Lion Rock

The weather has been holding up relatively well, so a group of us guys decided to arrange a hike.

One of the most famous locations in all of Hong Kong is "Lion Rock".  It sits overlooking Kowloon and stands with a distinct profile seems to come out of the hillside.  It is a spectacular looking rise that gives you a lovely focal point when looking up along Kowloon.  It's also a famous hiking location which is meant to give incredible views of all of Hong Kong.

We all met at Wong Tai Sin MTR station and even from the exit, we could see our destination in the distance.

We started walking up the hill towards the start of the hike.  The road up towards the park itself was incredibly steep.  The four of us powered up the hill, looking with a touch of surprise at some of the elderly people who were also slowly walking up the hill.  After what seemed like a long time, we walked past a large temple and then onto the walking trail of the park.

Eamon had been up before and he told us that the hike was short, but steep.  Within a short time, had risen up very quickly.  The steps and the walk were indeed very steep, but it did meant that we were quickly looking out towards sweeping views of Kowloon and Hong Kong.

This hike was by no means a long hike, but there were definitely parts of it which were a bit more challenging purely because of how steep it was.  Other friends had told me they had wandered up with their kids, so it's definitely doable from that perspective, but if you want to go up quickly it'll be much harder.

Once we got to the top, we found ourselves looking out over Hong Kong.  The views from this peak are some of the nicest I've seen in Hong Kong.  The peak rises up so sharply, it means you are very "close" to the city itself and so you look down on everything rather than just looking at everything from a distance.

At the top of the peak, you can walk along the ridge, moving from vantage spot to vantage spot.  It gives a more panoramic view of the skyline along with some enjoyable sections of boulders and rocks to scamper over.

We had gone up in the late afternoon, so we were given the lovely views of the setting sun as we stood and looked out across the horizon.  It's always incredible to see Hong Kong from these views, you get to appreciate just how small the residential parts of the city are compared to the vast areas of forests that form part of the HKSAR.

We kept wandering up and down the different rocks, tired but still trying to find a better spot with a better view.

As night fell, we started the slower walk back down the mountain.

We walked slowly in the dark with a few headlamps and torches to guide us.  About half way down, we all stopped as we reached an opening in the trees and saw out towards the golden lights of the Hong Kong.  Matty declared we were stopping as he pulled out his camera equipment to take a photo of the glowing image in front of us.