Been wanting to do Lion Rock Hike for quite some time now but was determined to do it on a fine day, which are few and far between in Hong Kong. Drove out to Temple Plaza, car parking underneath the South Mall, this is near Kowloon Walled City Park, worth a visit if you have the time. Anyway from there, cross the road (walkway between the South and North Malls), head right towards Sha Tin Pass Road, then simply walk up that for a few kilometers until you find the entrance to Lion Rock (sign posted). Saw a few monkey’s, say away from them, they’re little buggers!
This first bit of the Lion Rock Hike is not particularly exciting and there’s a lot of people going up and down Sha Tin Road, including old foggies blaring out their radios. The hills quite steep going up, but nothing gruelling. once you reach the entrance to Lion Rock trail, you’re still going to find loads of people. I hiked Lion Rock today, Friday, in the morning, and can imagine they’d be half of Hong Kong up there in the weekends – not pleasant. Anyway, the hike up is short but some steep stairs, it’s a good workout if you’re going fast, but definitely won’t knacker you out.
The top of Lion Rock Hike has nice views, it was a sunny, cloudless day, but even then it was so hazy the views were spoilt a little bit, typical of HK. I’d even go so far to say that the views are a bit overrated, yes you can see all over the city, but actually I prefer something like Sharp Peak where there’s no concrete jungle views. That’s obviously a personal preference – the views are undoubtedly good, but not spectacular. Anyway, on this Lion Rock Hike when I got the top there were some rock climbers scaling down Lion Rock, including a guy in a wheelchair.
Loads of people around, but at the same time it was quite a thing to see (see photos and look closely). Typically, there were dickheads trying to take the ultimate selfie, saw one guy almost go over the edge, shame he didn’t as those people need to learn a lesson. If you can go on the Lion Rock Hike on a totally fine day, the views would be much better, today was too hazy even though it was a beautiful day. You can see both sides all over Kowloon and HK and North over Tai Po and you can see Tai Mo Shan, Hong Kong’s highest mountain.
There’s multiple ways up and down doing the Lion Rock Hike and because this is a relatively short hike we tried to find a few trails. One thing I will say about the Lion Rock Hike is there’s plenty of excellent running trails around it so if you’re into trail running, you’ll be able to find some good ones. Headed down then took a right which is apparently part of Maclehose Trail section 5, this takes you up to big pylon, then found a great little trail going down, this would be a good one to go up, it’s got ropes, not overly steep but I almost assed over trying to avoid 3 old locals coming up.
Still puzzles me why the locals don’t move out the way. Come across any westerner, they’ll see you running and move out the way, come across a local, they’ll just block the way and not even attempt to move. At the bottom you’ll reach an intersection and I decided to head down to Amah Rock, where again there were 2,000 people trying to take selfies. Not great views but the rock itself is actually pretty good, a shame there were so many people there. From there I headed back up and over to Wong Tai Hom.
Would I do the Lion Rock Hike again? Probably, but early morning (like before 8a.m) to avoid the crowds of people who go up there, and would probably try and hike over to Kam Shan Country Park. Total Lion Rock Hike distance today was only 11k.m, took me over 2 hrs but that was with numerous photo taking and stopping to see where I was going. You could easily get up and down in about an hour and a half if you’re fit. Check out the photos of Lion Rock Hike and if you head out there, expect lots of people and you’ll be fine.
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