Double Haven

This walk starts at the typical New Territories village of Wu Kau Tang scruffy concrete 3 storey boxes crowded into an old site amid disused rice terraces.

The path soon disappears into a valley of old rice paddies beside a meandering stream under rough green hills, passing the crumbling remains of traditional farmsteads and hamlets. Enjoy a perfect picnic where the stream tumbles down a shelf of rock.

After traversing a rugged hillside, the path drops to a deep inlet of the beautiful Double Haven, a bay sheltered behind a series of promontories and islands. Behind the shoreline all is scruffy charm: overgrown fields, an ancestral village with a weedy square shaded by a huge Banyan tree, another with a laid-back eatery with a black-clad peasant granny perched in a corner.

And then a trek up across the steep ridge from Lai Chi Wo passing patches of abandoned hardscrabble farmland fighting a losing battle with exuberant sub-tropical growth back to the refreshment stalls at Wu Kau Tang. Alternatively, you can cut back earlier at Sam A Chung on a path that winds around the contours of the hillside back up the same valley.