5 April 2025
Rest day rainy peak climb
The Peak from Central to South Horizons
Its rainy, dark, misty, foggy, grey and moist. Luckily for me it was my designated rest day.
So I decided to walk up to the peak in the rain, and down the other side to Aberdeen and beyond to the South Horizons area where the newest but not particularly new MTR line ends.
I also had some wontons.
The peak was completely fogged in, but there were still a few tourist groups enjoying the white out view.
The path up from central to the peak is short, only about 20 minutes once you find the starting point which is often not easy, even on this my third time walking up to it. The path down is much longer, at least an hour. Both were very lonely with only a handful of joggers who all looked much wetter than I did.
The path down the back of the peak lets out in a graveyard in Aberdeen, these are always on the side of a cliff, and I think the leading cause of death for people buried there is probably visiting dead relatives already buried there, which causes heart attacks or results in the elderly slipping down 500 stairs.
From there it was just a stroll around the waterfront in the drizzle, looking at the many boats in what was once a typhoon evacuation area for fisherman, before stopping for lunch at South (Southorn?) Horizons and catching the MTR back to town.
A rainy Nathan road greeted me as I exited my hotel room bright and early.
After coming up to the street near Central, it was apparent I was on the expat side of Hong Kong. There is no Marks and Spencer on the Kowloon side of Hong Kong.
As mentioned above, getting to the path up to the Peak can be a logistical challenge. They want you to pay for the tram.
Low cloud. Despite appearances, it never really rained that much, my key indicator of wet is my socks, and they stayed dry all day.
Here is the path up to the peak, steep in sections, I had it to myself.
That is uphill, but appears to be downhill. Also, it was very dark.
A bit of view, mainly of cloud.
Here is a tram station at the mid point of the way up. They recently replaced the trams with boring looking new ones. Technically I think it is a funicular railway.
Soon after I entered the proper fog.
Once arriving at the peak, I entered the peak observatory, which has very expensive coffee. I decided to get an iced coffee from the 7-eleven instead.
There is the peak observatory. It has been remodelled since I was last here. Actually last time I was here the fog was even thicker!
Behind the peak observatory is the galleria mall, which has also been completely renewal'd since I was last here.
I will now continue down the pack of the peak, in the fog and mist.
The path down was not too foggy, and much like the path on the way up the front of the peak, only longer.
The lower part of the descent even had a creek to follow for a while.
And then a wonderful foggy drain.
Soon I arrived at the graveyard, it was huge.
There were people burning stuff somewhere, adding to the fog with smoke, aka smog.
The streets of Aberdeen were very dark and moody.
Behold, boats sheltering from the typhoon. Well there is no typhoon, but there is a little museum explaining that sheltering from a typhoon was the original purpose of this area.
South Horizons on the left, Aberdeen on the right. I was standing on a bridge, in the rain.
The peak is up behind those buildings.
Strangely, you cannot walk all the way around the waterfront, you eventually get to a lift / staircase (I took the stairs) to take you up to street level.
And then the street overpass leads you straight into a mall. The central attraction is a cherry picker. Is that the only name these things are called universally around the world? I cannot think of anything else to call them.
I decided to have some lunch, the cheapest option was this, dry noodle with wontons from a Hong Kong style plastic tray McDonalds type place that only sells various combos of noodles, fish balls, wontons and duck necks. It was bland but hot.
And finally, before boarding the train, I walked down to the ocean to check out the view, I guess I can see the South horizon, but mainly I see a small island.