Uncharacteristic

Today Beth and I did something out of the ordinary for us. We went hiking. As part of my newly revamped desire to lose weight, I decided that the key to lifelong fitness is for us to become "outdoor people" We'll see how long this lasts (starting the timer ....now!) I've long known that Hong Kong is supposed to be great for hiking, lots of great trails, views, all within close distance to the city. Hong Kong loves to surprise people that think it's just a sprawling, polluted metropolis (it's that too), by stating that 40% of the territory is country parks.

So, I set about to do a little research on where to hike and settled on one called "the Dragon's Back." It's ranked as "the Best Urban Hike in Asia" by Time Magazine. (It wouldn't be very Hong Kong-ish if it didn't top some sort of list) So, this morning we packed our backpacks, grabbed the dog and hailed a cab to our hike. Getting there was difficult by taxi. By MTR and bus, it would have been simple, but having the dog required using a taxi. After a few wrong turns we arrived.

The hike starts off relatively easy, fairly cool due to being shaded by trees. Just as we're remarking on this, we turn onto the actual "Dragon's Back" part of the trail. It's called the dragon's back because it involves a lot of going up and down hills that vaguely look like a dragon's back. On the plus side, this presents some really great views.

The hardest part was dealing with Zoe. I don't know if this is her finally getting old, if it was just too hot and long for her to handle, or if she was just being a drama queen (probably all of the above) But she did get quite tired and hot requiring several stops and we near ran out of water for the 3 of us. Zoe even whined when lying down whether on the trail or in the taxi and so we'll probably leave her out of the next hike. Perhaps she can handle another track in the fall or winter, when the heat dies down.

Here's a couple pictures:

One of the steep climbs on the Dragon's Back (is steeper than it looks)



View from the highest peak of the dragon's back:


And the obligatory 'proof that we actually did this hike' picture:


I would like to point out it is very Hong Kong to have the umbrella with 24/7. Rain or shine, people here like to be protected from the elements above. Though regardless of Beth's use of the umbrella we both finished with quite bad sunburns.