Out of the ordinary constructions within Hong Kong landscape. Good for initiation hike or to add to longer routes.

  • Beauty/fun: 4.5/10. Combination of historic buildings, strange structures, some easy coasteering and bush walking
  • Difficulty (check this link if new here, this is not your standard HK hiking web): 3.5/10 The hiking paths are a bit overgrown (cover yourself accordingly) but with ribbons and quite clear. The coasteering is very simple till the Obelisk. If you want to continue dry to Turtle Cove Beach you will need to do it with low tide and no waves or/and be good scrambling. Difficulty increased to 4.5 if doing this too.
  • Map

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Different starting points possible. Chai Wan MTR station exit E. Walk within the buildings and bridges till you arrive at Wan Tsui road. Find your way up

towards the cemetery

on top of the city. You could take a bus up till here otherwise. Those going to Shek O for example.

Find the entry towards the pipe here, going down the stairs behind the fence.

You will find some ropes helping you down. Check how safe they are. No need to use them anyhow. Once on the pipe

just continue on or next to it. Sometimes it goes 2, 3 meters high above the ground, sometimes disappears under. Side paths possible to do it as easy or difficult as you want.

Once you arrive at the connection with the Hong Kong trail, turn left. Walk on the concrete for not even 50 meters and cross the fence into the little creek on the left here.

Two options. a) Go up the creek and you will see a water channeling on its right. You can climb it, or on its left side find easier entry to a path within the woods with ribbons guiding you up. b) The creek (wrongly marked in openstreetmaps as a dry path, red line on my map) itself will take you up to the road too. In the middle there are some trees down after the Sep18 typhoon, which are not difficult to pass on their left side. But the connection with the stairs is a bit tricky. Dense vegetation and quite steep for some 20m. Bring pruning scissors or enough cover to pass it. Road for some meters and the entrance to the path going down Obelisk Hill on the right here.

In any case, after some time you should be able to see the Obelisk. Now after quite some people visiting it there is even a tiny path to a place to take the picture from,

before you continue on the previous path among the bushes downhill and you arrive at the connection with the Hong Kong trail again. Exactly here.

Time to walk on concrete again for a while. On the map I have marked the way down I prefer to take so that you do not need to go up to the Tai Tam road and down the dam again. Stairs and dirt path for a while with vegetation closing around till you arrive at the bottom of the dam. Continue on concrete till the Water Pumping Station and get out to the pier next to it.

You will need to walk next to the fence and trees East direction. You will find some (precarious) constructions built by fishermen, I guess, that will allow you to walk completely dry even in highest tides. You will pass some little beaches and “creeks”. Beware, some of them are just sewage from the condos above… Getting close to the Obelisk.

If you want to continue coasteering, as mentioned, it gets a bit more difficult.

You will end up in Turtle Cove Beach from where to take stairs up to the bus stop. If you want to end up your outing easier though, just go back to the Pumping station and up to the bus stop next to the Tai Tam Country Park South Entrance.

Here some pics of a day that we did the coasteering + heading out through the stream of the Secret Valley of the Twins.

Everything should know before coasteering