Hiking over the dragons back via Chai Wan station and a connecting bus
Today I was lucky enough to hike along what is officially one of the words top 10 urban tropical hiking locations. Who makes these lists? Coming up shortly, my top 14 goat herding locations above 300 feet of altitude.
The dragons back hike is generally the first you will see whenever you look up hiking in Hong Kong. Everyone raves about it. Frankly, I was a little disappointed. I think the lion rock hike is better.
It is not that the view is bad, its just that its not great. And the hike is very easy.
I read things saying it would take 5 hours. It barely took 1 hour. You start near the top when you get off the bus, after a short hike up its flat and downhill.
Now, you can do this as a loop, which would be really disappointing, instead I decided to combine 3 hikes. In addition to the dragons back, I continued on down to the Big wave beach, which should be called the no wave terribly sunburnt British people beach, then I hiked up over the biggest staircase of this trip to the Chinese graveyard. Even after all of this it was still only 20,000 steps. I consider a good hike 30,000 and a long hike 40,000+. The dragons back on its own probably isnt even 10,000. So thats enough about steps.
I guess the dragons back is quite remote, you do have to take a bus to get to it, but it is very convenient, easy to find bus number 9 from the subway station, and it departs every 10 minutes. There are toilets at the bus stop as you shall see. If you do go to the beach, there are shops and toilets there as well. If you do go back up over the hill a different way into the back of the graveyard, theres a gate at the top that says private property keep out. Who are they kidding? There are hundreds of people wandering around the graveyard, I dont really think they are being charged admission or being asked to prove they are related to someone dead in the ground.
Like most Asian mega graveyards (I cant spell cemetery it seems), there are lots of spots to burn paper versions of everything. So be prepared to choke on smoke. There is actually a big push in Hong Kong to convince people to not be buried at all, there are signs at bus stops explaining this, perhaps there is even a reward? So there you go, a hike a beach, a graveyard, a rant, bad English, long sentences, unnecessary brackets, insensitivity, stereotyping, elitism, this post had everything.
The view from the bus stop is already quite good, but I was disappointed you start so high up. I would have rather started at the bottom and climbed up.
Here are the above mentioned public toilets, with full time cleaner cheerily greeting everyone who wants to use his toilets. He was very proud, he literally said 'please be my guest'.
As you can see, quite flat. Theres some fog around the top, and maybe that made the view not quite as OMG!!!!!! as everyone seems to claim it is. More elitism shown here.
The sun shining off those white buildings is not agreeing with my camera. My very expensive full frame camera. Interesting. Most of the buildings you see around here belong to elite country clubs and golf courses, as you shall see.
I think that area is called Shek O, there is a big golf club white colored pants only area to the left.
You can hike all the way along all these peaks as part of the Hong Kong trail, I think it is very very long though, more than 100km. I already did part of it yesterday.
My course would follow the ridge just to the left of this shot, in the fog. You can see golf courses below. They like to hide them in Hong Kong in areas people that rely on public transport cannot get to. Also I now realise that little bit of beach is the beach I climbed down to and up again from later.
The first part of the dragon back ridge amaze balls walk is out in the open, but that only lasts about 30 minutes, then its standard covered trail in shade. Nice streams periodically.
There were not many spots for a view, this is back over the other side, the same side that bus stop is on but a lot closer to the main part of Hong Kong.
Eventually I got to this spot, which is a T junction. You can either go down through those buildings to the subway, or turn right and go down to the beach. I chose the beach.
Big wave beach has no waves, but lots and lots of backpackers staying in places with old surfboards on display in the window. There are numerous shops selling ice creams. I think a small mini bus comes to here, but if it doesnt and you dont like hiking over mountains, you can walk along the coast to the Shek O place shown above where all the buses go.
Here is the beach. It has life guards, shark nets, and almost no Asian people at all, everyone was British.
More beach as seen from the huge staircase over the mountain. Really a surprisingly large number of stairs. I was sweating profusely as you shall soon see.
First, a bit more of the coast. You can see the same golf course as pictured earlier. I am standing on the 11th tee here, its a dog leg 7km to the fairway or something. BOGEY.
OK, so where I was must be quite secluded. That is the Hong Kong maximum security prison. Luckily I brought my tennis racquet and some balls filled with contraband to knock into the exercise yard. Also I refuse to type RACKET no matter how much my dictionary doth protesteth.
Its my big ugly sweaty head. Terrible hair day. This is probably the 2nd to last big ugly head shot. Rejoice.
And after all that, it was time for a leisurely descent through a mega graveyard back to the subway. By this point I was looking forward to my delicious orange.
Riding on the slow old double decker trams of Hong Kong
I dont think I have ever ridden on the iconic Hong Kong double decker trams? Tonight I rectified that situation.
I predict most people who have been to Hong Kong have been on a double decker tram, but generally I prefer to walk. I decided that if I was going to go on a tram I would first walk most of the way the tram goes, all the way to the furthest stop, then catch it back across most of Hong Kong. If I was spending 50 cents on a tram ride, I was going to get my moneys worth.
The tram had no windows, no air conditioning, terrible seats, no leg room, and sent a violent jolt through my spine frequently. All the things you expect of a tram. It was also painfully slow, I could have walked quicker. I cant work out why anyone other than tourists would take it and yet there are seemingly thousands of them traveling along the same stretch of road.
You do however get a great view, and they are quiet, which meant I could listen to the conversation the girl / woman sitting across from me was having with various people all around the world.
She was probably no older than 21, and I think she was half Chinese, but had spent time in the USA. She was trying to arrange a place to meet for a party with her friends....this weekend. Some of her friends were in the USA, some were in Bangkok, one was in Singapore. She probably had to return to Beijing on Thursday for a polo tournament appearance, but could be anywhere on Friday night, ready for a Saturday party. Apparently meeting in Bangkok was ruled out due to the weather there, but one person who was thought to be in the USA was already en route to Bangkok to sign some kind of investment deal. Singapore seemed to be the ideal place everyone could get to, but only if a venue with a roof pool away from prying cameras could be secured. Has anyone got any ideas to help this poor girl out? If that is her life why was she on the 50 cent a ride tram?
I first walked along the water front, in the other direction to last night, towards Kennedy town. It was hot. Shirtless men were fishing. There was an area advising that it was off limits and used for loading and unloading international cargo, and yet the gate was open and everyone was walking their dogs on the wharf as shipping containers were being moved around. I also played dodge the giant forklift.
Tonight photo of big apartment buildings features a strange flying saucer building. I thought it was a metro station, or maybe a toll point for a freeway, but no, its a public swimming pool
Eventually I got to the end of the wharf, 3 fences between me and a Chinese navy ship.
Here is the view back along the coast. Nice clear skies. My camera is struggling with the white buildings again. The histogram does not show any clipping. Maybe its the terrible screen on my ancient laptop.
Time to board a tram! Even though I am on the top level, from this photo it does not look particularly high, but it is. You look down on the top of double decker buses. The tram is also narrower than a bus. I wonder how many have tipped over?
View 1 of 2 from a moving tram. I was taking photos out the back.
View 2 of 2 from a moving tram. Periodically another tram would pull up behind us, and I would be about 3 feet from the person in the other tram staring at me.
Here is a street market as seen from a moving tram. Time to get off. Getting off was not easy, it took 3 stops before I was able to negotiate the spiral staircase filled with people and get to the front door to get off. Luckily the stops are about 14.5 feet apart.
And here is a market. Nothing special about this market, they generally make for nice night / dusk photos.
I selected this butcher for a moody shot of flesh because it was the only one without the red light globe making it look weird. Generally your choices are pork or starvation.
Except, my dinner had no pork or meat of any kind! Its vegetarian curry. I actually saw it a couple of nights prior and decided that is what I wanted, and so that is what I had.
A bonus photo tonight of my phone screen. I read my phone while eating. Remember earlier I typed at length about Hong Kong graveyards? Googles recommended news story algorithm has placed a story about graves in Hong Kong costing more per square foot than housing. Google is always listening! I AM GOING TO KILL YOU GOOGLE!