mnisthiti mou: Sunset Peak

Mar 27, 2010

Sunset Peak

We took a bus to Pak Kung Au, the starting point of our hike today. Today's hike was quite strenuous, on a scale of 1-10, it was a 7. As Pak Kung Au is at around 340m elevation, our actual hiked elevation gain is about 529m estimated. Sunset Peak is @ 869m. The weather was simply great, a cooling 22 degree celsius, the sky was not very clear though, it was a little misty or was it pollution??

When we started our hike at Pak Kung Au, there was a group of local middle-aged hikers who were starting at the same time, they were extremely noisy and they blocked the path completely with their photo-taking..I think there were about 15-20 of them. They were talking loudly and non-stop the whole time, some of them were shouting, some screaming and one of them was blowing on a whistle continously which I was not sure for what purpose (pyschotic??), creating such a din. I regretted taking this path, for a moment, I wanted to change our plan and hiked up Lantau Peak in the opposite direction instead, of course we didn't, because we have hiked Lantau Peak before, and this is our first time going up Sunset Peak, I did not want to ruin our plan because of this bunch of @$#!%#^#&*. On the way up, we met several trail-runners running down from Sunset Peak, wow! they were so physically fit! One of the man from the noisy group even imitated dog barks to scare the trail-runners! How childish! or pyschotic? Utterly Unbelievable. They were even blaring cantonese opera music on a cd player during their rest break!!! Absolutely noisy bunch! As D was physically in a better condition then I am, he was ahead of me on the slopes, while I was trying very hard to climb up the steps quickly, I was SOOOO out of breath! I heard myself gasping for breath so loudly, I am sure I can be heard above all the dins they were making! Hahahaha We tried really hard to distance ourselves from this noisy group, At about 500m elevation, we managed to shake them off and were able to enjoy the peace and tranquility of the mountain, thank God! I dared not even rest any longer than needed, because I did not want them to catch up with us. Honestly, I didn't mean to complain so much, but they were way too much to bear! One good thing that came out of this was, it became a motivator for me! I wouldn't have climbed so fast and pushed myself to my limits if it weren't for them!! That I am thankful for, though I wouldn't want to encounter such a group again in a million year!

Wow! upon reaching the peak, we saw many stone cabins, I think I read somewhere on the internet that it was used by the british as holiday homes last time...well, I'll have to find out more.. from there, we took the path that led to Wong Lung Hang Country Trail...gosh! this trail is an absolute 'knee-breaker'! We have to descend 2.3km length of uneven huge stone steps with elevation loss of close to 700m!! This trail is absolutely 'amazing'! So treacherous and difficult! It is rated as one of the most difficult trail in Hongkong! I am not kidding! D & I had to shuffle and descend like a crab (side-way) on the steep and endless treacherous stone steps in order not to stress our knees out. It was an hour and a half of non-stop descend. Mine mine....if we didn't descend using this crab-like side-way shuffle, I am sure our knees will be completely busted! I've read somewhere on the internet that there are close to 2000 over steps or so, (I wondered if it's true). In any case, it was truly an eye-opener for me today! hahahaha almost towards the end of the descend, D & I were cursing away! hahahaha...we were so absolutely fed-up having to shuffle crab-like for the past hour and a half! Don't let the name 'country trail' nor the short length of the trail deceived you into thinking that this is any easy trail, on the contrary, it is one of the most difficult trail in Hongkong! Thank God our knees are intact!

We descended onto Wong Lung Hang Road and exited from there to Tung Chung Road, passing by Chek Lap Kok New Village. We ended up having our lunch at Yat Tung Estate..... Total time we took for this trip from Pak Kung Au - Sunset Peak - end of Wong Lung Hang Country trail was 3 hours 45 mins.