Hiking: Lantau Trail Stage 11

Finally – we continued hiking the Lantau trail. Originally our plan was to finish this hike in 2012, but unfortunately we were too busy and also a little bit too lazy to do so. Given that the Chinese Year has not ended yet, we can still claim we finished the trail this year… but unfortunately, Monica, my hiking partner and friend told me that’s cheating. Anyway, on Saturday it was an amazing day, blue sky and sunshine with 16 degrees (which felt like 22 degrees in the sunshine) and we headed to Tung Chung to catch a bus to take us to the starting point of the Lantau trail stage 11.

The hike continues from the water catchment area that we hiked along stage 10 and to get there we had to get off at the bus stop at Tong Fuk. That’s exactly where our checkpoint 3 was located at the Moontrekker, on the road between Sunset Peak and Lantau Peak.

From there we walked downhill on the old Tung Chung Road, which used to connect Tai O and Mui Wo to Tung Chung. Nowadays this road is not in use anymore as a new South Lantau Island Road was built years ago. So we just walked downhill in the middle of the old road until we hit the water catchment to our left.

We walked 30 minutes along the water catchment, passing cattle grazing next to picnic benches and meeting a group of eager mountain bikers, all kitted out in their gear. We stopped briefly to admire this waterfall, a small oasis hidden away from the busy roads of Hong Kong.

Here are our shadows, as we stand together looking at the waterfall and talking about our new cameras – both Monica and I are testing our new Christmas gifts, an Olympus EM5 OMD each. Lovely camera, just takes some time to get used to.

Then a sand-and-stone path descends towards Pui O, the end of stage 11. At the marker L20 the hike turns right and we caught a first glance at the curved beach with the village houses in the background. The wild, green Chi Ma Wan peninsula serves as backdrop to this view.

We continued hiking downhill and as we get closer to Pui O, we can see some graves set into the hill – there are a few places with little shrines to remember the ancestors as well as little stone huts that include urns.

The graves always face the mountain in the back and the sea in front – it’s believed to be good feng shui this way.

We turned right and walked downhill, until we hit the main road. Now we are only a few minutes away from Pui O.

The hike is short and easy – just 4.5km and about a 70 minutes stroll for the two of us, taking our time as we take pictures as we go along. In Pui O we admire some of the houses, there are some beautiful modern village houses next to very traditional ones.

In between we see a few shops and small restaurants, but rather than stopping, we’ll continue to the final stage of the Lantau trail.