Running Away To Lovers' Bridge.

Lovers' Bridge.

It's been another week where the best laid plans have fallen foul of the weather. All poor old Peter has wanted to do all week is swim. On Mondays the pool opens much later, as it's being cleaned and we were going out to dinner with our friend Jason in the afternoon, so I promised Peter we'd go swimming on Tuesday.

We met Jason in The Outback, Causeway Bay. We had a very pleasant meal and a really good gossip. Peter doesn't eat that much. He just wanted an Aussie fries - chips smothered in cheese and bacon, Jason was going home to a meal cooked by his wife, so he just had the bloomin' onion. I have never tried this before. It's a sort of variation on the onion ring, except the onion is still whole. I had the Alice Springs chicken. Mr Jason even insisted on treating us. Thank you very much, Mr Jason.

Meal out.

Mr Jason.

Peter.

On Tuesday, it was pitch black, pouring and stormy all day. I didn't even make it as far as the shops, never mind the pool. Fortunately, I had a good book to read, but I was still a bit on the pissed off side and Peter was still hankering after his swim.

On Wednesday we were meeting our friend, Bonnie, for the last time before she goes away to Canada for the summer. We planned to swim first, but the thunderstorm warning was up all day, and I really do mean ALL day, so the pool was closed. We met Bonnie in Figo's and had a lovely meal. I had thin crust pepperoni pizza, Peter had thin crust four cheeses pizza and Bonnie had chicken fajitas. Figo's has only recently reopened following renovations and is looking good.

Thursday was a bit of a fight day. Peter wanted to go swimming, but I could not stand another day of just waiting around to see if the thunderstorm warning went down or not. It was raised when we woke up, so I went out. It did come down for about three hours, but then went back up again. I guess if I hadn't been selfish, I could have managed to get Peter to the pool, but how can you know what the thunderstorm signal is going to do and I was desperate for a walk.

Anyway I felt I had found the perfect day out for the current climate. Somewhere that felt like the countryside, was easily accessible and could be done in around an hour. I had decided to go to Shek O. I have been there several times before, and it is beautiful, so I could happily go back again and again, but actually my plan was to go to a new bit that I hadn't seen before. That bit was Tai Tau Chau.

Tai Tau Chau, translates into English as Urn Island. It is an island off the coast of Shek O, and I assume it has this name due to its shape. At one time this island would have been joined to the rest of the mainland, but due to erosion, it ended up separated and only accessible by tombola at low tide. Well, the tombola access wasn't considered to be good enough, so a bridge was built to link Tai Tau Chau and Shek O. The reason I had not been before was that this bridge was totally destroyed by a horrendous and terrifying storm called Typhoon Mangkhut in September 2018 and by the time I had heard of Tai Tau Chau the bridge was long gone and the difficulties in getting there had returned. However, I recently discovered that a new bridge was built between Shek O and Tai Tau Chau in 2021 so I knew there should be no problem in accessing the island now.

To get to Shek O I headed to Shau Kei Wan and boarded the number 9 bus. The scenery on route is fantastic, but the journey is not for the fainthearted. Drivers drive fast. The road twists and turns. There are substantial drops off to the side at various places.

View from the bus.

View over Tai Tam Harbour from the bus.

Red Hills from the bus.

Looking down on Shek O from the bus.

When I arrived, I had a quick look at the main beach. It's gorgeous, but almost totally devoid of shade. There's a veritable army of ladies trying to rent you sun umbrellas and chairs. I didn't hire these as I was just dropping by, rather than staying. As the thunderstorm warning was miraculously down when I got here, people were actually swimming in the sea.

Shek O Beach.

Shek O Beach.

Shek O Beach.

Shek O Beach.

To get to Tai Tau Chau I headed back to the roundabout and started to walk up Shek O Village Road. There are some colourful houses here and lots of things to photograph. However, be careful this road does have traffic that suddenly appears out of nowhere.

Shek O Village.

Shek O village

Shek O Village.

Shek O Village.

Shek O Village.

At one point the path was strewn with fallen flowers.

Flowers in Shek O Village.

Flowers in Shek O Village.

Flowers in Shek O Village.

I deviated off the path at one point to go to the little Tin Hau Temple. I've been here before, so I just had a quick look then returned to Shek O Village Road.

Shek O Tin Hau Temple.

Shek O Tin Hau Temple.

It wandered a little uphill and merged into Shek O Headland Road. I kept going until I reached an impressive Chinese style building and spotted a set of stairs next to it.

Temple like building

Temple like building.

Temple like building.

I walked down the stairs and in front of me I could see a beautiful blue bridge. This bridge joins Tai Tau Chau to the mainland. It is called the Blue Bridge by some, but is also known rather more poetically as Lovers' Bridge. I'm not a hundred percent clear on the origins of this name, but some people say it's because the bridge is narrow and only two people walking close together could cross it at the same time. Apparently this is a favourite spot for wedding photos.

View over Tai Tau Chau.

Lovers' Bridge.

Lovers' Bridge.

Lovers' Bridge viewed from the side.

Lovers' Bridge viewed from the side.

Selfie on Lovers' Bridge.

View from Lovers' Bridge.

View from Lovers' Bridge.

I noticed that someone had picked up a frangipani flower and placed it on the bridge wall. It looked stunning against the blue of the bridge and the wonderful ocean background.

Flower on Lovers' Bridge.

Flower on Lovers' Bridge.

Once I was on the island, there were lots of gorgeous flowers on the shore. There was a seating area which would normally be really relaxing, but was way too hot to sit in during summer.

Flowers on the shore.

Flowers on the shore.

View from the rocky shore.

Seating area just past Lovers' Bridge.

Path.

Tree and shore near the bridge.

Flowers on the island.

Flowers on the island.

Flowers on the island.

There were lovely views back towards Shek O Village and out across the sea. I came to two paths. I chose the path on the left. As far as I can see if you choose the other one, you'll still end up in the same place.

Views back towards Shek O.

View back across the water towards Shek O.

I went up a few steps and came to a lovely rock formation. There was someone fishing off the shore nearby.

Wonderful rock formation.

Fishing off the shore.

I climbed up more steps. The metal rail next to them was scorching hot in the sun. I was delighted with all the views both back towards Shek O and out to sea. There were seating areas and barbecue sites. There were views over a smaller rocky island that may have had several caves.

View from a stairway.

View from the top of the stairs.

Smaller island with caves.

Beautiful Sea View.

Beautiful Sea view.

Looking back at Shek O.

Shek O across the barbecue site.

Looking back at the rock formation.

In the far distance I could see Tseung Kwan O and used my zoom to photograph its bridge. This has only recently opened and I have still to see it close up.

View towards Tseung Kwan O using a zoom.

I climbed all the way up to the pavilion on the top of the island. There was a school outing going on and the kids had taken over the pavilion, as a shady place to have their lunch. There were beautiful views from here. I also noticed an interesting looking tree.

Pavilion on top of the island.

Pavilion on top of the island.

Tree on top of the island.

After enjoying the views, I retraced my steps and then headed down some stairs past lots of fantastic rock formations to the sea. I read a blog that described this as 'the edge of the world' because if you look in a certain direction all you can see is ocean. It's very peaceful here. There were lots of birds. The rocks were brightly coloured.

Way down to the edge of the world.

Bird calling from the top of a rock.

Rock formation on the edge of the world.

At the bottom of the steps you come to this building, but you can't access it.

Looking out from the edge of world.

The sea was calm, but I bet it can get rough here.

Selfie on the edge of the world.

There were a couple of sampans fishing in the waters off the edge of the world.

Sampans.

Close up of sampan.

I was really enjoying the beauty of this place, but the sun was relentless. I decided I would walk back to my bus and start wending my way home. I hadn't been out all that long, but the lure of aircon was strong.

I was enjoying the very scenic drive back until we got stuck due to a traffic accident. This is a narrow road and there are not really side roads off, so if there's an accident you are literally stuck.

Traffic jam on the way back.

View from the bus while stuck in the traffic jam.

View from the bus while sitting in the traffic jam.

The accident when we finally passed it seems to have been someone who drove into a concrete drainage wall on the side of a hill. He didn't appear to be injured, but his car had cut off an entire lane.

Once we were passed this accident spot, it was plain sailing all the way back home.

I had a quick look at some of the information about an upcoming event, but I will save most of the pictures of this till later.

The duck is coming back.

But this time there will be two of them.