Hong Kong - Sha Tin Travel Guides | Hong Kong | Sub Regions | Hong Kong - Sha Tin

Once a tiny settlement on the KCR line, Sha Tin has mushroomed into one of Hong Kong's largest 'new towns', a landscaped township with four railway stations and home to more than half a million people. Predominantly made up of huge housing blocks, it is best known for its Museum of Heritage, racecourse and Ten Thousand Buddhas Monastery. New Town Plaza is a large shopping mall, also containing a musical fountain. Sha Tin Town Hall hosts arts events and along the Shing Mun River is attractive Sha Tin Central Park.

Sights

1 Man Lam Rd, Sha Tin, T 2180 8188. 1000-1800 Mon and Wed-Sat 1000-1900 Sun and some public holidays; closed Tue. $10, $5 children. Free Wed.

Along with the History Museum, this is one of the best exhibitions in Hong Kong. Its life-size models and recreated scenes in different galleries depicting the culture and heritage of the territory, is wonderful for both children and adults. Most people flock first to the Cantonese Opera Heritage Hall, which uses a reconstructed shed supplemented with multimedia and interactive gadgets and life-size models, complete with ornate costumes. If you secretly fancied yourself as an opera star, the virtual make-up interactive zone allows you to electronically apply make-up onto an image of your face on screen.

New Territories Heritage Hall, has life-size reproductions of boats, part of a Chinese merchant ship, village houses and shops. The T T Tsui Gallery of Chinese Art has miniature models of classic Chinese furniture in Ming style made from rosewood. It also has models of how wooden furniture is built without nails – an interesting lesson before visiting Chi Lin Nunnery. On your way to the museum, follow signs from Sha Tin station for Pai Tau Village, one of the only remaining Qing dynasty villages, today just a small street of old houses with large balconies and gardens. The houses are still inhabited and prove to be a far more desirable alternative to the cramped apartment block. At the end of the street is a Wong’s Kitchen and Café

Sha Tin. KCR: Racecourse (race days only), T 2695 6223. Hong Kong Jockey Club T 1817. Racing season Sep-Jun. Penfold Park (closed Mon and racedays) KCR: Fo Tan.

Although not possessing the dramatic visual impact of a night race meeting at Happy Valley, the weekend afternoon race meetings at Sha Tin make for good entertainment. Completed in 1978 and built on reclaimed land with the proceeds from night racing at Happy Valley, it is an ultra-modern racetrack which has also landscaped the infield to create Penfold Park, one of Hong Kong’s largest, which contains a bird sanctuary. The biggest (and richest) races of the year are the Hong Kong Cup, Hong Kong Mile, Hong Kong Vase and Hong Kong Sprint. Entrance costs $10 to the public stand, and tourists staying in Hong Kong for less than 21 days may buy a guest badge for the Member’s Stand (bring passport), which are also for sale at the off-course betting branches. On your way to the racecourse, increase your chances of backing a winner by visiting the ancient Che Kung Temple in nearby Tai Wai, where local race-goers flock to offer prayers and seek divine fortune.

KCR: Sha Tin. Daily 0900-1700.

The stiff climb up more than 400 steps to the monastery (Man Fat Tsz in Cantonese) is well worth it, with a forecourt and nine-storey red-and-gold pagoda filled with miniature Buddhas and shrine images, at the top of which are some wonderful views including Amah Rock. Built in the 1950s, there are around 13,000 golden statues of the Lord Buddha lining the walls of the main prayer hall, each one slightly different from the last. In Chinese, the number 10,000 is used to signify a countless number, thereby indicating many more Buddhas than the actual number in the monastery. There are also statues of animals, gaudy statues of Buddhist gods, fortune tellers who often work in the main hall, and the encased mummified corpse of the temple’s founding abbot.

Lower down the hill is the Po Fook Ancestral Hall, built in the 1990s, containing pavilions, a red-trimmed pagoda and landscaped terraces, and dozens of small shrines – the resting place for the ashes and ancestral tablets of thousands of dead souls.

Travel Guides | Hong Kong | Sub Regions | Hong Kong - Sha Tin
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