Lantau Island is the largest island in Hong Kong, and while it’s not the hub of city life, the island has a lot to offer! It’s home to the Hong Kong airport, Disneyland, a giant Buddha, several mountain peaks, and a little fishing village.

 I ventured out for a day trip and could have easily spent more time there.

How To Get To Lantau Island

Take the orange Tung Chung metro line all the way to Tung Chung. The Po Lin Monastary, Big Buddha, and Ngong Ping village are on the top of a mountain, so you have a few options for getting up. The most popular option is the Ngong Ping 360 Cable Car, which offers a 25 minutes gorgeous ride up the mountain. You can even pay extra and take the Crystal Car up which has a clear floor to see through.

Another option is to take bus 23 from the bus terminal next to the metro. Its takes a little longer (about 50 minutes) but it’s much cheaper (17-27 HKD depending on the day) and has a nice scenic tour around view the island. When I got to Lantau around 7:45 am I didn’t want to wait for the cable car to open at 10, so I went with the bus option.

Tian Tian Big Buddha

Po Lin Monastery

Lantau Trail and Peak

If you’re feeling extra energetic you can take the Wisdom Path from the monastery and hike up to Lantau Peak, one of the highest views in all of Hong Kong.

The day I went was super foggy, but I pushed through with the hike anyways because it was my only day to do it. I made it to the top in an hour after lots of climbing (SO MANY STAIRS). It was definitely much more challenging than Dragon’s Back or Lion Rock.

At the top I was greeted by a Hong Kong couple. “We don’t see it sunny up here very often” they told me cheerily, munching on their apples and ready to hike off on their next adventure.

I was a bit disappointed to make it up and not see anything at the top because the views are supposed to be incredible! (I wanted to insert a pic of what it’s supposed to look like but don’t want to make myself sad about it all over again so you should Google it, but don’t tell me about it). I’m still glad I did it though, and it gives me motivation to come back another time and try it on a sunny day!

On the way back down I caught some great views of the Island – better than the top haha.

I had to head back into Chinese mainland so I was on a bit of a time crunch and didn’t spend much time on the island. I’d love to come back to explore the Ngong Ping village and try the Cable Car. I’d also like to try Lantau Peak again and possibly Sunset Peak, the mountain next to it!

Lantau Island is definitely worth a trip out to see – hopefully my next trip will be a bit sunnier!

Check out my other posts about Hong Kong:

• 15 Things You Should Do In Hong Kong
• Hiking Hong Kong’s Lion Rock
• Qing Ming Festival in Hong Kong
• Hiking Dragon’s Back in Hong Kong

Here are 15 Things You Definitely Should Do in Hong Kong:

1. Take a hike

Hong Kong has some awesome hiking trails! Whether you have a full day or just a few hours, there are tons of trails to explore. I’ve hiked Lion Rock, Dragon’s Back, and Lantau Peak, and still have more on my list.

2. Walk around Lugard Road on Victoria Peak

Take the tram or a bus up to Victoria Peak and check out the iconic views of Hong Kong. But don’t just visit the Sky Terrace – take a stroll around Lugard Road trail to the left of the big Galleria mall. You’ll get to enjoy even better views of the Hong Kong skyline and Victoria Harbor!

3. Go Shopping in Causeway Bay

Causeway Bay is a popular shopping area on Hong Kong island and you can shop and eat to your heart’s content here.

4. Stroll The Temple Street Night Market

Hong Kong’s famous night market complete with tons of vendors, street food, and neon lights. It’s a great place to shop for souvenirs and snap some cool nighttime pics.

5. Visit Victoria Harbor During the Day

Go early in the morning to get better photos without so many people! I woke up at 7am one day and decided to visit the harbor, and it was just me and a few sweet older folks. The lighting was fantastic and there was no fighting for picture space!

6 …And at Night

Did you really go to Hong Kong if you didn’t come to the harbor and snap some pics? You can get some great views from the Victoria Harbour on the Kowloon side, on the Hong Kong Island side, or take a ferry and get the best of both worlds. The harbor is especially beautiful at night!

7. Take a Day Trip To Lantau Island

Lantau is the biggest island in Hong Kong, and while it’s not the center of city life, there is so much to do! From Disneyland to Big Buddha to Sunset Peak, Lantau Island has a lot. I came here for a day trip and want to go back again – more on that later.

8. Stroll Around Yuen Po Bird Garden

Near the Prince Edward metro station in northern Kowloon you’ll find the Yuen Po Bird Garden. Lots of elderly folk will bring their birds here everyday for people to buy or enjoy watching. I was so excited to visit that I went too early before people even brought their birds…whoops.

9. Hop Over To Goldfish Market

Close to the Yuen Po Bird Garden is the Goldfish Market – since they’re nearby each other I had to take a look around. Hong Kong is one of the leading exporters of goldfish and other tropical fish and here you can find hundreds of little fish hanging up in bags waiting to be bought!

10. Walk around Tsim Sha Shui

Tsim Sha Tsui (or called TST if you’re cool) is a popular tourist place to walk around. It’s kind of a home base for many people who come to visit Hong Kong, so there’s lots of shops, restaurants, and hotels here (it’s where my hostel was).

11. Catch A Rooftop View

I have a big thing for rooftops – they’re a great place to get a new perspective of a city. Hong Kong has some awesome rooftop views: there are lots of restaurants and bars where you can grab a drink and see the city from high up, and you can also check out Sky100, Hong Kong’s highest indoor observation deck.

Or if you’re like me you can find some residential buildings to go up into. I found it a bit harder to get on rooftops in Hong Kong S.A.R. than in Chinese mainland; all the apartments have outside gates that are locked, and I was also worried more about being stopped by a security guard here because they would mostly likely speak English! (In China I can get away with the “I’m a foreigner I can’t speak Chinese” card. But here I can’t.) I didn’t find the most spectacular views but I was still pretty excited to get up to a few rooftops.

12. Try Hong Kong Street Food

When you’re hunting for food in Hong Kong don’t disregard the food stalls and little places selling things on the street. Egg waffles, fish balls, squid tentacles, egg tarts, pineapple buns, and fried pig intestines are among the best known street foods in Hong Kong and you shouldn’t miss them. Also try the world famous Hong Kong milk tea! I’m in love with the stuff.

13. Admire Hong Kong’s Street Art

There are lots of streets with fantastic street art. I only had time to visit this Man Fung building near Prince Edward, but there are lots of other places to check out cool stuff. Every year an organization called HKWALLS holds a street art festival and decorates different streets around Hong Kong – I want to check out some of their sites next time.

14. Find Monkey Hill

This is definitely not something I expected to do in Hong Kong – but once I heard about the monkeys here I wanted to see some. I went to Kam Shan Country Park to visit the famous Monkey Hill. You can’t feed or play with the monkeys here (like you can do in Bali) but I still love monkeys a lot and was happy to see them hanging out here.

15. Wander Without A Plan

The coolest thing about Hong Kong is that even without an agenda or plan you find some really interesting things. Take some time to wander around and get lost!

I made a short video about my 3 Days in Hong Kong! Check it out here:

I also made a Google Map of all the places I went – I’ve linked it below.

What Else?

There’s lots of items on my Hong Kong Bucket list I didn’t check off yet! I still would like to go to the Instagram-famous Choi Hung Estate, see more street art, visit the Man Mo temple, climb Sunrise Peak and Suicide Cliff….honestly there’s still so much I haven’t seen and done!

Have you been to Hong Kong? What else should you do when visiting?

After hiking to Lion Rock a few weeks ago I knew I wanted to do more hikes on my next trip to Hong Kong.  I decided to check out Dragon’s Back, one of the more famous hiking trails in Hong Kong.

Named the Best Urban Hike in Asia by TIME Magazine, it’s a popular trail that can be hiked by all ages and offers stunning views of Hong Kong’s southern islands and the South China Sea.

HOW TO GET TO DRAGON’S BACK

Dragon’s Back is located on the southeastern side of Hong Kong Island and very easy to get to:

• Take the Island Line MTR to Shau Kei Wan Station.
• Take Exit A3 and get on Bus No. 9 at the Shau Kei Wan Bus Terminus.
• Take the bus To Tai Wan, which should be 11 stops later.

You can start from Chai Wan and hike from the opposite way, but I think the first way offered a better hike up!

HIKING UP DRAGON’S BACK

• Distance: 1.5 hours+ to complete
• Difficulty: 2/5
  
• Views: 5/5

It’s not a long hike up – just a lot of stairs (at least I thought it was a lot of stairs until I hiked to Lantau Peak – more on that later). I started hiking up right after a group of fit and fierce elderly Chinese folk and they had no problems with the hike, so it’s perfect for all ages.

The views the entire way up are fantastic – these kinds of hikes spoil you by giving you great views after such little effort (I’m not complaining though.)

CONQUER THE DRAGON

After 30 minutes here you are! I channeled my inner Khaleesi and gazed out from the Dragon’s Back pretending I was going to conquer Westeros.

HIKING DOWN

I continued the way I was going to the Tai Tam Gap and caught a public minibus back to the metro station from there. If you want to extend the hike, you can go to Big Wave Bay instead and soak up some sunshine on the beach!

I’ve been really impressed with the hikes in Hong Kong – they’re very accessible and easy to get to, and once you’re hiking you actually feel like you’re outside in nature and far from the bustling city life. Just like with Lion Rock I spent more time at the top taking photos and enjoying the views than I actually spent hiking up!

If you’re looking for a shorter hike with great views, Dragon’s Back is perfect.

CHECK OUT THESE OTHER HIKES I’VE DONE

• Hiking Hong Kong Lion Rock
• TV Tower Mountain in Yangshuo
• Climbing Emei Mountain in Chengdu

Hong Kong is an amazing place – with ancient history, modern skyscrapers, night time markets, gorgeous mountains, and an unbeatable skyline, it’s the ultimate travel destination. Guangzhou is just an hour and a half from the Hong Kong border and I decided to challenge myself to make a trip to Hong Kong in just one day.

I’ve been to Hong Kong once before but mostly spent time walking around the streets and shopping and eating Mexican food (all of which were fantastic and you can read about it here.) But there’s another part of Hong Kong I’ve been dying to see – Hong Kong has some of the most amazing hiking trails, so for my one day challenge I wanted to do a hike.

Since my time would be limited, I decided to try one of the shorter and not super difficult trails for my first one: Lion Rock. At 495 meters, it overlooks the harbor and gives you a fantastic view of Hong Kong. I found a great article with details about the hike that made it easy to get to: https://www.gettingstamped.com/lion-rock-hike-hong-kong/

FROM GUANGZHOU TO HONG KONG

• Train from Guangzhou South to Shenzhen Futian Station (1 hour – 80RMB)
• Metro from Futian to Futian Checkpoint (20 minutes, 4RMB)
• Exchange money, pass through customs, cross into Hong Kong (30 minutes)
• Metro from Lok Ma Chau to Wong Tai Sin (43.50 HKD, 1 hour)
• Taxi from Wong Tai Sin to Sha Tin Pass (45 HKD, 10 minutes)
• Start hiking from Sha Tin Pass (there are other routes to hike up)

WHAT TO BRING

1.5 liters of water (at least), good hiking shoes, snacks, and a willingness to sweat. And an umbrella just in case. I just got a tripod (why haven’t I had one before? Great question, Rachel) and wanted to play around with it more so I brought that along, too. There’s a warning at the entrance that you might encounter wild monkeys as well, so be prepared for that possibility – I didn’t see any though and I was a little disappointed.

Wong Tai Sin is a convenient metro stop that exits right next to a mall so I was able to buy water nearby before catching a taxi. I’m glad I took a taxi up to Sha Tin Pass because it saved me so much time. Since I was trying to make it from Guangzhou to HK and back in one day, time was of the essence!

HIKING UP TO LION ROCK

• Duration: 1.5+ hours (1.8 km from entrance to peak)
• Difficulty: 3/5
• Views: 5/5

Lion Rock is a great hike because it’s not terribly difficult and the payoff is great. You work up enough of a sweat and climb enough stairs that you feel like you earned the view at the top, but it’s not psychically exhausting. The first steps get your heart going and the last .5 km to the top will have you pouring sweat, but the in-between is actually really nice, with some flat strolls and slower elevation climbs. I spent more time taking photos and sitting at the top than I did climbing up and down!

I kept a moderate pace the entire time and it took me 40 minutes to get from the entrance to the top. I saw so many elderly people hiking up (older Chinese people are so fit!) and I heard kids go up here often so it’s pretty do-able for most ages.

LION ROCK PEAK

There’s the actual Lion Rock at the top, as well as two other peaks you can climb up. The view is incredible! Here’s some of my favorite pics from the top.

LION ROCK HIKE VIDEO

I made a short little video about my day hiking here! Check it out.

RETURN TO GUANGZHOU

I wanted to be back in Chinese mainland before it was too late so I started hiking down around mid-afternoon and then began my journey back to Guangzhou. I left my apartment at 6:45 a.m. and finally returned at 8:45 p.m., exhausted, a little sunburned, but really happy about the hike and my little trip to Hong Kong.

It’s always fun to take a trip out of the country and not have to use a VPN One day is definitely not enough time in Hong Kong, however, so next time I go I’ll definitely plan on spending more than a day. I’m excited to do more hikes and photo excursions – if anyone has any recommendations on places to hike or things to see let me know!

Until next time Hong Kong!

My friends Andy and Raymond wanted to travel to Hong Kong for the Qing Ming festival holiday and asked if Lauren and I wanted to join them. I’ve never stepped outside the Hong Kong airport before and was excited for the chance to finally see it!

To get to Hong Kong we took a 7 hour slow train to Shenzhen, a big city right next to Hong Kong. We stayed the night in Shenzhen then walked into Hong Kong the next day from the Lo Wu Port next to the train station.

About Hong Kong:

• 1 USD = 7.77 HKD
• They drive on the left side of the road
• They speak English, Cantonese, and many speak Mandarin

We had 3 full days in Hong Kong and it was incredible! We spent time in the Kowloon section and also on Hong Kong Island. Here are a few of my favorite things.

The Peak

This is probably number one on lots of Hong Kong ‘must do’ lists. You pay 40 HKD for a cable car to the top of Victoria Peak (or you can hike it) and get an amazing view of the city and islands. There’s a giant mall on top with tons of shops and restaurants and it’s a nice place to hang out for awhile.

Temple Street Night Market

There are lots of night markets and shopping streets to see in Hong Kong, and I heard this was a great one to look at. It was just like many other night markets in Chinese mainland – lots of vendors and food shops hoping to sell you something. It was also a great place for people watching.

Shopping in Causeway Bay

There are tons of malls in Hong Kong and Causeway Bay is the place to go if you want to see a lot of them. There are so many designer brands and Western stores here – Fossil, Chanel, Nike, Gap, H&M, Adidas, etc.  There’s even a mini Times Square here and some awesome Western restaurants.

The Harbor and Ferry

The Hong Kong skyline is incredible, and there are so many great places (besides the Peak) to view it from. You can go to the Harbor to several viewing platforms, and you can also take a ferry to get from Kowloon to Hong Kong Island and back again. It’s beautiful day or night.

Walking

If all else fails, just walk around and you’re bound to find something interesting. Hong Kong streets are so diverse, huge skyscrapers and shopping malls next to little mom and pop restaurants and Chinese snacks. I’m obsessed with the neon lights and red and white taxis.

Some Other Things

Hong Kong is awesome because English is everywhere! We didn’t need translators to speak to people or read menus, so that was a nice little break from Chinese mainland. There are Seven Elevens and Starbucks everywhere, and grocery stores with Western food (CHEESE AND AMERICAN SNACKS AND BAGELS)

Hong Kong was a little expensive, especially to buy those foreign imported things or drink Starbucks or eat at a Western restaurant. We spent a lot of money at a Mexican restaurant but it was so worth it because we can’t find that in Hengyang.

We also ate Chinese food (of course). For a traditional Chinese breakfast you might have noodles and dumplings and these delicious meat filled steam buns

Hong Kong Costs

• Water: $7 – 12
• Coffee: $20 – 40
• Dinner: Anywhere from $30 – 80, more for a nice restaurant
• Tram to the Peak $40, plus $50 to see the top observation deck
• Average Metro Ticket: $4-8 one way
• Shirt at H&M: $100-300

Traveling is a great way to learn about the world and also about yourself and your traveling friends. Everyone has their own traveling style – some people like a strict schedule packed full so you don’t miss anything, and some prefer a relaxed day wandering until you find something.

Andy and Raymond were somewhere in the middle, and I appreciate that because I’m the same. Sometimes when I asked Andy if he wanted to go somewhere in particular he would say “I just want to feel the atmosphere you know?”

We had a few different things on our to-do list. Andy and Raymond really wanted to see Hong Kong University and the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and were amazed by the buildings’ architecture, because many  universities in Chinese mainland look so different from the Hong Kong style.

Lauren and I saw one university and thought it looked just like American ones because it was so Western looking. I wanted to see more of the Asian side of Hong Kong – I like street markets and little alleys, but these are the kind of things Andy and Raymond didn’t find as exciting because they see that more often. Hong Kong is said to be the place “where the East meets the West” and I found this to be so true. It was cool to see their perspective on Hong Kong and how different it was than my perspective.

Andy and Raymond are both from the Guangdong province, right next to Hong Kong. They are from the city Shaoguan, where in addition to Mandarin and Cantonese they also speak their hometown dialect. (So with English, they essentially know 4 languages. That’s crazy.)

I’ve been friends with Andy for almost a year and a half and he’s one of my closest Chinese friends – it’s easy to talk to him about deep topics or silly things and he says the funniest things sometimes.

On the way to the train station he advised us, “When it is crowded, the danger is coming!” And later when it was just the four of us walking on an empty street he said, “We are the crowd now- so we are the danger to other people mwahaha.”

If I walked too fast to catch the metro he would say poetically “When you hurry through the day, it is like an unopened gift….thrown away.”

On the train to Hong Kong a girl walked over to our seats and put her suitcase above us and Andy winked and said, “She came over here because of me, you know.”

Andy and Raymond left a day before me and Lauren to visit their hometown. When Lauren and I left Tuesday morning we decided to take the fast train back from the Futian Port instead of the Lo Wu Port. It took 2.5 hours to get to Hengyang from there.

All in all it was a great first trip to Hong Kong and hopefully not the last! There’s so much more I didn’t get a chance to see – 3 days was only enough for a little taste of Hong Kong.

Now it’s back to the teaching grind.

Lots of love,

Rachel