Tools to help manuever Hong Kong

When we first found out we were moving to Hong Kong, I got a little nervous. Almost any city we have gone to, I have easily been able to look up things on the internet and in books and figure out how to get places. When I first started looking through information, I couldn't make heads or tails to where the different areas were and what area we lived in. Even though I had visited Hong Kong a couple times before, I never really paid attention as to where we were and how we got there. Things started making more sense once we got here. There have been some great tools that have made it possible for us to get around and find things.

The Ipod Touch
There are some great applications that have been really helpful in finding out how to get somewhere.

MTR Ap - This ap has the interactive map like on the MTR website that allows you to plug in what station you are starting at and what station you are going to and it tells you which line to take in which direction and where to change trains. It also tells you how long it'll take you and the fare.

Bus Ap - I had to learn the area a little better for this ap to be really helpful. If you know what bus you need to take you can put in the bus number and it'll tell you the fare, the headway and all of the stops. There are even pictures of the stops. That helps when you haven't been to a place before. You can also search for a bus by putting in the area you are coming from and the area you are going to (this is the part that had to wait awhile because I had to figure out what areas they meant. I think they changed this ap since then and has more choices but when we first got here it wanted really broad areas first before you could choose your specific area).

Google Map - We can put in an address or if it's a well known place just the name of the place where we are going and where we are coming from and get the walking directions.

Mail- Sometimes I will find the address of somewhere on that place's website or from google map on my computer and then e-mail myself the directions. I have a folder of directions so if we go somewhere again but it's been a long time I can look up the directions and the MTR exit I need.

GPSFood Easy- This Ap allows you to search restaurants by food type, cuisine, location and a few other criteria. It also has a map so you can see where the restaurant is located. One thing that took me a little while to figure out was that some addresses where in Chinese, but if you press the map icon you can find the street name on the map! We found a Nepali restaurant through this and have also used it to get phone numbers for restaurants since you can make a reservation for most places.

Hong Kong Map Books

Hong Kong Guidebook- This is a book of maps that shows you where things are. It gives you a brief glimpse of buses at major stops. It's mostly in English.

Public Transport Atlas- This is also a book of maps that shows where every bus stop is and what bus it is. The index in this book is in Chinese so if I'm looking up a specific street then I can look it up in the index in the Hong Kong Guidebook and then find it on the map in this book. The other book is better if looking for a specific place because sometimes the bus stops cover up different places. Sometimes it is also helpful to take the book when going somewhere new and follow the bus route so you know where to get off or find the stop when you are heading back!

That is in a nutshell how we have been able to maneuver Hong Kong along with help from our friends too! Thank goodness for all of these helps!