We got to the Macau airport and were lined up at the taxi stand when Boyet's cousin texted to say that he was picking us up. From there, we went to some restaurant in Macau, I think it is called the Golden Island, ate a bit and proceeded to the Ferry terminal. It was already almost 1:30 am.

The Ferry we took was the TurboFerry. I thought we had made a mistake of buying the ticket because we got the one to Hong Kong when were supposed to go to Kowloon. But at that time of the day, that was the only one available. I got a bit worried. This is the first time for any of us to travel to Hong Kong and being in a foreign country where most people do not speak english, it is really quite scary.

The Ferry ride took us 1 hour. It was rather hard for us to bring our stuff. I brought a suitcase for my and my daughter's things while my husband brought a bag, his camera bag and his Thinkpad. 3 pcs of luggage for him and 1 for me. But that 1 luggage was really hard to transport. Why, because the ferry had a narrow path going to the dock (I think you call it the plank) and the staff were unlike the Filipinos who would readily help their customers when they see them having some difficulty. Hurrah for Filipinos! From the terminal in Hong Kong Island, we took a cab to our hotel.