Hong Kong 2010, Part 1 of 3
This adventure starts when we get off the fast ferry on the island of Cheung Chau, one of the many islands that make up Hong Kong. I had read about a cave that was rumored to be the hiding place of the infamous pirate Cheung Po Tsai, and that was the first place McKenzie and I wanted to go. We have figured out that in China, grade school kids know more English than adults, so we asked a few of the children where the cave was. We were pointed to the western end of the island. It would be a long walk, so we looked for another way to get there.
We ended up finding a local with a flat decked boat. He knew enough English that we were able to negotiate a price of 30RMB. We hopped aboard and were off. The ride only lasted about 10 mins. The wonderful view of beautiful tropical blue water was often ruined by piles of floating garbage.
When we reached the small protected harbor on the end of the island, we quickly hopped off and hit the trail. The trail was mildly steep, but was easy to walk at a good pace. The trail quickly took us away from the populated area. We were getting out in the middle of nowhere when we rounded a corner and met a man sitting on the side of the trail selling odds and ends.
At first, it was real strange to see him in such a remote place selling water, flashlights, sea shells and such. He spoke no English, so we mostly ignored him and continued to the cave. He was persistent trying especially hard to sell us a flash light. He followed us around the corner to the entrance to the cave. Aletha and McKenzie headed in first.
The entrance was straight down and you had to carefully crawl down 15 feet. That is when it dawned on me why this guy was tapping my shoulder again trying to get me to buy a flashlight; it was completely dark in the bottom!
He held firm to his price of 10RMB, so we paid it and headed in. It kept going straight down to the point we had to use a ladder. In all, it was about 25 feet deep. As we carefully walked through, you could hear the ocean waves crashing on the side of the hill trying desperately to get in and fill the cave with water. McKenzie spent her time with the flashlight looking for left behind pirate’s treasure as Aletha and I stepped carefully in the dark, hollering at McKenzie to shine the light in front of us.
The cave continued straight for about 30 feet. Without the flashlight, you could not see a thing. I was started to regret being so cheap and only buying one light for 3 people. I mean, 10 RMB is only about $1.30.
The exit of the cave required us to slither through an opening only about 18” wide. If not for my firm 6 packed stomach, I may have gotten stuck. We could now see the sunlight shining through the exit. We emerged slowly allowing our eyes to adjust from complete darkness to bright sun light.
When we popped out, we were on the other side of the point, on a shear
rock faced cliff, 40 feet above the ocean, overlooking a small harbor. The only sign of people was the path that headed down to the edge of the water and around the point on the far side of the inlet. I tried to enjoy a few romantic minutes with Aletha, but that was disturbed by the flash light salesman. He was back, but this time to give me money! He gave us 4 of the 10 RMB back in exchange for the flashlight. So instead of selling us the light, he rented it to us with a small deposit to ensure I did not run off with it.We were all as excited as kids on Christmas morning. This was about as real an adventure as you can get. There were no guard rails, warning signs, tour guides or anything else to force us to be safe. We could have easily slipped and fallen to the bottom and been in real trouble. This is something we have noticed throughout China, safety is second and living for the moment is first. It does allow us to enjoy things close up, but can be a little eerie at times.
