Hiking - Big Hat Mountain

My secret plan for Chinese New Year holiday was to hike section 8 of the MacLehose trail over Tai Mo Shan or "Big Hat Mountain", the tallest mountain in Hong Kong (957m).

I had thought it too ambitions to carry Hannah.  But the Grassy Hill hike had proved that we could do a 400m climb and 4.5hrs walking, and also hike to the start of section 8 at Lead Mine Pass in under 1.5hrs.

So we set off as before, with a taxi to Wong Chuck Yueng village.   By 9:33am we had joined the  MacLehose Trail on the ridge, with Hannah riding in the Deuter and giving instructions.

Instead of climbing Grassy Hill we took the forest road around the side of the hill to Lead Mine Pass.    This is Tai Mo Shan from the road.

We reached Lead Mine Pass at 10:30 and had a brief snack break.

Start of Section 8 at Lead Mine Pass.   Steps straight up the ridge for 200m.  I carried Hannah most of the way but she happily scrambled the last section.

11:15am   Distance post M140 (about 650m).  Looking back east towards Grassy Hill, which wed climbed 2 days ago.  Lead Mine Pass is back down the hill behind Hannah.

Looking south-east.  Hong Kong island in the distance.

The on up the ridge to Sze Fong Shan (785m) which we reached around 12:00.

Video:   Panorama from Sze Fong Shan, looking north-east to Tai Po town the east and south.

I carried Hannah most of the way up but she happily walked the short steep descent from Sze Fong Shan

Video:  Hannah hiking

From there we were on a steep concrete roadway leading up the side of Tai Mo Shan itsself.  This was hard work in the sun but by taking baby steps we made slow but steady progress.

The views were terrific, although the visibility wasn't quite far enough to see China or the outlying islands.  

The photo below is from near the summit, looking north across Shek Kong and Kam Tin.  You can see the old RAF airfield at Shek Kong, and an abandoned military installation in the immediate foreground.



Video:  From near summit, panning NW to NE.

1:00pm:   Summit of Tai Mo Shan, 957m.

I was wondering why the Brits had so many military buildings on the top of this mountain.  Granny provided the answer a few days later courtesy of her Bletchley Park skills: 

"(In the late 1950’s) In both Hong Kong and Cyprus, the British were experimenting with intelligence-gathering radar.  At Hong Kong the main site was located three thousand feet up the precipitous cliffs of Tai Mo Shan in the New Territories.  Operated jointly by the RAF’s 117 Signals Unit and the Australians, it peered out into Chinese airspace, and its main purpose was ‘to provide intelligence information for the UK, USA and Australia.’  Western aircraft regularly intruded over the border to generate an elint response from Chinese defences.  The site was constructed with great difficulty in 1957 and was operated continuously into the 1980s.  By a heroic effort, cranes and lorries had moved materials up to the summit by means of what was little more than a jeep track..  During construction a ten-ton crane had been lost over the edge, but fortunately the RAF driver leapt clear before the vehicle disappeared over the cliff.  Later, the RAF Regiment, known as the ‘Rock Apes’, who guarded the base, lost two Land Rovers over the cliff.  This prompted a local humorist to erect a sign at the base of the uphill trail that warned: ‘Beware of Falling Rocks’. "“GCHQ : the uncensored story of Britain’s most secret intelligence agency” by Richard J. Aldrich published in 2010.    

Video:  Hannah at the summit of Tai Mo Shan, and view down to SW and S over Tsuen Wan.

We had a very nice lunch on the summit - bananas have seldom tasted better - and enjoyed the view.   Hannah got to drain the batteries of my iPhone playing 'HayDay'.

We then started on the 6km exit down the winding road to Route Twisk.  This was very pleasant with terrific views, and Hannah walked about 1/3 of it.   We arrived at 2:40pm got a bus down to Tsuen Wan and a taxi home by 3:30.

In total 5 hrs 40 min hiking, about 14km (9.7km for Section 8, perhaps another 4.5km for the approach), and vertical climb/descent perhaps 700m.   Not bad for an old man with a 25kg load.

More importantly Hannah and I had a good time together and lots of opportunity to chat and have fun.  Hannah is quite chatty wen she is riding along in the Deuter.   And Rika got some time off.

Tai Mo Shan from ICC on a cold Feb day

Big Hat Mountain

Chinese New Year

We enjoyed Chinese New Year.   And I was particularly glad to have 2 days public holiday, especially as the weather was unseasonably warm.

This year is the year of the horse, so there are lots of horse decorations everywhere (of wildly varying levels of tastefulness).

Horse decorations at Plaza Ascot.

And at Elephants Mall at ICC.

 The big horse head is made out of hundreds of small horse figures. 

Illuminations at Royal Ascot

Oranges at Honorary Family restaurant.    Apparently the words for tangerine and orange sound like luck and wealth, respectively, and the gold color is auspicious.   Of course, Mandarins have now become the official festive orange for the whole of China, but you still see other types of citrus.
 

Decorations at the clubhouse.

On the first day of CNY we saw lots of small kids dressed in traditional clothes.  They look very cute.

Lion Dancers at the office

Video:  Lion dancers.

For good luck my colleagues give the lions red packets containing money.  Which the lions spent on luxury watches down in Elephants mall.

Video:  Lion dancers shopping at Jaeger Le Coultre

Hannah at a Lion Dance performance near Funzone in Ma On Shan

Hiking - Grassy Hill

The weather during Chinese New Year was excellent, so we went hiking again.   Hannah readily agreed to another trip on the same terms as before.  

The plan was to complete section 7 of the MacLehose Trail, resuming from where we exited last time, climb Grassy Hill (647m),  and walk out via Lead Mine Pass to Tai Po Road just behind Hannah's school.

To make it a bit easier, we took a taxi  to Wong Chuck Yuen village (about 200m up).  We arrived at 9:30am, just as the residents were letting off new-year fire-crackers, which rather surprised me.  In the interests of public safety Hong Kong has banned the use of real fire-crackers, along with the use of real lions in lion dances.

Photo above:  Fom our apartment looking south towards the Grassy Hill ridge in the far distance (summit is out of sight to the right).  Wong Chuck Yuen village is the white dots up the left-hand-side valley, about the same height as the top of the tower blocks.  The MacLehose runs along the far ridge and we join it via a trail up the ridge to the left of the village.

New Year fire-crackers at Wong Chuck Yueng

Video:  fire-crackers

Steps up from Wong Chuck Yuen to the main ridge and MacLehose Trail.  This was a bit tough with Hannah on my back, but we were on the ridge by 10:00am.

The approach to Grassy Hill was a pleasant walk up a forestry road, mainly in the shade, with nice views over the valley.

Looking east to Fo Tan and Royal Ascot from the approach to Grassy Hill.  a hill fire occurred around her a few days later (see below)

Looking south to the Sing Mun reservoir and Needle Hill

We reached the summit of Grassy Hill at around 11:am, and had a very pleasant lunch for 30min enjoying the view.

Looking north to Tai Po from summit of Grassy Hill (647m)

Selfie on Grassy Hill

Fo Tan from Grassy Hill

Video:   Grassy Hill view 1.  Panning from Tai Po town in the north, west to Tai Mo Shan then south.

Video:  Grassy Hill view 2:   panning north, east and south

After lunch we descended the steep path to Lead Mine Pass (around 400m).   Hannah cheerfully walked down the steps with me hand-in-hand for safety.  We arrived at the pass about 12:15m, and followed the exit route out to the north along the forest road through the Tai Po Kau nature reserve for about 6km.

Hannah was a bit bored by the forest trail and didn't want to do her share of walking down the hill.   We had a small argument during which I promised to put this photo on the blog, but our mood improved again when we met a monkey eating berries by the side of the road.

Hannah's school is nearby and she told me that the children are forbidden from eating outside in case this attracts monkeys who might mug the kids for their lunches!

We reached at the Tai Po Road around 2pm, and got a bus back home.   In total about 4.5hrs.  

Postscript:   Hill Fires

From the top of Grassy Hill we could see a hill fire burning in the hills on the other side of Tai Po.  I pointed it out to Hannah and we talked about fires.

It turned out there had been a hill fire had been burning for 2 days which took 130 firefighters to put out (scmp link).

Then on Tuesday night around 12:30am looking out from our apartment, saw a hill fire burning near Grassy Hill.   To me it looked like the flames were about 20ft high and burning on a front of about 100m.

Hill Fire on Grassy Hill , 3-Feb.

I called 999 just in case none had already reported it (they had).

The next morning the hill was covered in fog.  I couldn't find any report of this fire on the web.

Hiking - Needle Hill

Winter in Hong Kong is a wonderful season with beautiful mild weather which is perfect for hiking.
In contrast Spring tends to be changeable and wet, and Summer is overly hot and humid.  

Last year I took it the weather for granted, naively assuming spring would also be nice like Japan, only to be be rained out almost every weekend (last aprils post).  So this year I am detrained to make the most of the season and do as much hiking as I can.

Previously I had not been very successful convincing Hannah or Rika to join me.   Frankly Hannah doesn't like to walk much.  But she does like to be carried and she really wanted to ride in the Deuter again, like she did as a baby.  

So I changed approach this year, leaving Rika at home, and negotiating with Hannah:   I will carry her in the Deuter on the flat and uphill, except for the really steep places, and she will walk downhill.

Hannah being carried in the Deuter

My plan was to take Hannah along the first half of section 7 of the MacLehose trail on Sunday morning while Rika slept in.   We'd get a taxi to the start at the Shing Mun reservoir (M125), climb over Needle Hill, and along the ridge to M131, then take the feeder path to the right down to Wong Chuk Yeung village, and then down to road to FoTan and home.  About 6km which I expected to take 4hrs.

Source:  Digital maps for HK hikes (link)

It pretty much went to plan, although I was horrified how heavy the Deuter was once it was loaded with Hannah (21kg), lunch, safety clothes and plenty of water (3kg- far too much).   In all, not much under 30kg and hard work to carry even on the flat.  After Christmas my own weight is back up to 99kg, so I had visions of my knees popping out under the strain!

We got Shing Mun at 9:30.  After a flat walk around the dam, the first hour was a rather brutal climb from the reservoir (200m) up a series of concrete steps to the base of Needle Hill at about 430m.   It was tough but fortunately my knees held up nicely.

10:30am  Looking west from around M127 towards Tsuen Wan

Hannah sitting in the Deuter at our first break.  Looking south you can just see the rectangle of the ICC poking up, and Honk Kong Island in the distance.

Looking south from M128 (about 430m).   The ridge in the right foreground is Smugglers Ridge which we walked with Rika in October (section 6 of the MacLehose trail).  Behind that on the left is Beacon Hill (section 5) which I walked with Mat on Wednesday, and in the far distance Hong Kong Island.

From here the route was a steep climb up to the top of Needle Hill.  It was too difficult and dangerous  for me to carry Hannah so she had to walk.  Fortunately she did this with enthusiasm.

11:30   Hannah on the summit of Needle Hill (532m), looking south.  

Looking west over the Shing Mun Reservoir and Tsuen Wan.   

Looking north from Needle Hill towards Grassy Hill with Lead Mine Pass on the left.   We had a nice early lunch on the summit.

Hannah cheerfully walked down the steep descent from Needle Hill and along the flat part of the ridge before exercising her right to be carried in the Deuter for the ascent from M130 to M131.

Looking south-east across Tai Wai towards Lion Rock.  We could really see the lion shape.

Lion rock - can you see the Lion's head, shoulders and back?

12:30pm  On the side-trail down from the MacLehose trail (main ridge) towards Fo Tan.   Looking west with Wong Chuk Yeung village in the bottom left, and Royal Ascot in middle right.  Ma On Shan mountain in the distance.

It was downhill all the way from here, although Hannah was getting tired and wanted me to keep carrying her (and let gher play with my IPhone).  But I really needed her to walk down to save my knees.  So we compromised again and she walked most of the steep descents encouraged by promises of ice creams and iPhone time at home.  We arrived in FoTan around 13:30.

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