Hong Kong is a great place to hike. Even so, you can easily spend an entire week just hiking in nature. Although you might expect otherwise, more than 60% of Hong Kong is made up of greenery. Enough reason to take your hiking boots and head out to discover this hidden beauty. During our trip, we took five hikes, all in completely different environments and parts of the city. In this article you will find these hikes including the best photos and I will give extra tips for more hikes. In fact, Hong Kong has more than 300 kilometers of hiking trails!
1. Plover Cove: Pat Sin Leng Nature Trail
Earlier, I wrote an extensive article about the beautiful 2.5-hour walk in Plover Cove, far away from the busy center of Hong Kong. Here you will find impressive views, green mountains, blue waters and many islets. Enjoy the tranquility in the middle of nature and discover the other side of Hong Kong. Read back the description of Plover Cove here!
2. The island of Lamma: the Family Trail
The last few days in Hong Kong, we decided to take a walk on Lamma Island. Lamma is located at the very south of Hong Kong and can be reached by ferry from Central in 45 minutes. On weekends the island is quite touristy, but despite that we really enjoyed the nature and beautiful views. The best part was the view from Lamma of Hong Kong’s skyscrapers. The 4-kilometer Family Trail runs right across the island. By ferry we arrived at the village of Yung Shue Wan, from where we walked to the village of Sok Kwu Wan in a few hours. There you can take the ferry back to Hong Kong Central. A wonderful walk where you immediately discover most of the island.
3. The Peak: down via the Morning Trail
Many visitors to The Peak buy a return trip on the little train, only to end up back at the same spot below after the impressive views. Much nicer, more fun and cheaper is to hike back via one of the marked walks. We opted for the 3.5-kilometer Morning Trail, which led us down the mountain via a fine trail. During the walk we enjoyed the beautiful nature combined with tall skyscrapers: what a contrast! The hike takes about 45 minutes to an hour. Despite The Peak being one of the top tourist spots in Hong Kong, the trail was extremely quiet. Delicious!
4. Lantau Island: to the Silvermine Waterfall
Earlier I was alone on Lantau and visited the great Buddha and the village of Tai O, but Lantau has much more to offer than these tourist attractions. Nature and hiking, for example! So with Jimmy, I go to Lantau again and we ride the bus to the south of the island: Mui Wo. Here we find a cute village from where there are several hikes. The hike leads us to the Silvermine Waterfall and back by a different route: a beautiful trip. Even though it is not a very long walk (about 4 kilometers), I think this is one of the nicest trails we hiked. Nature is so incredibly beautiful: we really enjoyed this immensely!
5. Hong Kong Wetland Park: against the Chinese border
The 60-hectare Hong Kong Wetland Park is an ecological park all the way in the north of Hong Kong. The large modern visitors center offers interesting films about birds, a restaurant and cooling in the heat. In the Wetland Park we find wooden footbridges over the water, wooden towers to see and photograph the many birds that live here and views of the border with China. Despite the heat, for which a warning has even been issued this day, it is a delightful walk over water, past colorful flowers and butterflies and past green mountains. Absolutely worth it!
What other hiking trails in Hong Kong are there?
Hong Kong is insanely good for hiking, and there are many more trails than just these five. Consider the Hong Kong (50 km), Maclehose (100 km), Wilson (78 km) and the Lantau (70 km) Trail, which together offer nearly 300 kilometers of hiking trails. There are also several shorter hikes to take, such as the famous Dragon’s Back Trail on Hong Kong Island (8.5 km). These and more hikes, the description and how to get there, can be found in the Lonely Planet Hong Kong.
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