Conquer the Dragon
A short trip from crazy Hong Kong brings you to this beautiful mountain escape. With breathless views of Hong Kong skyscrapers to golf resorts to coastline, this 8km hike is a fabulous addition to your Hong Kong holiday. Ending at a cute beach, a swim may be in order if it is hot.
Getting there:
Exit A3 MTR Shau Kei Wan station on the Island line. Walk over to the bus terminal and take bus 9.
Alight at To Tei Wan on the Shek O Road. Lots of other hiking looking tourists will exit here. There is a national park type sign with Dragon Back on it.
Hints:
Take:
Good walking shoes, joggers, hat, sunscreen, lots of water, snacks, small backpack, swimmers for the end.
When to go: Not Summer if you can avoid it! It is extremely hot and humid. This is from experience, and it wasn't pleasant. The humidity is terrible.
8.5km
Approximately 4 hours
We followed the self guided directions from discoverhongkong.com You do not need a guided tour. There is only one path to follow, and if you can't follow that, follow other people.
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| discoverhongkong.com |
Starting at the Dragon Back sign we ascended the mountain full of bravado.
Walking up through the shade of trees and dense bush, we enjoyed the peace and solitude of the ascent.
After about 20 minutes, exiting the tree tunnel we were greeted with an open air view of the Shek O peninsula. Full sunshine beat down on us with humidity of 70%. The view kept us going!
Following the rugged path winding through bush and trees we were ready to conquer the dragon back. Ascending constantly we caught glimpses of exquisite golf courses and resorts, homes and beaches. Alway some thing to look at.
Finally, when we had had enough of forever going up we started descending down a rough rocky path. Mountain bike riders pushing their bikes up the other way were our only company.
As we descended the beautiful tree tunnels emerged. Semi rainforest, creeks and moss covered rocks appeared. Simply beautiful and serene.
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| smiley face in the shade! |
While the humidity was intense now the shade gave us some relief. We had arrived at Pottinger's Gap.
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| more hot smiley shade faces |
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| Pottinger's Gap |
Following a large path we found toilets at the bottom. Sadly disgusting and not useable we continued on.
There were a few options of paths here but we used our instinct and continued down finally reaching a quiet village of Big Wave Bay. Meandering through the white concrete village we arrived at our destination.
Obviously we are not in Australia as the "big Waves" lapped people's ankles!
This was a typical Asian beach with plastic permanent umbrellas, lots of drowning signs but lovely cool drinks!
The water and sand were not tempting compared to Australia, so we chose to have a lovely cool beer under a shady umbrella before heading back to the hustle and bustle of Hong Kong.
We could not find the bus back and in the end had to ask for directions. We couldn't work out how to pay for the bus, as people were not using their octopus card on return. We threw a bit of spare change in and all was good. Possibly it was a donation system?
Returning to our accommodation we felt achieved and satisfied that we had accomplished something other than shopping in Hong Kong. Wonderful to see another beautiful area of Hong Kong.
Read my other self guided walks
Tags:
Self Guided Walks
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