Ocean Park, Hong Kong - Part 1 - Travel to Ocean Park, Cable Car Ride, Whirly Bird, Bumper Car

Our day out to Ocean Park, Hong Kong.  Ocean Park is a famous amusement park cum conservation park in Hong Kong.  Opened in 1977, the site is built on two sides of a mountain.

This is a 4 part blog post.  Here are links to Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4 (See the pandas).

We decided to take the MTR and Citybus to Ocean Park.  This seemed to be the most common way. From Eaton Hotel, we walked to Jordan MTR and took the Tsuen Wan line to Admiralty, just two stops.  At Admiralty MTR, there were clear signposts (Exit B).  The fare was $10.6 per adult and half price for kids under 12.  Check out the following video for the journey.

Video - Citybus 629 from Admiralty MTR to Ocean Park Entrance



The bus journey was very smooth, 25 minutes.  Once we entered Ocean Park, which didn't look too crowded, the plan was to take the cable car to the Summit.  So, we decided to look for the cable car station, which was not difficult to find.  The queues for the cable car were not long, which was great. The cable car system wasn't very new (built in 1977, I think), and there was some noticeable vibrations.  Thank God everything was safe.  Check out the next video for our cable car ride up to the summit.


When we reached the Summit, we did not know where to go.  There were many signs to different segments of the park. We had a park map, however, the descriptions on the map weren't great.  So we decided to work our way downwards, i.e. go to the top most part of the park first.  This brought us to this set of escalators which said Thrill Mountain.  So we went up.


We took a couple of rides (the not so scary ones).  The most exciting ride we took was Whirly Bird. The Whirly Bird ride looked like this.  Looks safe?  Yeah, let's try.  The kids could take it too.  Minimum height was 122cm.


It turns out that the ride was very whirly indeed.  My kids sat together and I sat with my wife.  The ride brought us rather high up, with wonderful views.  But I got a bit giddy after that.  Thankfully, I had my breakfast some hours ago.  Here is a video of our Whirly Bird experience.


After finding our feet, we managed a couple more 'safe' rides.  One of them was the bumper car, which was very safe indeed.  There was a line but the wait wasn't too long.  Not more than 10 minutes.  We were fortunate today that the park didn't seem very crowded.  The crowds at Ocean Park are supposedly legendary.


Here is a video of the bumper car ride. They squeezed many bumper cars in a small space and they tried to make it 'One Way Only'.  Also, the electricity for the bumper cars came from the floor and not overhead cables.  This meant that when the ride started, the entire floor would have strong electric currents flowing through.  STAY IN YOUR CAR until the ride is over.


Next, we took this blue roller coaster, that was directly opposite the entrance to the South Pole Spectacular.  This ride was suitable for kids.  Worth taking, even if you do not like roller coasters too much.


After this ride, we would head over to the South Pole Spectacular.  Go on to Part 2 of this review.