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Published: December 10th 2017
#Optoutside is the movement to get outside on Black Friday. Black Friday has gone out of control for many years in the US. During the 4-day Thanksgiving holiday, the doorbuster sales start as early as Thursday 6pm. Stores want you to skip the whole turkey thing and go shopping!
This year, we #optoutside in Hong Kong. But isn’t HK known for shopping and endless high-rises? It’s not widely known that outside of those high-rise shopping jungles in Central and Kowloon, most of HK is green! This year, we found an uber deal to Hong Kong for the Thanksgiving week. Time to check out four Hong Kong long-distance trails spanning over 298km with 14,500m total elevation gain. So excited! After researching, I picked out sections from each of the four trails: 1) HK trail section 8 (Dragon’s back), 2) Lantau trail section 2/3, 3) Maclehose trail section 1/2, and 4) Wilson trail section 8/9.
After a long 14-hr flight, we found ourselves in HK airport Tuesday evening. Airport Express zapped us into Central in 30min. Unlike previous trips to Asia, I slept through the first night. This is a good start.
Wednesday: HK primer Today, we’ll ease into
Looking up in HK
Everything is verticalHK with the easiest hike: Dragon’s back. It’s the easiest logistically and physically.
After a quick search for a breakfast place nearby, we decided on Kam Fung cafe a few blocks away. This tiny shop was decently busy. The moment we walked in, I caught the cashier guy’s look that read: Oh crap, foreigners. I’d read many times that the seats are shared so that part was ok. Waiter literally didn’t say a single word. The menu was all in Chinese. I could make some out but not enough to pick a meal combo. But we had to pick something, right? We hauled the waiter but I failed to understand that there were a couple of options in meal combos. Still not speaking, the waiter finally went to grab an English menu. Why didn’t you tell me you had one!! We had HK breakfast staples: macaroni, pineapple bun, egg n ham, with milk tea. Macaroni is literally that, swimming in hot water, with a sprinkle of julienned ham. So bland, love it.
The trail starts behind Chai Wan station, up through a huge cemetery. We started at ~8am with a nice single track in the lush forest. Soon
after, the view opened up, overlooking Shek O. It was a gorgeous sunny day. The view of the dramatic coastline and little bumps popping along was spectacular.
Once the path went down the stairs to the intersection of Shek O road, we were on the road all the way to Shek O village. There wasn’t even a sidewalk for the most part and I was wondering if we were not supposed to be walking this one. We could’ve probably taken a bus but it wasn’t a huge distance to Shek O village. The village looked like a beach town with mom n pop beach stalls lining along the street. Sun was in full force andirons was a perfect day to hike out to the easternmost spot.
From Shek O, we made our way back north through 3-ish miles of woodsy path. We were back at Chai Wan station little after noon. Perfect. We picked Mongkok area for the point of food attack. From south to north, we had Lee Keung Kee eggette, Mak’s noodle wanton, curry fish balls, Kim Wah cafes pineapple bun, and steamed milk from both Yee Shun and Australian dairy company. Oink oink. Eggette, the
egg waffle, has a Michelin star, believe it or not. I’m making this my first eggette to raise my bar high. It was crunchy on the other side, chewy inside, mmm. Mak’s noodle’s yummy plump wanton comes in an incredibly tiny bowl. The curry fish ball from a stall on Dundas Street was V’s favorite. Super easy-going street food 😊. Steam milk from Yee Shun was sooo yummy. Super soft, softer than the softest tofu, slightly sweetened, warm, and milky. Comfort food! We were able to share one at Australian daily company but they don’t have the simple milk-only item and it was too sweet. The texture was amazing though. By the time we got to Kim Wah for pineapple bun, I was full and we wanted to share a bun. But the lady wasn’t having it. She made us order at least one drink each. Fine, we each had milk tea. The bun was legit. Needless to say, it put me over the top as I’d outdone myself eating. Good start.
Thursday: Lantau crossing Yesterday and today will have the best weather during our stay. We decided to do the Lantau trail and see the giant Buddha
under the sun!
The plan was to catch 7:10 am fast ferry to Mui Wo. That means eating breakfast at ~6 am near the ferry pier. I passed out at 8pm last night and was up well before 4am. 5:30 am departure was easy. I didn’t know what to expect walking in the darkness but no problem. The town is already starting to get going, especially where the high-end stores start to pop up. The street was filled with newspaper people. They were unloading and sorting. Backstreets were dead at this wee hour but Tsui Wah was lit brightly at 6 am. This is a 24/7 family restaurant that we saw again at the airport. Too bad the menu was limited at this hour 😞. We each got breakfast sets. I’m going to need this macaroni today but milk had to be excluded from my tea in preparation for the ferry ride.
On schedule and got on 7:10 am ferry to Mui Wo, woohoo! Glad to have taken the fast boat cuz 30min at sea was reaching my limit. There was a sizable crowd on the ferry, mostly men. From the port, we started hiking the road (this
time with ample sidewalk space) at 7:45 am. After a gradual ascent, we reached the beginning of the single-track. Stairs to be exact. How little did we know that this will be much of the hike rest of the way. It was brisker than yesterday for sure. Also windy, blowing away my windbreaker. We did not see a soul until the barracks right before the Sunset Peak, 4 miles, 2500ft gain, and ~2hrs later. These barracks were super eerie. All windows had wooden pieces nailed onto it. All I could think was the zombie apocalypse, lol.
Past Sunset peak, the view opened up, including the mountain in front of us with a track or path leading straight to its peak. Wow, looks amazing! Except! That was where we were headed, doh! Not seeing any person on that track was giving me a hope that our route will be somewhere else. The trail dropped very fast on deep stone stairs. We started to run into many groups of hikers here. Apparently, all of them started at the bottom in Pak Kung Au. It seemed that everybody went toward the Sunset peak and that’s why Lantau peak was empty.
Our
trek to Lantau peak began. It was literally stairs all the way. V took the stairs at good pace while I took one stone step at a time. The steepness came in 3 waves. The wind continued to blow strong. Finally arrived at the peak!! From there was another steep descent on more stone steps. Knee-buster. We saw the Buddha and the village from above, epic! Continued dropping on large stone steps. I was so glad I wasn’t going up on these steps. We approached the village from the Wisdom Path. You can’t miss it. The path is dotted with tall wooden pillars with chants etched on them. Pretty artsy. By this time, I was depleted. 5hrs, 4500ft later. Luckily, there was a snack store next to the vegetarian restaurant. Rice cakes and whatnot gave me a little oomph to climb more stairs to the Buddha. Very cool. It was worth squeezing the last drop of my energy.
Now to find the bus to Tung Chung...but wait. I keep seeing signs for fresh tofu dessert. We checked out one of them, toward the end of the village. Oh boy. A lady was scooping soft tofu from a bamboo bucket.
She was also ladling smooth shiny black sesame soupy thing. Oooo. We got one of each. Sooo smooth and light. I can eat bowls of these!
The bus ride took just 40min to Tung Chung, not bad. MTR from there will dump us at Hong Kong station. Great. We’ll conquer eateries in Central! First stop: Yak Lok roast goose! This place is Michelin-rated. We got goose drumstick and pork over rice. While it was super tasty where I could even eat the skin, the plate was puny. It was like 1/8 goose. The guy in front of us was chowing down the whole leg, although his bill was stiffer. Welp, the good thing is that we can hit Kau Kee also. The beef tendon in curry was the bomb, melting in my mouth, mmm. The beef brisket was super moist too. This was right up V’s alley. I got my share of sweets with milk tea from Lan Fong Yuen and egg tarts from Tai Cheong bakery. Milk tea was definitely the smoothest I’ve ever had! I always wondered if the HK style milk tea is necessarily bitter. Black tea gets bitter if you steep too long. But you
Gorgeous day!
Dragon's Back need strong tea for milk tea. Every time I had HK milk tea back home, it was always too bitter. But this one was so pleasant. I guess the secret is in the sock filter. Egg tart was eggcellent!!! Butterly dough and subtly eggy filling served warm...heavenly!
Friday: Crossing three beaches Oh no, sore quads from yesterday! But we had to power Maclehose today before the weather goes downhill during the weekend. This one was going to be the longest hike at the furthest location. Total elevation won’t be as bad as yesterday but it won’t be Dragon’s Back either.
It turns out, there is a 24/7 noodle house right across the street. It was pretty empty before 5:30am. There is English on the menu. I got Wonton with rice noodle. It was bland to my liking, especially before a day of hiking. I surprised V by clearing much of the noodle for a long day to come. V’s dumpling noodle soup was tasty too 😊.
At MTR Diamond Hill station, we found our double-decker bus 92. This line is supposed to be pretty frequent and we’ll go to the end of the line so no
stress there. At Sai Kung terminal, we had to change to bus 94 and get off at Pak Tam Chung. Better pay attention. Bus 94 was easy to find as many people were headed that way. Among them was a fellow American, Marcel. He works for an airline and is originally from Alaska. It was freezing with the sun behind the clouds, prompting us to put all the layers we had. But he seemed comfortable in his t-shirt. He was doing the same hike we planned for. The bus arrived at Pak Tam Chung shortly before 8am and a load of people got off. Naturally, we followed them but got stopped as they were going to some kind of office. It turned out, us three were the only ones headed to the trail, lol.
We parted with Marcel as his strides were too big to keep up. First 6 miles were literally on the road. It ran along High Island Reservoir but the view was meh. Things got interesting at Hexagonal Columns. It is part of UNESCO Global Geopark. You can see the walls of hexagonal columns, similar to Devil’s Tower and Giant’s Causeway. Really an amazing sight. We
saw various groups cabbing into this spot. Smart, actually. Should have done the same.
Stairs led us through the trail and it quickly started going up. I dragged my tired legs up the stairs. Still, this section wasn’t too long. We hit the peak, took in the view and the trail descended straight to Long Ke Wan. Walk on the beach was nice, different. Passing by the campsites on the beach sand, we saw a sign outlining what was ahead. We were to climb up ~1000 ft in 1 mile to Mt Sai Wan!! We passed a group of backpackers with big packs which looked so heavy on this steep climb. Somehow, I made it (V was in good shape). It was a gradual descent to Sai Wan beach.
We hit the 3
rd beach of the day ~1.5 miles from Sai Wan beach. This section was nice, overlooking hexagonal columns lining the bay. From Ham Tin beach, the path was very well lined with the pavement. A good 3.5 miles on rolling path felt like forever. We jogged a bit to make the time go by faster. Finally, we reached the road before 2 pm. Drink vending machine
was super tempting but I didn’t have any coin 😞. There was a long line at the bus stop. This bus runs every 30min but we didn’t have wait too long. Marcel was in front of the line, still in a t-shirt! Me? I had all my layers back on as the sweat was fast getting cold.
We tracked back 1.5hr journey back to Causeway Bay. We were headed straight to Bowrington Road market food court. Apparently, there is an awesome outlet that has good roast chicken and steamed fish. We were starving. At the food court, we found the place but they weren’t serving food, nooo 😞. It’s hard to assess alternative stalls on the spot for us foreigners. Plan B. Sun Kee’s cheese noodle with port cheek. Uh, sounds so good right now. When we got to the supposed location, there was no Sun Kee, baaaa, I wanted to cry. Plan C. Kam’s roast goose. Finally, this place existed. But! Before 4pm, there was a mob in front of it!! Ah, it has a Michelin stamp, of course. We ended up waiting ~45min for our seats. During that 45min, we were told, first, goose over rice/noodle economical
fairs were out, then second, quarter geese were out. And it’s cash only. I’m glad I had enough to get through this meal. We had no choice but to get a 1/2 goose. V also got a small plate of egg noodle doused in goose fat, mon dieu! HK’s table-sharing custom was a torture. 1/2 Michelin starred roast goose later, V was up-to-here with meat, which says a lot.
On our way back to Wan Chai, we made a crucial discovery. Tai Cheong bakery with killer egg tarts had an outlet right under our nose!! We couldn’t help but pick up a few tarts and other desserts.
...to be continued on
Part 2.
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