Five days around Hong Kong and a day trip across the Pearl River Delta to Macau: the Peak Tram and Victoria Harbour, Lantau Island’s giant Buddha and a fishing village on stilts, dim sum at a century-old teahouse, and Macau’s Portuguese old town and casino resorts. Real hotels, restaurants, and 2026 prices for every stop.
Day 1Tsim Sha Tsui & Victoria Harbour
Settle into Kowloon with a harbour crossing on the Star Ferry and a first look at the skyline after dark.
🛎️ Hotel Check-In — Hotel ICON
From $180-220 USD / night, for 2 people
A design hotel run by Hong Kong Polytechnic University’s hospitality school, a short walk from the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront and the Star Ferry pier.
Hotel ICON · 17 Science Museum Rd, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon
⛴️ Star Ferry — Tsim Sha Tsui to Central
~10 min · famously inexpensive, around HK$5 (~$0.65 USD)
One of the world’s great harbour crossings for pocket change, with Hong Kong Island’s skyline rising ahead on green-and-white ferries that have run this route since 1888.
📸 Avenue of Stars & Symphony of Lights
~1.5 hours, self-guided · free
A waterfront promenade facing Hong Kong Island’s skyline, timed for the nightly Symphony of Lights show when dozens of buildings flash and beam in sync at 8pm.
🍽️ Dinner — Temple Street Night Market
~1.5 hours · ~$15-25 USD / person
A neon-lit street market strung with lanterns and lined with outdoor seafood stalls, fortune tellers, and vendors selling everything from jade to knockoff handbags.
Day 2Victoria Peak & Central
A tram ride to the city’s best view, then a wander through Central’s escalators and alleyways.
🚡 Peak Tram & Sky Terrace 428
~2 hours, self-guided · round-trip + Sky Terrace from ~$30 USD / adult
A funicular climbing Hong Kong Island’s steepest slopes since 1888, arriving at the Peak’s Sky Terrace for a 360-degree view over the skyscrapers and harbour below.
🏙️ Central & SoHo
~2 hours, self-guided · free
The Mid-Levels escalator, the world’s longest outdoor covered escalator system, cuts straight through SoHo’s restaurants and street art on the way back down from the Peak.
🥟 Dim Sum — Lin Heung Tea House
~1 hour · ~$15-20 USD / person
A century-old teahouse where trolleys of har gau, char siu bao, and egg tarts are wheeled tableside under creaking ceiling fans, little changed since it opened in 1928.
Lin Heung Tea House · Wellington Street, Central
⛩️ Man Mo Temple
~45 min, self-guided · free
A 19th-century Taoist temple thick with the smoke of enormous spiral incense coils hanging from the ceiling, dedicated to the gods of literature and war.
Day 3Lantau Island
A cable car over the hills to a giant Buddha, then a stilt-house fishing village on the island’s quiet west coast.
🚠 Ngong Ping 360 Cable Car
~25 min each way · round-trip from ~$33 USD / adult
A 5.7-kilometer cable car ride over Lantau Island’s hills and the airport runway, with glass-bottomed cabins available for an extra fee.
🙏 Tian Tan Buddha & Po Lin Monastery
~2 hours, self-guided · Buddha free, monastery donation
A 34-meter bronze Buddha reached by 268 steps, with sweeping views back over Ngong Ping village and the monastery’s vegetarian dining hall below.
🎣 Tai O Fishing Village
~1.5 hours, self-guided · free (boat tour ~$10 USD)
A stilt-house fishing village on Lantau’s west coast where homes still stand on stilts over the tidal creek, with boat rides out to spot the rare Chinese white dolphin.
🍽️ Dinner — back in Kowloon
~1 hour · ~$20-30 USD / person
Return to Tsim Sha Tsui for dinner at one of the neighborhood’s Cantonese seafood restaurants or noodle shops.
Day 4Day Trip to Macau
A high-speed ferry across the Pearl River Delta to Macau’s Portuguese old town and casino resorts.
⛴️ TurboJET Ferry to Macau
~1 hour · from ~$25-35 USD / person one-way
A high-speed ferry across the Pearl River Delta to Macau, departing from the Hong Kong-Macau Ferry Terminal in Sheung Wan roughly every 15-30 minutes.
TurboJET · turbojet.com.hk
🏛️ Senado Square & Ruins of St. Paul’s
~2 hours, self-guided · free
A wave-patterned Portuguese-tiled square leading to the stone facade of St. Paul’s, all that survived an 1835 fire, in a historic center that blends Portuguese and Cantonese architecture.
🎰 The Venetian Macau
~2 hours, self-guided · free to walk
An indoor recreation of Venice’s canals under a painted sky, with gondola rides through a vast casino resort, the largest in the world by floor area.
⛴️ Return Ferry to Hong Kong
~1 hour · last sailings around 11:30pm-1am
The same TurboJET route back to Sheung Wan, with Hong Kong’s skyline lighting up ahead as the ferry crosses back after dark.
Day 5Markets & Departure
A final morning in Kowloon’s markets before heading to the airport.
🛍️ Mong Kok Markets
~2 hours, self-guided · free to browse
Ladies’ Market’s bargain clothing stalls, the Flower Market’s wholesale blooms, and the Goldfish Market’s tanks of bettas and koi, all within a few blocks of each other.
🧳 Last-Minute Shopping — Tsim Sha Tsui
~1 hour, self-guided
A final pass through Harbour City’s shops or the small electronics stores of Mong Kok before heading to the airport.
✈️ Departure — Hong Kong International Airport
~1 hour from Kowloon via Airport Express
The Airport Express train runs every 10 minutes from Hong Kong or Kowloon Station, with free in-town check-in for most airlines up to 90 minutes before boarding.
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