Biking Blog: 'The Toughest Hill in Hong Kong'

Now that I have my new bike i've been trying to make up for lost time exercising to get back into 'summer shape'...  the last two weekends I managed to go biking both Saturday and Sunday...  trying to ramp my way up to the shape I was last year when I did some of my tougher rides.

This past Saturday I started out doing a simple route I've done many times (Tai Wo to Fanling).  It was a bit late when I started (~5pm),  but that route only takes like 45 minutes tops, so I was considering even turning around and going the whole way back to just get a double workout.

But as I came to about the 3/4 mark, I decided to check Google maps to see if there were any good side roads in the villages along the way that I hadn't tried before.  I figured I'd get an extra kilometer or so out of it but nothing major.

Turns out that there was a path off to the right which went up the hills a bit.  Its been a while since I did a big hill trip, but I figured what the heck? 

It started out relatively tame, it was all paved and although it was steep at points, none of the steep sections were that long.  I decided not to kill myself so I walked the bike up the steepest parts and rode on the manageable parts.

About 1 km into it I found this... which I assume used to be some kind of military buildings?  creepy!

After about 2km I came across a trail map at a junction.  Turns out this road leads to a bunch of hiking trailers and by now was on the outskirts of the Pat Sin Leng County Park (which you may remember from some of my other biking trips).

The view from here of the villages in the valley was pretty decent!

It was getting a bit late but it said it was only about 45 minutes to the peak of Cloud Hill via the 'Wilson Trail'.  I assumed I could probably make it in less time (because of / in spite of having the bike), so I pushed on. I decided to check the elevation on the map.  It said I was at 150 and the peak was somewhere above 350.  I thought to myself 'another 200 feet, that's not that much... I can handle that.' and 'wow, I've only gone up 150 feet? it seemed more steep than that!'

As I went on, unfortunately the 'sometimes steep' hill turned into a 'mostly steep' hill...  this entire time I didn't see a single other person until about halfway up as I walked my bike up another steep turn in the road.  I saw a guy coming down past me on a bicycle.  he was trying hard to control his speed on a steep descent and said something to the effect of 'its so steep here!  the hardest hill in Hong Kong!'  I foolishly thought to myself "could it be harder than the hills of death?  harder than the 'I almost threw up' hill?  no way... this guy is weak!'  as I kept going I realized he was probably right... it got steeper and steeper as I went... and riding down a hill this steep is no fun either.  you don't have to pedal but you are constantly riding the breaks and trying to avoid crashing on a rock or pothole and losing it.

Finally I got to the peak...  and passed this sign,  I guess I was already in the park for the last half.  

Up here there was a radar and radio installation.

But that's not what I came to see!  The view was amazing.  Check out some of the long exposure night pics I managed to get:

You could see all of the Tolo Harbor including Ma On Shan, Taipo and down all the way to Shatin.  

This is a zoom in of Ma On Shan.  I can see my old apartment!

To the north you could see Fanling, Sheung Shui and all the way to Shenzhen across the border.

So.... as you can see from the pictures, I stayed well past sunset!!!  Which leaves me with a bit of a problem... I'm on top of a mountain (with a bicycle) in the pitch black at night!  

Don't panic. Of course I had a plan.  I noticed on the maps that the trail I was on actually continued on past the peak of Cloud Hill.  Right back to downtown Taipo (right near where I started actually).  on the map it actually looked a lot shorter than the path I came on too.  And I actually have a wide array of lights with me whenever I go biking.  Worst case scenario,  I have to walk my bike down if its too dark to see.

ACTUAL WORST CASE SCENARIO:

(Impressive all the spots you can find these alivenotdead.com stickers!)

Well,  the last laugh was on me... unlike the path I took up, the path down was NOT a paved road that a small truck could navigate.  It started out as a narrow concrete path (still ride-able),  but as I reached the first slope, it decided to change into:

Stairs!  Descending down into the inky black abyss!

I'm an adventurous biker... I've been known to ride down a few stair cases in my youth,  but not at night when you're faced with a 200+ foot drop to either side of the 3' stair case you're trying to go down. :-P  

Anyway, I did a LOT of walking my bike down the stairs... (and a bit of pushing it up the stairs on a few stretches where you had to go back up).  This was more annoying than tiring or dangerous.  It was not outside the realm of possibility that if II tripped on the stairs, my bike very well may have ended up falling down the side of the hill (headlight mockingly showing me how far it tumbles all the way down the hill side).  But in reality the Wilson trail had one more laugh in store. for some reason the TOP of the path was paved concrete with stairs, and the BOTTOM of the path was paved concrete with stairs, but someone forgot to actually do a big stretch in the middle.... it was loose dirt, and rocks... not so much fun in the dark.... doh!)

Last picture,  as I got close to the end... the path literally went right next to a family grave site.

That's not creepy at all! :-O

Here's the map of the path I ended up doing: the route map is here: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3907286

But the real story is looking at the topographic map:

yikes.  that wasn't 150 FEET elevation, it was 150 meters! :-O  so in total I went from sea level to 420m elevation in 4km!  (a 10% grade on average).

Here's the elevation map:

So actually the steepest part is the descent after the peak (the stairs!)

420m!  That's  the same height as the IFC2 skyscraper! (an 88 story building!)  and I pushed a bicycle up and down it!

Anyway,  I recommend this as a good hike.... leave the bicycle at home! :-P