At The End of The Rainbow.

Kwong Pan Tin Squatter Village, Tsuen Wan.

I had intended to go to Clearwater Bay today, but it was stormy all night - winds howling, rain pouring down. In the morning it looked dark and rainy, so I decided to change to a shorter, easier walk. Of course, when I got there, the sun had come out.

I was heading to Kwong Pan Tin Squatter Village in Tsuen Wan. To get there I took the MTR to Tsuen Wan and exited through Exit A3. I entered the brightly coloured corridor that leads to Discovery Park, but I walked on the right hand side and kept an eye out for an old bridge that goes across the railway line. When I reached this, I exited the brightly coloured corridor through some metal doors and went onto the bridge.

The colourful walkway to Discovery Park.

Looking out at the old bridge over the railway line.

Me on the old bridge over the railway line.

I crossed the bridge, walked along the path on the other side of it, then went through a tunnel decorated with a triangular pattern. After the tunnel, I went left and climbed up the stairs. At the top of the stairs I was on Route Twisk which connects Tsuen Wan to Shek Kong. This area is at the foot of Tai Mo Shan, Hong Kong's tallest mountain. I went left and began to walk uphill.

In the triangular patterned underpass.

Stairway to Route Twisk.

After maybe fifteen to twenty minutes, I could see a multicoloured wall and a gigantic banyan tree on the other side of the road. The village I was heading to was about five minutes further on, on the same side of the road as the painted wall, just past a bus stop marked Kwong Pan Tin Tsuen Phase Two.

The undecorated Kwong Pan Tin Tsuen Phase One

Colourful wall and banyan tree.

Looking up at part of the squatter village.

This mural marks the entrance to the village from Route Twisk.

Why would anyone come all this way to see a squatter village? Well, that's because the village has been beautified by the local residents and a group of volunteer parents and their children. There are colourful paintings at the entrance way. The main stairway through the village has been turned into a rainbow, several walls, rocks and houses have been brightly painted and covered with artwork.

Just past the entrance steps there are two little pigs welcoming visitors to the village. There's also pictures of chickens, images of children collecting honey and paintings of a river filled with fish. All of these tell of the village's rural past when the inhabitants raised animals for food.

The welcoming pigs.

Children gathering honey.

Chickens.

On the wall at the back of this area there's a mural showing tourists flocking here to take photos. I don't know about tourists, but there were certainly quite a few Hong Kongers here for exactly that purpose.

Tourist photographers.

I climbed up the rainbow stairs to a bright yellow rock that has been painted as a house from a fairytale. This seemed to be the most popular spot for photos. There was a big group of people taking pictures here.

The yellow house.

Me in front of the yellow house.

I headed to the left and followed a stairway decorated with pictures of pigs towards a colourful house, a real one this time, with lots of flowers in its garden. There were many paintings of animals on its walls. It looked quite idyllic.

Pig Staircase.

Colourful village house.

Colourful village house.

Parrots and pigs.

Then, I headed back to the yellow house. On the other side of it there was a large open space with beautiful children's paintings on the wall. Looking at them was like flicking through the pages in a children's picture book.

Kwong Pan Tin Squatter Village, Hong Kong has been beautified with murals painted by local children.

Pigs, pigs and more pigs.

After taking many photos here, I climbed up the rainbow path, past the yellow house. There was a pretty mural showing an apple tree. I passed a house with an attractive green door.

Rainbow staircase past the apple tree painting.

Apple tree painting.

Green door.

The walls on both sides of the rainbow stairway were decorated. Sometimes the paintings showed things from the village's past, for example, there were once bee hives here and the paintings showed bees inside their hexagonal cones making honey.

The Rainbow Stairs lead the way through Kwong Pan Tin Squatter Village.

Murals line the rainbow stairs.

Hiding dog.

Mural on the stairs.

Honey bee mural on the side of a village house.

Close up of honey bee mural.

Children gathering honey.

Me with the honey murals.

Other paintings showed some of the fruit that was grown here in the past. There's probably still some grown here now.

Villager collecting fruit.

Villager collecting fruit.

Picking fruit mural.

Fruit Mural.

Trees, flowers, fruit and bees.

Near the top of the stairs there was another open area. There were paintings here of wild boar and monkeys. I suppose both of these might be found in the wild here, though I associate monkeys more with Shing Mun and Lion's Rock.

Wild boar, orange flowers and honey mural.

Wild boar mural.

Houses, flowers and murals.

Monkey mural.

Even the village houses that weren't decorated looked quite picturesque.

Village house.

Village house.

I'm not sure exactly why this village was painted. It may just have been to make it look better, or it may have been because, being a squatter village, it was threatened by demolition and the inhabitants felt they could save it by turning it into a tourist attraction. Whatever the reason, it's certainly worth a look and it isn't even necessary to do the short walk I did to get here. Bus 51 stops right outside. I used that to get to the start of my walk when I climbed up nearby Tai Mo Shan.

On my walk back down the hill, I stopped to look at a little church on the other side of the road from the brightly painted wall I saw on the way up. There was a pretty garden here with flowers and views of some of Tsuen Wan's high rise buildings.

Church.

Blue flowers.

It was still early, so I decided I would continue past the MTR station and revisit Sam Tung Uk, a former Hakka village which is now a museum. I was glad I did, because, although I have been here before, much of it was closed on that visit due to COVID. This time it was all open.

Before going in, I took some pictures of the wall paintings outside the museum. This walled village was once home to the Chan Clan. They were rehoused into more modern accommodation and their ancestral home became a museum.

Lions and Puppets.

Pagodas and paper cut crafts.

Temple and dragon.

Painting of dim sum.

Photo of the Chan Clan who once lived in this village.

I quite like the buildings themselves. I always look at the architecture when I enter a building, especially an old one. There's a beautiful entrance way with couplets written over the door to bring good luck and ward off evil. Then there's a central area decorated with many lanterns and behind that the ancestral hall where the ancestors can be worshipped. Each room had an area for collecting rain water, so that in a rain storm the building did not flood.

Entranceway.

Lanterns in the central area of the walled village.

Lantern.

Looking through an opening in the roof.

Ancestral altar.

Pathway.

Pathway.

A lot of the exhibitions focused on crafts. There were videos and displays on making umbrellas, mahjong sets, puppets, galvanized objects, decorated plates, heads for the dragon dance and more.

Mahjong set.

Dragon dance heads.

Parts for puppet making.

Finished puppets.

I rather liked the musical instrument display. You could look at examples of the instruments and hear them being played.

Musical instruments.

Musical instruments.

Photos of people playing musical instruments.

There were also displays and videos about festivals and traditions. These showed how to make traditional food for certain festivals and how to make lanterns to celebrate the birth of a male child. Other displays showed the floating children of the Cheung Chau Bun Festival. I'd love to see this, but am put off by the crowds.

Dim sum making.

Lantern for a newborn boy.

Photo of floating children at the Cheung Chau Bun Festival.

One part of the museum had been kept as a village house and each room was furnished in traditional style. I found this part quite interesting. There was lots of information about what everything was. Although there was an upstairs part this wasn't furnished and it wasn't possible to go there. I think this is to prevent damage to the stairways.

An old kitchen.

Kitchen in Hakka house.

Dining room in Hakka house.

Bedroom.

Bedroom.

Store room.

After looking at the museum, I had a quick walk round its gardens, then headed to Fusion, near the train station to buy some groceries before returning home. In the end I felt quite glad it had rained.

Garden.

Garden.