Our first stop was lunch. Here Jill is enjoying some delicious beef noodle soup.
Macau is well know for its casinos, it's sometimes referred to as the Vegas of the Orient. We saw the MGM Grand, the Sands and a few other casinos that you would find in Las Vegas. But what was really interesting about this city is the Portuguese influence. The Portuguese first came here in 1513 and started to colonize in the mid 1500's. A lot of the architecture has been influenced by it. Here are just a few of the buildings we came across on our walks.
The most famous sight in Macau is definitely the Ruins of St. Paul's Church or Ruinas de Igreja Sao Paulo. It was really strange, here a lot of the signs were in Portuguese.
The facade and the stairwell are all that remain of this church. It was completed in 1602 and some consider it the greatest symbol of Christianity in Asia.
Next to St. Paul's church was the fortress that used to protect Macau. It was on a hill overlooking the city in all directions. Built by the Jesuits, the cannons were fired only once in a failed attack by the dutch.
FIRE!!!!!!!!!
The views weren't that spectacular in all of the directions. One side looked like a big slum of multicolored tin roofs.
At the end of our walk we this 16th century temple called A-Ma Temple. The name Macau comes from the name of the goddess A-Ma. The area is called A-Ma Gau (the bay of A-Ma) so the Portuguese called the place Ma Gau or Macau.
These are giant incense sticks hung from the roof. There were hundreds of them.
And the casinos. The one was by far the strangest. I can't remember the name of it.
The Sands
The MGM Grand. We spent a little bit of time inside.
It was a fun trip. Glad we got out. Jill got me a pedometer for Christmas and I counted that we took 28,637 steps that day walking around. We definitely felt it when we got back.
I also went to the MGM Grand this Christmas. In the Vegas of America the MGM Grand keeps three sleepy lions in a glass case in the lobby. They were sad.
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