Hi everyone, I was in Zhuhai a few weeks ago and finally got a chance to visit Macau for the first time. I wanted to share some of my experiences as a newbie so that others making the trip for the first time won't be as clueless as I was.
Getting to Macau:
I was staying at the Holiday Inn in Zhuhai, so I went outside and hailed a cab and told the driver Gong Bei Kou An (拱北口岸). Gong Bei is the name of the closest checkpoint between Macau and Zhuhai from downtown, and Kou An simply means entry port in Chinese. FYI, Gong Bei also happens to be a huge shopping mall where you can find tons of knockoff goods. The driver dropped me off in a tunnel under the shopping mall (about 15 RMB from Holiday Inn). I went up the first set of stairs I found, and promptly got lost in the mall. I eventually noticed that there are signs overhead which direct you to the Macau checkpoint. If you follow these signs, they will lead you to a large open area of the mall where there are a lot of vendors sitting at various counters. There should be a large set of stairs that lead up and out of the mall, and you should take these stairs up to get to the customs building. Once you pass China customs, simply follow the crowd of people who walk out, and it takes about a minute or two to get to the Macau customs building. It took me about 15 minutes to get across the China side, and 10 minutes to get past Macau customs.
Getting to the Casinos:
The casinos have free shuttle buses that take you from the customs border to the casinos. Once I came out of the Macau customs building, I turned left and followed the signs for "bus". I quickly realized this wasn't what I was looking for, as the signs lead to an elevator and set of stairs which go underground, but no one was taking them... hrm.... As it turns out, the buses are parked in a lot one block away from the building. After you hit the elevator/stairs for "bus", you will see a public street in front of you. Turn right on this street and walk for about a block and you get to a footbridge. You will notice a big parking lot with casino buses across the footbridge. (Coincidentally, if you look up at the billboards when you hit the public street, you can see pictures of a bus and a big arrow pointing to the right leading you here). When in doubt, do what I did and ask one of the guards to point you in the right direction. I'm not sure how much English they speak but they at least knew that I was asking for the bus.
Casino/Hotel Lisboa:
I was looking for the Venetian bus as I heard it was a good casino to check out, but couldn't find it so I took the first bus I saw to avoid looking like a total newbie. I ended up on a Wynn bus which dropped me off across the street from an old looking building that said Hotel Lisboa. I didn't know if this was THE Hotel Lisboa that everyone talks about since it looked so rundown, so I hopped across the street to take a look. I went through the front door, and turned left to try and find the casino. That's when I ended up finding all the WGs walking around the shopping arcade. I didn't notice that the entrance to the casino was by the escalator, and walked up and down the shopping arcade looking for the entrance. I think the WGs thought I was checking them out because they kept whispering PSSST to me to get my attention
Getting back to Zhuhai:
So after about 5 hours gambling (I ended up at the Grand Lisboa, which is across the street and connected by skybridge), I came back through the shopping arcade to get to the front entrance of the Hotel Lisboa to catch a shuttle back. There were two lines for shuttle buses, one for the ferry terminal and one for the Gong Bei border. The shuttle for the border drops you off in the same parking lot, and I just crossed the footbridge and walked the block to the customs building. Once back in China, I wandered outside, found a line of cabs, and took it home.
Other:
Two things I wanted to make note of. First, bring a pen (or pre-completed customs forms). For some reason, all the pens on both the China and Macau side were stolen from the little desk chains, and I would have had no way to fill out the customs forms if I didn't end up begging for pens off the guards. Second, it appears that Zhuhai has a taxi shift change at 7:30 (day to night shift). I found out because I got to the taxi line at 7:35, and got very confused when all the taxi drivers started rejecting passengers. As it turned out, the drivers in the queue were from the day shift so when 7:30 rolled around, they were still in the queue, but were selectively choosing their passengers for extra cash off the meter. I had no idea what was going on at the time, and ended up offering a driver 30RMB to take me back to the hotel because I didn't want to be left at the border at night.
Well, that's it for my first trip to Macau. I didn't lose any money at the casino (totally expected to lose lots), so I guess that makes it a good day
, hope someone finds some of this stuff useful!
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Last edited by dp4p at 17-4-2010 13:27 ]
