These hotel, airline and hiking tips come courtesy of the redoubtable Maya and Matt from Seattle.

The lowdown on the hotel and airfare:

After much investigation, the package deal from Priceline seemed best, which puts us on Asiana airlines (supposedly award-winning, and you can put the miles on your United account), and we’ll stay at the Holiday Inn Golden Mile. According to my guidebook this is an excellent hotel, and it’s just a few blocks from where Lian and Meredith are staying. It was much cheaper than the Renaissance or other nearby 4 star hotels.

The actual cost might be helpful: 2 people RT airfare LA-Hong Kong (2 hour layover in Seoul) + 6 nights at the Holiday Golden Inn ran me $3100 total.  (Priceline has options for various other hotels, including a couple cheaper ones).

There is a lot of hiking in Hong Kong since it’s all hills or skyscrapers.  The Victoria Peak hike (there’s a 1 hour loop) can be extended indefinitely onto some major trail, but I’m not sure that’s worth it.

The Plover Cove hike is a little ways away in New Territories - you take the rail line to Tai Po and then a taxi or bus (I prefer taxi) to Plover Cove. The trail I’m suggesting is the Pat Sin Leng nature trail, my book says “This excellent and easy 4.4 km trail leads from Plover Cove Country Park Visitor Center at Tai Mei Tuk and heads NE to Bride’s Pool, there are signboards numbered 1 to 22 so it’s hard to get lost. The elevation gain is 300 m, the scenery is excellent, and the 2 waterfalls at Bride’s Pool are delightful.”