Lunar New Year Hiking 農曆新年行山活動

During the Lunar New Year Holidays, most of the shops and restaurants will be closed. Even you can find restaurant that is open for service, it will definitely include a 10% surcharge. Other than visiting relatives or friends, hiking is believed to be the most cost saving activities. Not only we can consume some of our free time, it will also bring good health to us and that’s why we had two hiking trips in this holidays.

農曆新年期間市面非常淡靜，商舗和食肆大都休息，即使照常營業的很多時都會有加一的安排。假期間除了拜年外，最慳錢的活動相信是行山。既可一家人消磨數小時，也對身體健康有裨益。就像今個新年假期，我們一家就走了兩轉了。

---

A New Beginning 新的一年好開始

On the first day of the Lunar New Year, we started right from the Mount Parker Road entrance of the Tai Tam Country Park and continued to the Braemar Hill via the Sir Cecil’s Ride. A journey of about 9 Kilometers to mark a good beginning of the year.

As we had the same journey many times and probably the readers are quite familiar with it, so I just skipped any further description of the hike.

大年初一午飯後從柏架山道出發，往金督馳馬徑至北角寶馬山，差不多九公里的路程為新的一年帶來個好開始。

這路線已行過很多次，不再多講了。

---

Escape from Quarrel 遠走高山避赤口

Day three of the Lunar New Year is called “赤口”, meaning that it is easy to have quarrel with others. So traditionally, Chinese will not visit other relatives or friends on that day in order to prevent having any possible quarrels. In that case, we went for another hiking.

My boy suggested to go up to the Victoria Peak starting from the Wanchai Gap Park. Hiking along Coombe Road, Barker Road and finally arrived at the Peak Galleria.

As there is no direct public bus service from our home to the Wanchai Gap Park, we started from Kennedy Road and hike along the Wanchai Green Trail to Wanchai Gap Park instead.

The chosen route was not too hard and only the Wanchai Green Trail and portion of Findlay Road would be a little bit challenging. The former lasted for 2 Kilometers at 10% gradient while the latter one was quite short, 300 meters at about 12% gradient.

Weather was fine and great sunshine and not too windy. There were quite a lot of hikers along the Wanchai Green Trail next to the Bamboo Groove.

年初三俗稱”赤口”，傳統習慣是沒有人來拜年的，於是也決定往山𥚃走。今次小朋友建議從灣仔峽道遊樂場出發，經甘道，白加道往太平山頂的山頂廣場。由於沒有公共交通直接去灣仔峽道遊樂場，於是改由灣仔堅尼地道口出發，打算經竹林苑傍的灣仔自然徑步行往灣仔峽道遊樂場。

這條路線整體上不算太吃力，只有竹林苑往灣仔峽道遊樂場的一段以及種植道往芬梨道一小段較辛苦。前者是2公里長約10%的斜坡，而後者則較短，約300公尺12%。

今日天氣非常之好，陽光普照而風又不太，怪不得在竹林苑傍往上走的路上踫到那麼多人。

Seems like most of the hikers want to have an easy hike, only a few of the hikers continued beyond the Bowen Road Fitness Trail.

寶雲道後人潮漸減，看來大家都不想太辛苦。

When we came to the Peak Road from Coombe Road, there was a long queues of vehicles congested along the Peak Road. The situation was probably caused by the Lunar New Year holidays where many tourists came here for visit.

We felt great as I was not driving up the Peak, otherwise, we might be caught in the traffic jam.

由於是新年假期，山頂道路上擠滿私家車及一列列的旅遊巴士。慶幸我們今天是行山，否則被困於交通工具𥚃，不知何時才能到達山頂廣場。

One of the most favourable activities at the Peak is to enjoy the great view of Hong Kong. The best places are along Barker Road, Findlay Road and area along the Lion Pavilion where one can have the view of the Central, Western districts of the Hong Kong Island and part of the Kowloon Peninsula. The is the signature scenery of Hong Kong as found in most of the Postcards. If this is your first time to Hong Kong, don’t miss it.

上山頂當然要睇香港最具代表性的景色，白加道沿途，芬梨道及山頂獅子亭都是好地方，可欣賞到香港島中、西區，以及九龍市中心的美景，也是很多名信片中描寫的香港。如果你是第一次到香港遊覽的，一定不可以錯過。

If you want to capture a close shot of the Peak Tram, you can get to the Barker Road Station.

想近距離拍攝山頂纜車的話，可在白加道盡頭的車站靜待纜車的到臨。

The Victoria Peak is the highest peak in the Hong Kong Island and is accessible with beautifully paved road. This is also one of the best challenging routes favoured by cyclists. Riding along Barker Road and Findlay Road is another great alternative as cyclists can escape from the busy traffic of the Peak Road and enjoy the magnificent view of Hong Kong.

由於太平山是港島區最高的山峯，亦有完善的道路可直達，這𥚃也是單車手熱愛的路線。想避開繁忙的山頂道交通，又想飽覽美景的話，沿白加道及芬梨道攀上山頂會是另一更好的選擇。

The most crowded areas were around the Lion Pavilion, The Peak Tower and the Peak Galleria. The latter one is currently closed for renovation and made the Peak even crowded.

最熱鬧的當然是獅子亭一帶、凌霄閣纜車站及山頂廣場。後者現正進行重建工作，暫時停止開放，令當日山頂更加擠得水洩不通。

Our original plan was having the Peak Galleria as the end of the hike and took the bus back to Wanchai. When we arrived at the bus station, it was already full of tourists and we turned to the mini-bus instead.

Unfortunately, there was no minibus coming for nearly an hour. Instead, fleet of coaches bringing groups of mainland tourists were crowded next to the bus stop which made the traffic at Peak Road came to halt.

It’s quite late in the evening and we decided to walk down the Peak.

原本的行程是在山頂巴士站乘搭巴士到灣仔，但見到巴士站擠滿旅客，我們便改到小巴站排隊往中環。排了差不多一小時仍未有小巴，只見旅遊車不斷地把國內旅行團送到山頂，令山頂道的交通陷於癱瘓。

時間已晚，我們決定原路步行下山。

We were quite lucky that a public bus with some free-standing space arrived when we reached the Wanchai Gap Park. Without any further consideration, we jumped onto the bus and had the Wanchai MTR Station as the end of the hiking trip.

回程在灣仔峽道遊樂場見到剛下山的巴士仍有企位，不用多説，立即跳上巴士，最後在灣仔地鐵出站結束今天的行程。

As we hiked nearly every week, a trip of 17 Kilometers was definitely not an issue to all of us.

由於我們一家大小經常行山，十多公里的行程也可升任。