Horny in Pui-O

Lantau days

Wildlife in Mui Wo

Silvermine Beach Music Festival 2011

Hmmmm

Friday afternoon

Bad day to be a buffalo

The Standard
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?pp_cat=11&art_id=109651&sid=31839499&con_type=3
Anger after buffalo destroyed

Natalie Wong

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Three water buffalo in Mui Wo were destroyed yesterday, days after a man was tossed and gored.

A spokesman for the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department said that after receiving complaints about Saturday's buffalo attack, veterinary officers put down two on-site and one while it was being transported to an animal management center.

The action immediately drew condemnation from buffalo lover and conservationist Paul Melsom, who reported Saturday's attack by a young bull on a man at Silvermine Beach.

"I feel absolutely sick on how they handled the matter simply by killing the buffalo. They need experts who have the welfare of animals at heart," he said.

Melsom, who has lived in Mui Wo for 14 years, said the small herd is in harmony with the locals and they do not want the animals to disappear on Lantau.

The department spokesman said its animal management team targeted three bulls that appeared to pose a public threat.

The officers intended to send them to New Territories North Animal Management Centre but put two down because they could not be loaded on to the truck as the location is "too remote."

Another was euthanized in a government truck after suffering complications due to delays during transportation, he said. The department will "continue to monitor the situation."

Lantau Buffalo Association director Ho Loy said there is no proof the animals destroyed were involved in last weekend's attack.

"Instead of killing innocent ani

mals as preventive measures, castrating them can calm them down and guard against more incidents effectively," said Ho, who along with a vet tried to stop officers from loading a buffalo.

Rupert Griffiths, welfare research and development manager of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said large animals have a greater chance of suffering complications during transportation.

"They must be anesthetized before being loaded onto a vehicle. But it is difficult to accurately determine the dosage used on large animals," he said.

Islands District councillor Andy Lo Kwong-shing said Lantau residents have long urged the government to relocate stray buffalo as they cause a nuisance.

The gored man, named Li, in his 40s, left hospital on Monday after being admitted on Saturday with leg injuries.

Fifty-three buffalo were caught last year. There are about 200 in rural areas with about 70 percent on Lantau.

Free Wheeling

Article Source-http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2011/03/20/5389135.htm

Mar 20, 2011 (China Daily - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- HONG KONG (CHINA DAILY/ANN) -- Hong Kong has a surprisingly small number of cyclists. Daredevil mini-bus drivers and narrow diesel-fume choked streets deter all but the bravest riders in the city. Yet those seeking two-wheel thrills don't have to look far. For a leisurely outdoor excursion, the New Territories and Outlying Islands offer a wealth of trails and paths to discover.
Best of all -- you don't even bring your own bike, since many places will rent you one for the day.

"My husband always takes the kids to Mui Wo if they want to go cycling or have their bikes serviced," says Dianne Ignacio-Urmeneta, a Discovery Bay resident and mother of five children, ranging in age from toddler to teen. "It is a good start to a cycling trip." Mui Wo, a laid-back community on Lantau Island, offers several bicycle shops within walking distance of the ferry pier.



Jacky of Friendly Bicycle Shop can help set you up a bike to suit your needs, or make sure that your bike is completely up to speed with a thorough checkup. Friendly stocks everything to ensure a fun and safe trip, including spare parts, lights and other accessories.

For the novice rider, adult and children's models can be equipped with training wheels. Friendly also offers a pick-up and delivery service at designated times throughout the day from Mui Wo or Discovery Bay.

Cycling is the main mode of transportation in Mui Wo, and the scenic villages of Wang Tong, Lung Mei Tsuen and Luk Tei Tong are all accessible along relatively flat paths for family outings.

You may encounter a water buffalo or two along the way, as these docile creatures are often spotted basking in the sun on Silvermine Beach or napping in a field. Silvermine Waterfall Garden is a good pit stop for a picnic lunch next to a scenic fall, and further up a nearby hill you can explore the remnants of a cave that used to yield silver.

Those looking for a more challenging ride head to Pui O, Cheung Sha, Tong Fuk or even Tai O on the west side of the island........continued
http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2011/03/20/5389135.htm

Lamma search for missing British woman

Lamma search for missing British woman

17-03-2011

Missing woman Janet Gilson. A search is underway on Lamma Island for a British tourist who has gone missing. Janet Gilson, 64, has not been seen since leaving her niece's home in Yung Shue Wan at around 11am on Tuesday. Her niece, Julia Fareed, contacted the police when she failed to return. Ms Fareed said it appeared that her aunt had left home in a hurry.

More travel blurb

From Today Online
Lantau

As Hong Kong's biggest island, Lantau is already partly on the well-trodden tourist path with attractions like Disneyland, the Big Buddha and the Ngong Ping Cable Car ride. However, its lesser-known charms are best reached by ferry or winding roads.

Mui Wo is a small community on the shores of Silvermine Bay, with a gentle arc of beach that serves sun-worshippers in summer and clam-diggers during the low tides. With one main street, a handful of restaurants, and quirky inns that dot the coast near the Silvermine hotel, it's like a small-town in the countryside where time seems to slow to a crawl.

Tai O, a rustic fishing village, is sometimes called "Hong Kong's Venice" for its ramshackle array of stilt houses over the water. Though out of the way, it attracts visitors with its photogenic charm and traditional yields of salted fish and shrimp paste. It's also the launching site for excursions to see Chinese white dolphins in the neighbouring Pearl River waters.

Full article here
http://www.todayonline.com/Travel/EDC110224-0000161/Getting-away

Eating

Bahçe

This Turkish place in Mui Wo proves that all you need for a good date is simply a warm, welcoming atmosphere and some very good food.

Sertug, Bahçe’s affable Turkish owner, has graced the menu with many of his own family’s recipes. The mezze platter is a good way to start the meal; the baba ghanoush is the best in Hong Kong.

The atmosphere teeters between homey bistro and intimate bar. A few street-side tables are usually filled with friendly, chatty locals -- always a good distraction if the date does get awkward.

Shop 19, 3 Ngan Wan Road, Mui Wo, Lantau Island tel +852 2984 0222


The Stoep: Beach, beer, and your babe.
The Stoep

What is more romantic than dining with soft sand between your toes?

The Stoep goes further than most beachfront restaurants by letting you actually dine on the beach itself.

And this is no ordinary beach -- it’s Cheung Sha, Hong Kong’s longest and one of its most beautiful. A sunset dinner here is hard to beat for romance in a natural setting.

The menu’s strengths are its barbecued meats and South African specialties like boerewors (sausage) and bobotie (a delicious meat pie). But their fresh bread and tapenade are also a satiating accompaniment for pre-dinner drinks.

32 Lower Cheung Sha Village, Lantau Island, tel +852 2980 269


| CNNGo.com http://www.cnngo.com/hong-kong/eat/best-date-restaurants-under-hk500-525822#ixzz1FEbQQNRJ">http://www.cnngo.com/hong-kong/eat/best-date-restaurants-under-hk500-525822#ixzz1FEbQQNRJ

Chill out

Only in Hong Kong

These Teenagers were found to have nothing wrong with them-they were just cold(or wanted to ride in a helicopter)!
From RTHK
Nine schoolboys taking part in an Outward Bound course in Saikung have been airlifted to hospital, after being overcome by the cold. This came as Hong Kong experienced its coldest day of the winter, with the mercury plunging to -2 degrees Celsius on Tai Mo Shan, where ice and frost were reported. The temperature in parts of the New Territories fell to 6 degrees, while the average temperature in urban areas ranged from 7-9 degrees. The cold weather warning is in force.

Police said the teenagers were among a group of students hiking in the hills above Saikung when they became ill. They called for help, and were airlifted by helicopter to hospital. Two were admitted for treatment, while the others were sent home.

The Outward Bound organisation said the teenagers had been asked to pack up and move to a store in the village. It said three of the students were found to be shivering and cold, but responsive.

It said on arrival at hospital the core temperature of the boys was found to be normal suggesting that they were not suffering from hypothermia.

The Island (which is called Lantau)

http://williamsons-world.blogspot.com/2010/10/island-which-is-called-lantau.html

From what I understand, Lantau is the largest of the islands in Hong Kong, (bar Kowloon which is on the island of Asia - somewhat larger. At least three times as big.) and provides the one thing you cannot get on Hong Kong Island: space.

On Saturday we tootled off to the pier to catch a ferry to Lantau (all of R30 to get there) which is about a half an hour journey. As we were both suffering immense hangovers, it became a 30-minute exercise in not hurling as we bounced from wave to wave caused by the multitude of boats traversing around Hong Kong harbour.......(click on link above for full post)

More roads for Lantau?

Major tourist attractions call for better roads.
Source-http://bit.ly/aDXirY




Lantau draws urge tourist roads

Natalie Wong

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Three major attractions on Lantau - AsiaWorld- Expo, Ngong Ping 360 and Hong Kong Disneyland - have called for an upgrade of the island's road system to improve its standing as a tourist destination.

Li Yun-tai, managing director of Ngong Ping 360, said at the Lantau Tourism Forum yesterday that more than 10 major attraction sites on Lantau are accessible by public transport within an hour of Tung Chung.

"However, it takes much longer for tour buses to travel directly between tourist sites because a number of major pathways on Lantau are private roads restricted to residents," he said.

James Tien Pei-chun, chairman of the Tourism Board, said one in four travelers to Hong Kong visit Lantau Island, double the number in 2005.

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"Lantau is gifted with spectacular scenery and a rich cultural heritage, as well as world-class trade show facilities. We should foster closer partnerships for the sustainable tourism growth of the city's biggest island," he said.

Ngong Ping 360, Noah's Ark and Hong Kong Disneyland have launched a joint-attraction ticket offer for the first time in which visitors to any one place receive a 10 percent discount when purchasing one-day admission tickets for any of the other two attractions during November.

Michael Wu Siu-ying, chairman of the Travel Industry Council, said he hopes tourism on Lantau will be further boosted after construction of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge, which is due for completion in 2015.

Chau Chuen-heung, a local resident and 10-year district councillor on Lantau, said she supports measures to boost tourism on the island because it would create more job opportunities for residents who cannot afford high transport fees for commuting to work in urban areas.

In 2004, a concept plan for Lantau was drawn up by Financial Secretary Henry Tang Ying-yen to provide an overall planning framework for the island's future development. New attractions including a boutique heritage hotel in Tai O, windsurfing facilities in Mui Wo and mountain bike tracks will be built on Lantau in the next two years.

Meanwhile, Tien said 27 million people visited Hong Kong as of October 10, up 23 percent over last year. Tourists stay in the territory for 3.4 days on average and Tien expects a 20 percent increase in the annual number of visitors by year-end.

Growing

My youngest son Jack, is 7 years old this week.He is still our baby, and always will be, but at 7 he is now a young boy, albeit a small one. Joseph will be 10 years old in the coming year, time is slipping away, so I thought it was time to take a look back.

Leaving Hong Kong behind in Tai O

Full Article-http://bit.ly/bL4xdB by Tiffany Lam

The stilt-house community of Tai O on Lantau Island is known as the Venice of the Orient, but let’s be honest. It’s nothing like the opulent Italian city.

Tai O, once Hong Kong’s biggest fishing community, was ravaged by fires, floods and typhoons in recent years, and it shows.

The community’s derelict pang uk (Cantonese for stilt-houses) look like they were built with whatever villagers could scavenge -- broomsticks, Styrofoam boxes, bits of nylon netting. Houses some distance away from the main street have broken windows. Barefooted grannies play majong on balconies overlooking the canal, their front doors flung wide open.

For some, this is Tai O’s charm. It is the antithesis of the city landscape and is a throwback to Hong Kong’s past as a simple fishing village.

Read more: Leaving Hong Kong behind in Tai O | CNNGo.com http://www.cnngo.com/hong-kong/life/tai-o-800151#ixzz11ZjBDku5

Mui Wo: an island getaway in Hong Kong

Full article-http://bit.ly/aXSMQ6

That was my last week in Hong Kong; I decided to do something different. Rather than climbing up to the Big Buddha, exploring the Stanley Market or indulging myself in the grand shopping malls, I escaped to Mui Wo, a little town on Lantau Island.

The ferry ride to Mui Wo is just as relaxing as the island itself.....

Soybean man on CNN

From CNN. Follow the link for full story and pics.
http://bit.ly/dBQYGJ

Mok Kau Moon came to Hong Kong from Dongguang nearly 60 years ago, dreaming of a better life. He settled in the island village of Mui Wo where he eventually began to farm his own soybeans to make tofu to sell for a modest income. Today, Mok still makes fresh tofu each morning to sell as the sweet Cantonese dessert known as doufu fa. Each morning he picks soybeans from his small backyard farm. Mok insists on cooking over a wood fire and making his own ginger syrup, not just for the authentic flavors produced, but also for economical reasons.

A mouthful of Mok's silken, nutty doufu fa is a taste of the fat of Mui Wo's land. This is the story of a locavore born out of neccessity; an accidental advocate of local eating.

Read more: In pictures: Mui Wo's tofu man takes us from farm to spoon | CNNGo.com http://www.cnngo.com/hong-kong/tofu-man-140691#ixzz10iTA2zD9