36 Hours in Hong Kong: The Intercontinental Hong Kong

02 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by misterselfish in Accommodations, Asia, China, IHG

Tags

Hong Kong, Intercontinental Hong Kong, Selfish Year, Selfish Years

Mrs. Selfish and I arrived bleary-eyed and jetlagged at the Hong Kong International Airport at 6:30am, from our 11:30pm flight from San Francisco. After hitting the showers and grabbing a cup of coffee in Cathay Pacific’s Arrival lounge we jumped in the closest cab and headed straight to our first stop, the Intercontinental Hong Kong.

Getting there and Check-in

The Intercontinental Hong Kong is located right off of the Avenue of the Stars and is pretty easy to get to. If you’re low on bags and traveling by yourself, I recommend taking the express train into town and taking a cab from there, which should run you close to $120 HKD total.

If you’re traveling in groups of two or more, a cab is probably more economical (and definitely faster), and should run you closer to $230 HKD ($30 USD). From memory, it took us around 20–25 minutes to get to the Intercontinental, since there was relatively little traffic around 7:30am.

The check-in process was smooth and quick, since I had already arranged everything via email ahead of time. We opted to book an award night for 40,000 IHG points a night instead of paying the ~$400 it would have cost. As an Ambassador member, Mrs. Selfish was granted late check-out, and two drink coupons for the bar.

Intercontinental is pretty stingy when it comes to perks, and doesn’t guarantee their Ambassador members much of anything. They are supposed to upgrade members to a better room upon check-in, but in this case we would have been upgraded to a deluxe room with a view of the Sheraton. Instead, we opted to pay to upgrade to a Superior Harbor View room for an additional $1,200 HKD a night (+10% tax), since the harbor view was the whole reason we chose to stay at the Intercontinental. Otherwise I probably would have chosen the Conrad HK, or the JW Marriott again.

Amazing skyline views of Hong Kong from the lobby.

Impressively, our room was ready at 8 in the morning, so Mrs. Selfish and I headed to our home for the next 36 hours.

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I Need a Vacation!

27 Friday Sep 2013

Posted by misterselfish in Accommodations, Asia, China, Hilton, Hyatt, IHG, Japan, Marriott

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Conrad Maldives, Doubletree Naha, Fukuoka, Intercontinental Hong Kong, Maldives, Okinawa, Ritz Carlton Okinawa, Selfish Year, Selfish Years

When we first started traveling abroad, I figured our year long wanderings would end one of two ways:

1) After traveling for a year we’d be so sick of it, that we’d immediately settle somewhere and never leave.

2) Our travel obsession would get worse and we’d have problems staying anywhere for longer than a month.

Unfortunately, it looks like it’s #2.

Mrs. Selfish and I have been settling into San Francisco for two weeks now, and I’m already starting to get antsy. While it’s nice to have a slightly more permanent home (at least for the next few months), I miss the call of the open road.

Fortunately, I anticipated this outcome and booked a new trip back in July. Come late November, we’re heading to the Maldives and Okinawa for scuba diving, by way of Hong Kong and Fukuoka, Japan!