Car Tours in Hong Kong - To book or not to book
… and why I do not recommend most of them
Me Jamie, English and 52 years living in Hong Kong and I know the know the place - I personally completed 2,324 Private Tours (6,000+ guests) from 2011 - 2020 and was considered one of the finest Private Tour Guides in Asia.
A blog post with a difference - Please do visit Hong Kong in 2024 | Travel, Tourism, Tours, Tips, Daily Life and my personal thoughts on Hong Kong - Pearl of the Orient
Discover the Real Hong Kong with Jamie
Car Tours vs Walking Tours and using Public Transport
Things to do in Hong Kong
I have lived in Hong Kong 52 years and have been heavily involved in tourism since 2010, so I have an opinion on this subject and I personally completed 2,324 private tours in Hong Kong from April 2011 - January 2020
...and yes, I will also recommend the best tour companies in Hong Kong to book a car tour with, if this is your preferred option
…and Jamie’s words of wisdom, a car tour of Hong Kong is only as good as the tour guide, please make sure you choose the right tour guide!
The Toyota Alphard 7 seater, for a driver | guide with 6 passengers or a driver and a guide with 5 passengers, common colours - black or white! a very popular model for tour companies, also popular are Tesla cars but you are really limited to 3 passengers.
The Mercedes Benz V Class - also popular in Hong Kong for car tours
Since I started doing Private Tours of Hong Kong I have watched how over the years the popularity of car tours has exploded in Hong Kong driven (sorry!) by the marketing efforts of OTA‛s (Online Travel Agents) such as Viator, Tripadvisor, Klook, Tours by Locals, Get your Guide etc.
From my perspective all it has done is reduced the quality of the tour you are booking as the tour operator actually doing the tour has to slash prices to compete and pay a hefty commission to the OTA and to make matters worse you can end up with a guide and a driver or guide | driver with very limited English, trust me in Hong Kong “Fluency in English” can mean many different things.
…….. and this is my great friend Amy of Hong Kong Greeters who does car tours and Amy is often the driver! Amy is English, has been in Hong Kong for over 15 years and is an absolutely brilliant private tour guide.
I can actually think of some great reasons to take a car tour even though I would pass on doing them.
you have arrived on a cruise ship and you have your luggage and you need to be dropped off at the Airport later in the day, so time is crucial and you also solve that pesky luggage problem
you have arrived on a cruise ship and you simply want to do a quick shore excursion and to ensure you make it back in time for the ship departure time.
you are in transit, you arrive at the Hong Kong International Airport at 6am, get picked up at 8am, do a 6 hour car tour and back to the airport for your connecting flight
you have health issues limiting your capacity for walking and a member (s) of the group is in a wheelchair
you are a small family with young kids and perhaps a stroller
you simply do not like to use Public Transport
it can make perfect sense if it is really hot and humid or it is raining.
it also makes perfect sense if you want to drive out 30 - 50 miles out into the sticks to see an offbeat “hidden gem” or secret spot” and how I hate those cliches!
One very famous “car tour” operator in Hong Kong offers up the following reason
“Hong Kong private car tour helps avoiding crowds and gives clients sense of superiority and security”
Personally, I think that is a terrible reason to book a car tour and you can just as easily get caught up in a traffic jam.
Since my first private tour of Hong Kong in April 2011 I completed 2,324 tours and 2,322 of them were walking tours mixed in with travelling on public transport, so yes, I did 2 car tours and that was 2 tours too many in a car for me.
I should stress that these are my personal thoughts and opinions, feel free to completely ignore me and believe it or not I understand why people book a car tour, I just feel you miss out on a very important part of Hong Kong Culture by not experiencing public transport and one of the great bus rides in Hong Kong is to take the No. 15 bus from the Business District to Victoria Peak, the views are astonishing from the upper deck of the bus and you miss those views sat in the back of a car.
So here are some of main reasons on why you should book a private walking tour with the public transport option and then why you should NOT book a car tour when you visit Hong Kong and remember I did 2,322 private walking tours using public transport.
Reasons to do a private walking tour with public transport.
Hong Kong despite having an area 430sq miles is actually very compact and after 52 years of using public transport daily here, I can say that we have probably the best public transport system in the world as well as 700,000 (ish) private cars, 120,000+ trucks and 20,000+ buses and yes, one of the most on time, efficient, clean and cheap subway systems (The MTR) in the world
public transport in Hong Kong is culture 101, if you want to see what makes Hong Kong tick then you use public transport and as much as I hate this cliche “travel like a local” it is spot on, personally I can never understand why people would not want to experience public transport here.
public transport here is remarkably cheap, you can purchase an “Octopus” card, think of it as a travel debit card that you can also use in shops, restaurants and convenience stores and yes, it works on all public transport.
having a knowledgeable guide that knows public transport here is essential, in a nutshell, you can actually see a lot more by using public transport in for example an 8 hour tour time frame which might take you 2 or 3 days if you tried to do it yourself - personally I am not a big fan of people using google maps or travel apps to find their way around, a great tour guide knows exactly what to do and will not get lost and has this ability to get you from A to B to C in the most efficient way possible.
if you are a visitor here for a few days then day 1 using public transport will give you the confidence to use it on your own for the rest of your time in Hong Kong.
these are compelling reasons not to do a car tour in my humble opinion.
Reasons NOT to do a car tour in Hong Kong.
Many of my private tour guide friends can also do car tours, this is simply an option that they like to have on tap for guests who want to book a car tour for whatever reason.
whilst you can get cheap deals on Viator, Klook etc for car tours, a car tour can cost US$180 to US$280 more than a private “walking tour” based on a 4 hour tour and some companies add on surcharges if you want to go long distances in a car and then you might also be asked to pay road tunnel fees and such, the costs can add up.
a popular car tour in Hong Kong is the “Lantau Island Tour” which highlights the NP 360 Big Buddha and the Tai O Fishing Village, I did many of these tours but NOT in a car but by using public transport, you also have to make sure that the tour company has the special licence | permit that allows them to travel around Lantau Island by car, private car usage is heavily restricted and if you do not check that the special licence is available then your car tour becomes a car tour | bus tour | cable car tour | walking tour!
Some tour companies offer car tours which come with a tour guide as well as the driver, this is essential as many drivers have limited English and they are NOT tour guides, ideally you want a car that comes with a licenced tour guide who is also the driver (and I should point out that these are very rare) Klook in particular offer car tours that come with a driver who is NOT a tour guide., bear in mind that if you go for the option of a guide and driver, that is one less space for passengers.
when it comes to the guide being the driver as well I am never quite sure how that works, surely the driver should be concentrating on driving safely rather than offering a running commentary! but then again I have never driven a car in my life, I guess for an experienced driver it is not a problem.
I decided after the 2nd car tour I did that I would never do another one again, it was a miserable experience for me as I could not help but be a little angry at the guests missing out on the fun of using public transport in Hong Kong and I am also a very blunt sort of guy, I tell it as it is, the good, the bad and the ugly and on my first car tour, the driver that came with the car spoke just enough English to be annoying and he kept interrupting me and contradicting me because he assumed I had only been in Hong Kong for a couple of years and knew nothing of Hong Kong.
at the end of the day it really boils down to you choosing the right car tour company and reading Tripadvisor reviews and then booking a tour with a tour company on my list that I have provided the link for above.
This is one of the Peninsula Hotel’s world famous Rolls Royce Phantoms on the South Side of Hong Kong Island, many of Hong Kong’s 5 star Hotels offer car tours at somewhat exorbitant prices! makes for a good photo opportunity though and yes, I took the photo, I have over 100,000 car images on my Flickr Photo site!
The truly stunning and amazing panoramic day view from the Lugard Road Lookout at Victoria Peak
The truly stunning and amazing panoramic night view from the Lugard Road Lookout at Victoria Peak
Lugard Road Lookout at Victoria Peak
If I had any followers on Instagram who liked views rather than my car images then this would be a classic, Mum, Dad and 4 kids aged from 12 - 22 from England, perfect weather, the planets aligned as they do on most days at the Peak.
This rather sums up Jamie’s spot at the Peak.
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Jamie, your friend in Hong Kong
52 years living in Hong Kong, our family arrived on January 2nd 1972
I have lived here for 25 years under British Rule, 27 years under Chinese Rule
I have 45 years of Business Consultancy experience in Hong Kong
My wife is a local & has lived her entire life in Hong Kong, her first language is Cantonese
We have 3 Adult sons all born and educated in Hong Kong, 2 still live in Hong Kong
I pioneered the Private Tour Industry in Hong Kong in 2010
2,324 completed award winning Private Tours of Hong Kong from 2011 - 2020
……and yes, I am a bit of an expert on the Hong Kong car culture!
© Jamie Lloyd | J3 Consultants Hong Kong | J3 Private Tours Hong Kong | | 2011 - 2024.
All rights reserved.
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