Hiking, snorkelling, strange rocks, perhaps a seafood lunch – Hong Kong’s small islands offer plenty for the visitor

While many of Hong Kong’s 200-plus islands are barren rocks, there are plenty of others that can be reached by ferry, speedboat or even kayak

A world away from the bustle of the city and sparsely populated at best, these islands are havens for marine life and offer hiking and curious rock formations

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Basalt Island (above) is one of more than 200 islands in Hong Kong waters. Most are undeveloped, uninhabited and a short boat trip from the city. Photo: Martin Chan

Ed Peters

Published: 12:45pm, 23 Feb 2022Updated: 1:02pm, 23 Feb 2022

Hong Kong’s outlying islands have a habit of vanishing.

Chek Lap Kok metamorphosed into an airport. Stonecutters Island – which within living memory was favoured for its coral reefs – is now bolted to the Kowloon peninsula and hosts a Chinese People’s Liberation Army naval base and a world-class sewage treatment plant.

In the 1950s, naturists made a beeline for Wok Tai Wan on Tsing Yi, an island which at the time barely supported any houses, let alone skyscrapers, malls and one end of a 2km-long suspension bridge.

Kau Yi Chau is threatened with becoming part of the humungous Lantau Tomorrow project to build housing on islands, most of them artificial. And so it goes on, with reclamation gobbling up more islands as the years go by.

Chek Lap Kok in an undated photo, before it was flattened and its surrounding waters reclaimed to form Hong Kong’s new international airport. Photo: SCMP

Apart from the usual suspects – Cheung Chau, Peng Chau, Lamma, Lantau – most of Hong Kong’s 200 islands are barren rock. Those that still support a community, with a ferry service, are often besieged by city dwellers yearning to breathe free in the time of Covid-19, particularly at weekends and on public holidays.