Travel Guides | Hong Kong Travel Guide
Hong Kong Travel Guide
Spiritual and traditional
Despite the obvious love of shopping and eating, the perpetually crowded streets, glitzy neon lights and hard-core work ethic, it can all be put into context when you consider that the most expensive houses and powerful banks could not be planned without close consultation with the feng shui master. Look at the elegant sharp angles of the Bank of China building, or the high-tech iconic HSBC in Central, then realize that their exact location was plotted with due consideration to keeping the spirits and dragons happy. Somehow this spiritual side of Hong Kong neutralizes some of its commercial excesses and is a great leveller. Even stepping inside any temple a few feet away from a traffic jam reveals the respect that many Chinese people always have for their religious and cultural traditions, whether burning paper money for loved ones to enjoy “on the other side” or eating mooncakes to celebrate mid-Autumn festival.
Rural escapes
But away from the noisy bars, crowds clogging Causeway Bay, obsession with share prices and those dragging shopping trolleys in Mongkok markets, few people would associate Hong Kong with deserted beaches, wild walks over the hills, bird sanctuaries and dolphin watching. Most visitors only experience, and usually love, the excesses of noise, lights and action of urban life and understand the “city that never sleeps” cliché. But more than two-thirds of the territory – made up of Hong Kong Island, Kowloon, New Territories and outlying islands – consists of country parks. Hop over the water to Lantau to see the huge bronze Buddha, the last surviving fishing village with aluminium stilt houses, the challenging Lantau Peak trek or take a boat trip to spot pink dolphins. The traditional walled villages in the New Territories reveal Hong Kong’s history of clan structure, while wandering around Sai Kung’s vast expanse of hills and reservoirs will make you forget that just the previous day you were haggling for clothes in Tsim Sha Tsui.
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