Life.Culture.Discovery.

She rode every Hong Kong ferry. So what did she find on city’s remote islands and coasts?

When a long-time Hong Kong resident found a list of official ferry routes, it opened a new world for her. She decided to ride them all

Reading Time:9 minutes

A view from the deck of a Hong Kong ferry. Boats big and small ply a surprisingly large number of routes, serving remote islands and stretches of coast. Photo: Bettina Wassener

Published: 7:45am, 9 Jun 2024

On the southern flank of Hong Kong Island, a small fleet of ferries picks its way between sampans, yachts and fishing vessels, from early in the morning until late at night.

Wooden, ancient-looking and high-sterned, they seat just a few dozen passengers, and their journey takes barely three or four minutes. The price per trip: HK$2.50.

This is Aberdeen Harbour. The original Hong Kong. When European explorers first came ashore here, they mistakenly applied the name of the location, Heung Gong, or “Fragrant Harbour”, to the entire island.

Now the erstwhile fishing villages on either side of Aberdeen Harbour are forests of high-rise blocks. Between them, the dinky little ferries shuttle to and fro amid the not-so-fragrant whiff of fish, seawater and motor oil.

Aberdeen Harbour, which you can cross by “kaito” ferry for HK$2.50. Photo: Dickson Lee

It is a gloriously quirky ride, and it helped get me mildly obsessed with Hong Kong’s varied transport options. Then, in January 2021, as Covid-19 was sweeping across the world, and with international travel near impossible, I stumbled across the Hong Kong Transport Department’s list of officially licensed ferry and regular kaito services (a kaito being a small motorised boat) that mostly service more remote routes.

By then I’d lived in Hong Kong for more than 12 years. I thought I’d done it all. The famous Star Ferry that shuttles back and forth across Victoria Harbour, the routes between Hong Kong Island and the outlying islands of Lamma and Lantau. Cheung Chau? Been there. Peng Chau? Done that.