Mangrove Park (Shenzhen Bay station) is right on the metro. But beware, it’s also super popular and busy on weekends. I saw avocets and a spoonbill when the tide was low. If you go a bit east of the station, there’s also a little forested area, where I saw things like the long-tailed shrike.
the linear park along the Shahe river: I was staying about 25 minutes from a northern part of this park, and then could walk south along the linear park through the city easily for an hour or so. If you try to walk all the way to the bay, it’s probably nicer to cross over to the east side because the west side gets loud with traffic.
local parks: it seems like there are a good number of these good-sized local parks. Many have trees and forest birds!
On WeChat, you can search for birding groups, and sometimes read about rare bird spottings, like a large green pigeon that was somewhere in town.
Vegetarian food
Even with my “I don’t mind if it turns out to be beef broth” concessions, there are a lot of places where every single food entry features a big slice of meat or fish. For my first trip, which became a little too complicated for me, I ended up eating a lot of bread.
Qing Chun Perma: more traditional, and you can get a ton of food for 12 USD.
Gaga is a chain that’s everywhere that serves Western food. It has a few vegetarian things.
Other places
HQB should be visited, ideally with someone who can show you where to go!
Tenz: the 24-hour spa. It’s also very close to the border, so I actually stayed there overnight so I could get into Hong Kong first thing in the morning.
Oct Loft: hipster area..
Hong Kong
I spent less time in Hong Kong, but the parks were great.
Mai Po (Hong Kong): You have to book in advance, but it was an incredible way to end my month in the region!
Hong Kong Wetlands: I started here! It’s only a few dollars to enter, and there were quite a few wetland birds. I had the experience of walking into a blind that was full of people with cameras, looking at a few spoonbills and stilts. I guess I usually bird in the cool hipster places instead.
Those are both about an hour north of the downtown area. In the city itself, I did enjoy the starlings in West Kowloon Park.