I was in Macau two weekends ago for a 50th birthday party.
It was held at a restaurant in the Venetian – an amazing development that contains an entire shopping complex complete with a real live canal and Gondolas you can punt around in.
And lots of restaurants. And Casinos. And a major hotel.
Without question the developments over the past 10 years or so are spectacular – and rival Vegas in many ways.
They’re mostly developed by US companies (MGM, Sands, Venetian) and replicate a lot of what’s worked in Vegas.
They repaid themselves in 18 months and, just before the economy went tits up 18 months ago, the betting turnover in Macau had overtaken the betting turnover in Vegas.
And most of those complexes have only been open for a few years – 5 or 6 at the most.
But while Macau has always been a casino town, it also has some beautiful, quaint and very European parts to it.
The ground area in the picture to the left is actually flat, and the narrow street in the picture below is of a street that runs off to the right of where I was standing in the top one (I was taking the picture!).
Ruled as a Portuguese territory for more than 400 years, it was returned to Chinese rule in 1999 as a Special Administrative Region – the same status as Hong Kong.
For years it’s been famous for it’s wonderful Portuguese food.
Fernando’s is a famous haunt, serving excellent Portuguese style seafood, but to my mind it’s pricey. The food’s good, but you can get food as good, and for less, in the small restaurants in the main city area.
Macau also has golfing, horse racing and Go Karting (where I managed to break my ankle in a racing accident in 2001).
While the casino developments are spectacular, I’m sad that a lot of the original charm of Macau has been lost.
The old town areas are still there, but being over-run by ugly high rise office blocks built in the style of Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
The atmosphere is still more laid back than Hong Kong, though, and the welcome generally warmer.
Getting to Macau is easy. You can fly direct, or you can fly to Hong Kong and take the ferry. It takes an hour and they run every 15 minutes, 24 hours a day.
There’s also a helicopter service from Hong Kong if you feel like spoiling yourself. Make sure the weather’s clear, though, because if it’s not you won’t see a lot.
If you’re in this part of the world Macau is very well worth a visit – and you can easily do it as a day trip from Hong Kong.
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