Hong Kong: Dragon's Back

On Thursday, I met up with Keith at 10:30 AM at a metro station near the east end of Hong Kong Island. Our plan was to go on a hike up Dragon's Back, on the eastern-most end of the island, then continue on to Shek O, a small town next to a beach. Overall, the day was a great success.

Before I get to the hike though, I will post some pictures of my breakfast - rice noodles wrapped around fried donut, some sliced fish congee, and a bowl of warm soymilk. This was a lot of food to start my day.

We caught a bus from the MTR (metro) toward Shek O - this was easy, as Keith had arrived before me and had scoped it all out. This bus took us up into the hills, and we got off the bus at a trailhead. A Canadian guy named Shawn was on the bus with us, and did the same hike, though we didn't really talk to him much till later.

At first the trail was shady, walking along a mostly flat ridge through some jungle-like vegetation. Eventually this trail rose above the treeline onto Dragon's Back, which provide views both east and west. Up at the top, it was very windy, but as soon as we were protected from the wind, the sun was really hot!

The whole hike only took us about 1.5 hours, and soon we were back at the road (further down it) where we caught the bus again for the rest of the trip to Shek O. When we got to Shek O, we explored a bit, took a peak at the beach (which looked awesome), then decided to eat lunch first. There are a lot of Thai restaurants in Shek O, so we chose one that was crowded and close to the beach. Shawn ended up there as well, so he joined us at our table - we ordered from a lunch special menu. Keith and I had pork chops and Shawn had green curry - all were HUGE servings atop huge servings of rice - a ton of food for about $5 US each.

After lunch we went to the beach, where we stayed most of the afternoon - we swam, we lay in the sun, we swam some more. There were some rafts in the water that you could swim to, and the waves were kind of big as well, so they were fun to play in. Keith and I threw a frisbee for a while, despite announcements made in Cantonese, Mandarin and English that said "No dogs, ball playing, saucer throwing or kiteflying allowed." Nobody seemed to care about these rules though, since there were plenty of dogs, frisbees and soccer balls on the beach.

The water at the beach had a bit of garbage floating in it, but for the most part seemed very clean, and the sand on the beach was great. We rented an umbrella too, so we had some nice shade. The three of us met a woman named Meghan, who grew up and lives in Hong Kong - and we chatted with her for a while before we all left to go back to the city.

One last anecdote: when we got off the bus at the metro station, I really had to pee. There were no toilets right at the metro station, but there was a sign that says "toilets" with an arrow pointing a street with lots of stalls. Keith, Shawn and Meghan waited for me as I followed the sign...which led me two blocks to another sign, and then to another sign....and soon I was four blocks away. But sure enough, I was eventually led to a public bathroom. I was quite impressed with signage...I can't think of anywhere else I've been where the bathroom signs are so clear, especially when the bathroom itself is blocks away.

That's enough for this post...more later perhaps. Here are pictures!

Keith at the trailead.


The trail on Dragon's Back

David and Keith on Dragon's Back

View of Shek O Beach from above


Pork chop rice plate at Thai restaurant in Shek O




Keith eating lunch.

Shek O Beach

Shek O Beach

Peal, Play, Win! Shir Appeal makes it all the way to the South China Sea!