Hike in Hong Kong!

So, here’s a Hong Kong Nature 101 lesson and a Hong Kong Capitalism 101 lesson.

I’ll start of with HK Nature 101.

Saw the HKTrampers website this morning and remembered that they were going to my favorite part of Hong Kong (well, favorite after Sharp Peak and Plover Cove). So, make that 3rd favorite part of Hong Kong – Wong Lung Hang waterfalls. So, carried my camera for a change and decided to take it easy (at least for the first half).

Getting to Wong Lung Hang is easy. It’s walkable from Tung Chung station and takes about 15 minutes from there to get to the starting point (you can see the Garmin page for the map – link below). From there, there’s a lot of hopping over boulders and you eventually get to a beautiful waterfall.

Ready for action

The group

Waterfalls

There was too much demand for real estate by the main waterfalls so decided to go up a bit and found a private pool to occupy. After chilling for a while in the pools, it was time to undo all the “take it easy” stuff and so decided to go full throttle to Mui Wo. Enthusiasm was great but as usual sense of direction was not. Could not find the trail up to Lin Fa Shaan but after going in some random direction and heading back, the trail suddenly appeared in front of my eyes! Wasn’t too easy going up to 715m from 250m but wasn’t that incredibly tough either.

View from Lin Fa Shaan – Lamma, Cheung Chau and anything else you want to imagine is visible!

From there a straight run down to Mui Wo in about 30 minutes or so concluded the hike. (Dejavu from yesterday). Took a total of 1 hour 30 minutes from the waterfalls to get to Mui Wo ferry pier.

Now, for HK Capitalism 101.

ICC, The Arch, The Cullinan and co.

They say success leaves clues and the clues these beautiful buildings have left is that one owner has built all the 3 of them. Sun Hung Kai Properties. ICC is already attracted all the big financial giants (Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank and co.) This area will probably become like Central in the next couple of years.

Masterpiece and First Ferry

New World Development has built the Masterpiece (nice name) and they also own the First Ferry brand. They keep advertising First Ferry services on the ferry’s TVs YET have a monopoly on that route!

And finally, here’s Ocean Terminal in TST.

Ocean Terminal

This place is special because if you bring the word’s top 100 dirtiest, fattest pigs and have them all fart in Ocean Terminal, the interior of the building WILL STILL smell nice! That’s because this place hosts all the high end perfume/make up brands that HK has to offer.

So, after a nice long hike, I don’t have to worry about how much I stink as I am walking home through Ocean Terminal…

Pictures are here.

Garmin link is here.

Hiking pictures here.

20-something Trampers showed up today for a day of waterfall exploration. There were several new faces too, including combat-ready Kevin from the UK, who had evidently paid utmost attention to the Tramper rucksack details listed on the website. He was wearing camouflage pants, had sturdy waterproof hiking boots on and several pouches containing life-saving equipments like a torch were attached to his belt.

We left at 10.45 AM to embark on a 20-minute walk that led to the base of the stream. As we approached the stream, the fragrant smell of fresh stream water hit our noses and the sound of the water hitting against the boulders intensified.

Shoes and socks came off and many of us immersed our bare feet in the purifying stream water. We were all like children in nature’s playground as we hopped from one boulder onto another in order to reach the Wong Lung Hang waterfalls. The water current was very strong because of the previous day rains and there were several challenging boulder hops on the course to the waterfalls. While the gentlemen offered their helping hands to those who needed, Francis seized on this opportunity to help a beautiful lady Tramper by giving her a Stream Hiking 101 lesson. In fact, we could hear the conversation. It went something like this:

Francis: Put your leg here, hand there and gently move forward. Be careful of this rock (blah, blah)

After 2 minutes, I could hear her say “But we should have gone THAT way!”

About one grueling hour later, we reached the mesmerizing waterfalls. Many of us simply couldn’t resist a dip in the enticing water. At this point Francis approached me with an unusual request. He wanted me to buy some very unique cloth made of jute from my upcoming trip to India. He came to me bringing a cigarette lighter and a piece of cloth. That conversation went something like this.

Francis: You see, this is a genuine cloth made of jute. Can you observe the natural color? Feel the cloth. (He then brings another cloth for comparison). Now, this is artificial. If I burn it, you’ll notice that the strands turn black and the feeling will be of burnt plastic. That’s why it is artificial.

Arianna, who was sitting 2 rocks away, came closer to me and confessed her curiosity. She felt the specimen cloth too.

“Is this guy in the fashion industry?” she asked in amazement.

As I burst into laughter, I asked her to look at his green shorts, his unusual hat and rethink her question. She then retorted “You know you can get a lot of strange guys in the fashion industry”.

A refreshing swim and a couple of group photos later, Dominic and I were off to high speed yet exhausting finish.