This tiny piece of coastline didn’t look too promising but it is cute and fun. Even small and with the landfill at the end, it deserves to pay a visit.

See full screen & the Garmin track of coasteering day & extra hiking day.

In the Eagle Beak rock comments we already discussed a bit about this route. Stefan was asking if I thought he could do it all in one go. As per this gohikinghk post there is still a tiny piece of natural coastline, which looks not specially interesting. The landfill long man made coastline after is a no-go. On the Western side there are big sections to be swam with big ships being loaded/unloaded with huge cranes and others. Not fun and not safe.

I have seen various names for the area. It seems that 佛堂洲 Fat Tong Chau and Junk Island are the most common. I will go with the first.

In late December I had time for a short outing and I headed there. Long transportation for most. Closest starting point Tseung Kwan O industrial estate terminus. Just walk a little and find a fence. One or several of the doors should be open. I went in through the first, Westernmost. Video of the full outing (a bit of drone footage included)

Initially there are some semi collapsed concrete structures. May be heading to the Chinese Customs Station long years ago. Under the semi abandoned building the first beach. Not specially pretty. But just a bit later, after passing first dodgy fishermen structures (there are a ton full route that you can avoid in our usual coasteering mode),

a really cute one with views of quite some of the city and surprisingly clean water.

Just after a cliff that you either need to climb into the hard bush (just only a couple of meters), or tricky angled traverse, or get wet, at least, thigh high. I did the first. I went down later, although it seems hikers continue on the bush line. Eventually I did too and I used the aids for the first time.

Almost perpendicular cliff that you need to downclimb. Once you see it from below, doable without the rope, but not easy. 4+3m high (?). Here is where I would recommend using your own rope the first time. That or just get wet. With my 💩y almost destroyed old NB and the drone in the backpack I decided not.

A little later the fishermen have built a mini “via ferrata”. Bolts, ropes, random pieces put together. Doable without but spoting & own rope highly recommended again. Otherwise just get wet for a few metres. After you are in front of the three tiny islets.

In the satellite image you can see them clearly with the corridor.

Here is where I decided to fly the drone. After I tried to traverse a bit on the corridor, but the grip of my shoes was not good enough and, just in case, I decided to put the backpack on my head and wade to safe ground a bit further East. Leave the backpack. Cross to the islets. Check them and exit through the hard bush. The path is mostly clear but dense in some areas. Just the last downhill toward the cemetery was a bit confusing. Drone picture of the area for your reference.

Once you arrive at the tomb area concrete paths. I run back just to add a bit more of training. Completely unnecessary. You could either take a bus in the same place you started or MTR in Lohas Park. Although the train frequency there is not the best.

While checking further information for writing the post I found that in the hill there is a tiny “cave” as per this pic and other similar ones. I had a social event in Clear Water Bay area. Everyone is used to see me arriving anywhere in HK by trail running / hiking. So… I went again 😄 The second Garmin track and the additional tracks.

The cave (green flag) is only easy to find if you know exactly where you are heading to. Check the GPS or most surely you will miss the mini fork. The rest of the (green) path back to the road is very bushy and not specially interesting. Same for the others added (purple). They don’t offer any fun. Just to be used in case of emergency. The Northern purple path coming up from the Customs Station is way more open than the one on the South coming up to the cemetery.

I also tried to find a better connection to the concrete from the coasteering, higher up in the cemetery. I could see in the satellite images those tombs in the drone image above, just 30m from the bushy path. I went up the brown path. But it seems that no one has tried to shortcut through it and it is a complete bush fight starting from there.

Finally I went to check (pink track) if you could head back through the landfill and as per 31Dec2023 it would be very doable. The fence on the very SW of the TVB City complex is broken and with ribbons. I think that hikers and fishermen use that way regularly to get close to the sea.

Video with visual clues for the aforementioned.

After the two days my recommendation now would be: coasteering, as wet as you require, bush walk, check the cave on your way back (in and out, don’t do the whole bush walk) and end up the loop taking the bus on the terminus. Only if you are not comfortable with the bush walk navigation return through the landfill.

Everything you should know before coasteering.

PS: From an email on 20th Jan 2023 from Stefan.

I went to Fat Tong Chau today. 🙂 Nice area.

For the way back we just walked at the perimeter of the landfill area,
including ~400 m on the roads there, without crossing any fences, and
it was no problem.