Hong Kong in the 1970s

In other posts, I allude to the fact that a lot of my inspiration for travel came from my dad. As a kid, we had a dark room in the basement where he taught me and my sisters how to develop film and print black and white pictures. Over the summer, we used to spend a lot of time down there looking through the enlarger, seeing the red light, mixing chemicals, and dipping and hanging up pictures to try.

There are still places in Kansas City where you can purchase the materials to have a darkroom like what we had. Overland Photo Supply has all the kits and chemicals needed for an at home darkroom. And Process One and Photo Express are two photo labs that still do prints like these.

After my dad died, I've been going through his old pictures. My favorites are the places like Hong Kong that have gone through so many changes.

My dad would have visited Hong Kong in the 1970s. There are definitely lots of skyscrapers in his pictures and he has lots of pictures of boats and markets. Which are definitely part of the Hong Kong that I saw as well. He also has shots of double decker buses driving by and some street photography.

To get started on the journey through Hong Kong, I'll start with the city that I saw. I visited many, many times while I was living in Guangzhou, China. Some of my favorite places to visit were Hong Kong Disneyland, the Star Ferry, the giant Buddha and Buddhist monastery at Lantau Island and the night time views from Victoria Peak.

Views from the harbor

Views from Lantau Island

Big Buddha Monastery on Lantau Island

Budhist temple on Lantau Island

Views from Big Buddha

Tai O Fishing Village

Hong Kong Disneyland

Sunset from the 36th floor of my hotel room

On a walk in Hong Kong

And now here are my dad's photos from Hong Kong in the 1970s. He's not here to ask where they are or provide any comments on them and I pulled them out of a manila envelope labeled Hong Kong.