Being basically surrounded by moutains, there's lots of great hiking to do around HK. I did a lot of different hikes and I've broken it up below by hike.
At the start and end of the video, towards the left side, you can see the long strip of land jutting out into the sea that was the old airport. It's being converted to residential use, with a stadium at the part where it meets the peninsula.
After an hour or so I came across a strange statue in the distance. You can barely see it in the first photo, but it's clearer in the second. The pin, as usual, represents my location when taking the photo, and in this case the photo is looking North.
More on this mystery later... But in the meantime, let's talk about Kai Tak airport!
Aircraft flying in would have to make "a low-altitude (sub-600 ft; 180 m) 47-degree right-hand turn." This led to many iconic shots like these:
The harrowing nature of the approach is probably best captured on video:
Also, Hong Kong has monkeys!
Overall this was my hike for the day. A little over 8 miles in about 3h30m.
Victoria peak is the tallest point on Hong Kong island at 552 meters. You can buy a tram ticket all the way to the top, but you can also just walk/hike up there so of course I did that! I'm glad I did because I got some great shots on the way up.
And of course there were great views from the top.
I took the tram on the way down, you won't believe how steep it was!
In case you're wondering, Victoria Peak is named after, of course, Queen Victoria who reigned from 1837 to 1901. As far as I can tell, she never visited Hong Kong, or even India, of which she was the Empress.
Back to topI took the bus to a place called Shek O and slowly made my way north. Shek O has a lovely beach!
I didn't go all the way down to that beach, but I did make it down to another nearby, very pleasant beach
Later I was treated to some more great views of the city.
I won't go through all of the hikes that I did, but I have one more I want to share. This was around High Island Resevoir and it was just very peaceful and nice, with barely any city views.
After the hike I spent a little bit of time in a village called Sai Kung, where I got a very Anthony Bourdain-esque shot of the fishermen and got to see a festive procession!
