Whatever these islands are called, they are a great way to experience traditional Hong Kong. Kowloon and Hong Kong Island have tradition all over the place, but they are also filled to the rafters with 21st century technology and convenience. Some of these outer islands can take you back in time. Only with a modern phone, it is hard to get lost. Even on a rocky island close to nothing, my phone knew where I was. I don't think I like that.
Hisoka wanted to surprise me, but at the same time, he did not expect me to just blindly follow him into the wilderness. He told me that we were going to see a few islands, but I assumed that meant Lantau. I have been to Lantau a million times. I worked on the island for six years. Instead, we went to the southern end of Hong Kong Island.
Ordinarily, when someone I do not know especially well says, “Close your eyes and follow me. And maybe bring an overnight bag,” all kinds of red flags pop up. But Hisoka has a history of top quality surprises. He never told me to bring my passport, so I assumed we would stay in China, but other than that, anything was possible.
At Aberdeen, we boarded a small boat that the company called a yacht. I'm not entirely sure what technically defines a yacht, but when you say the word, I think of giant boats with helicopter pads owned by billionaires. I doubt any billionaire would be impressed with our little “yacht”. This boat was maybe 20 or 30 feet long from top to tail. Or bow to stern, in this case. It would struggle to hold more than a dozen of the billionaire's closest friends, and most helicopters would sink it.
The biggest surprise to me was that they gave Hisoka the keys and let him sail away without any supervision. You can hire pretty much any form of transportation in Hong Kong, but anything bigger than a car usually comes with someone to operate the vehicle. This was a small boat, but it was not propelled by oars or paddles. I have absolutely no idea what kind of license is required to drive a two story motorboat around Hong Kong, but he must have had something. At least I hope he did. Had he relied on me, we would still be out there.
I am not exactly an experienced sailor. I have been on all kinds of boats in my day, from kayaks that hold one person to enormous cruise ships with 2,000 passengers. I have been on smooth boats with large sails and choppy boats with loud engines. I have sailed lakes small enough to swim across and oceans that stretch across the globe. But what I know about sailing can fit on a brochure. The only boats I can operate without assistance are small enough to be lifted out of the water by hand. This boat was a little bigger than that.
The top deck had all of the controls behind a bow that could only be reached by walking outside and holding onto a railing. But people were meant to go out there. It had cushions for several people to sit and take their Facebook pictures. Behind the steering wheel, there was a tiny kitchen with an oven, stove, sink, refrigerator and more counter space than the average Hong Kong apartment. Next to and/or in the kitchen was a small dining room sofa that could hold three or four people. The aft deck had a much larger sofa and a small ledge close enough to the water to sit and soak legs. I'm sure that ledge has a nautical name, but I don't know what it is.
The lower deck had two small bedrooms with beds larger than I would have expected. They were probably closer to queen than anything else. The windows in the bedrooms were small, but well placed, letting in plenty of light. The ceiling was also higher than I would expect from the lower deck of a small boat. In between the bedrooms was a tiny bathroom. It was designed to look like you were in the lap of luxury, but it was no bigger than an airline bathroom. All of the storage space, from the kitchen to the bedrooms, was hidden away in places the Japanese would understand. They are the masters of maximizing storage in confined spaces.
The company that owned the boat stocked the kitchen with plenty of food. That was convenient since parking is difficult. There is more than enough water around Hong Kong for everybody, but if you want to stop your boat and get off, your options are limited.
Hisoka's plan was to sail around the islands. There are more than a few choices. Most of them are much smaller than Lantau and completely uninhabited. A few are popular tourist destinations for their traditional fishing villages and clean beaches. I have seen plenty of fishing villages here, so I wanted to go where few people who look like me have ever been. Fortunately, Hisoka had a list of islands where it was physically possible to park the boat. November might not be the best time to sail around Hong Kong, but it never gets cold. At its worst, winter hits in January/February. More importantly, it never rains nearly as much in winter as it does in summer. You might think summer is a better time to sail around the islands, but summer can get 20 times as much rain as winter, and there are no typhoons in November.
From Aberdeen on Hong Kong island, you have two choices. You can go east or west. South is Lamma Island, which is too developed and full of tourists. Beyond that and you leave Hong Kong waters. I have a visa for Mainland China, but Hisoka did not. Crossing the border by boat and getting caught in some international espionage was not on the agenda.
West is Lantau and all of the islands around it. I would not mind sailing to Shenzhen Bay, but this was supposed to be an island trip and there are no islands in the bay. East was the logical choice. There is far more water and more than a hundred islands between Po Toi and Mirs Bay.
Past Ocean Park, we headed toward Ngan Chau, a tiny uninhabited island with nothing more than a rocky beach and a lot of trees. Hisoka wanted to stay close to the coast to avoid shipping and ferry traffic between Hong Kong Island and Lamma. We sailed around Hong Kong Island between Luo Chau and the cape at Hok Tsui. We could not see the famous lighthouse until we were close to the east coast. From there, we headed straight to Tung Lung Chau.
Our first port of the day was Tung Lung Chau, a medium-size rock, maybe a mile long, just off the coast of Hong Kong Island. It was an easy walk to the fort, but we both wanted to see the stone carvings first, which was a hilly hike on a more or less paved path. The few people who live on the island use the paths for transportation. On the northwest coast of the island, someone carved a large dragon into the massive rocks that spread across the shore. This dragon's claim to fame is that it is the oldest stone carving in Hong Kong, estimated at about 5,000 years old.
What I liked about it, which did not especially impress Hisoka, was that cave paintings in Europe are often large mammals being hunted by people or other depictions of their daily life. In Europe, they are mostly saying, “Look at us.” In Asia, it is dragons and other mythical creatures. Their stories are more symbolic than autobiographical. It might be a stretch, but I think this is one of the reasons Asian cultures tend to see their religious stories as parable and allegory while Europeans see their stories as literal fact.
Tung Lung Fort was at the end of an easy hike along the northeast coast. It was built in the early 1700s and is mostly rubble now, with a protective walkway for visitors to look without damaging anything, almost like the Qumran Caves near the Dead Sea. I was expecting an actual building, but the fort was abandoned 200 years ago on a rocky shore where nature takes back whatever man does not want.
We sailed to the Kwo Chau Islands, a group of 20-something uninhabited islands just east of Tung Lung Chau. Some of the islands are little more than rocks sticking out of the water. The largest island is half a mile long and 300 yards at its widest point. People go to the islands to climb rocks and explore the sea caves, assuming they can find a way in. There is no transportation to the islands, unless you have your own boat. That might be why it was completely deserted when we went. Despite a population of zero, there is a tiny temple atop the largest hill on Tai Chau, the southernmost island.
When we sailed up Ngau Mei Hoi, I looked for the house at Clear Water Bay. Every year, my roommates and I stay at a house at Clear Water Bay for anywhere from two weeks to a month. I missed last year because I was recovering from surgery and this year because I was in Spain. But I have been at the house often enough to recognize the amazing views of the harbour and South China Sea. Sailing around the islands gave me a new perspective. It is like looking at a picture for years and then finally walking around that scenery.
Kiu Tsui Chau is about a mile and a half long and anything from half a mile to a few hundred feet wide. Most people go there for the beaches and rocks. There are two main beaches and a few tiny beachlets, all of which have some of the softest sand on the islands. Most of the beaches around Hong Kong are rocky and not especially great for building sand castles. For geologists, the rocks might be more exciting. Kiu Tsui Chau has unusual volcanic rocks that you cannot find anywhere else in Hong Kong. For me, the best part was the small isthmus that connects the island with a tiny islet that you can walk across at low tide. It was like walking on water to get to Mont-Saint-Michel, Tanah Lot or the Itsukushima torii, only instead of going to a temple, you are going to a bunch of rocks and trees.
Just northeast of Kiu Tsui Chau is Yim Tin Tsai, a small island less than half a mile across in any direction. Though uninhabited, it has a visitor center, public restrooms and a restaurant. People visit the island for a little taste of history. Once a series of farms, the island was abandoned and most of the population left many of their possessions behind. You can go into mostly furnished houses and see how people lived in the early and middle 20th century, only with far more dust and weeds. There is also a 100-year-old Catholic church that is regularly maintained and still occasionally used. Boat parking is difficult since the island is almost entirely surrounded by mangroves, but there is a small pier next to the church.
Coincidentally, Yim Tin Tsai had a thriving salt industry before modern machinery changed the way salt is produced. Once the old ways died out, the salt farms were abandoned and the people left the island. I went to Aveiro, Portugal in October, which was put on the map by its salt farms. Aveiro survived the changing times because it is the largest coastal city between Lisbon and Porto, and it focused on tourism. Yim Tin Tsai is a small island far from Victoria Harbour and not at all connected to any train lines.
Not only did people leave their furniture, but enough of them left their dogs behind. Now there is a thriving stray dog community on the island. The original dogs were once pets and were probably mostly friendly, but the current generation are wild animals. I don't know if they ever attack visitors, but I was always aware whenever there was a stray dog nearby. Pet dogs can be the friendlies creatures in the world, but these are not pets. They are territorial predators and the island is their territory. I have to assume they have never killed anyone. China hates bad press and would gladly wipe out the entire island's population to keep the tourism money flowing.
Just south of Yim Tin Tsai is Kau Sai Chau, easily the largest island we visited, three miles long and about one mile wide. Though relatively removed from civilization, it has a large golf course that takes up the northern end of the island. We did not go there to golf, so we concentrated on the southern end, with a small fishing village where most of the population lives, and a 150-year-old temple. It looks old, but 150 years is pretty young by Chinese temple standards. There are more prehistoric rock carvings on the northwest coast, but they are not as interesting as Tung Lung Chau and, since they are so close to the golf course, more tourists line up to take pictures.
As a larger island, Kau Sai Chau has more room for packs of stray dogs, but to protect the golf course and its income, the government regularly removes as many as they can catch. They don't seem to be doing a good job since scientists think the stray dogs are killing off the civet population. The island also has boars that like to tear up the golf course, but attempts to stop them have all failed dramatically. The boars ignore traps and tear through electric fences. A few years ago, the golf course wanted to quietly hunt the boars, but the hunters only killed a few and outraged pretty much everybody when they posted their trophy pictures online. Unlike Americans, Chinese people consider it uncivilized to pose like a manly man over a dead carcass while holding a gun and wearing a goofy looking costume.
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