Cheung Chau Vacation

This week is our spring break. It comes so late in the year because it coincides with the Chinese Labor Day. We had our Chinese New Year break at the start of February, and now we have our spring break. It's great knowing we only have six weeks left of school when we go back.

For the break, we decided to go somewhere nearby since I wouldn't be too comfortable traveling too far. We headed to the little island of Cheung Chau, just a 30 minute ferry ride from Hong Kong. The weather was a little rainy and windy, but we got a couple of good days in on the beach. We went with another couple, and Sophia had fun playing with their twin boys.

Cheung Chau is an interesting shape. The middle part, with the harbour on one side and the beach on the other, is very thin. The two ends are hilly and much bigger. The island doesn't have any cars except for ambulances and police. They do use little motorized carts to get things around the island, though. The island has an interesting ambiance, kind of Cancun-ish/Chinese. It was nice to be in a place where you could feel a little bit more of the culture.

While we were there, they were preparing for their annual bun festival. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about the bun festival.

"Cheung Chau's Bun Festival, which draws tens of thousands of local and overseas tourists every year, is staged to mark the Eighth day of the Fourth Moon, in the Chinese calendar (this is usually in early May). It coincides with the local celebration of Buddha's Birthday.

The Cheung Chau Bun Festival began as a fun and exciting ritual for fishing communities to pray for safety from pirates. Today this religious origin has largely been forgotten, and the festival has mainly become a showcase of traditional Chinese culture.

One story of the origin of the festival is that in the 18th Century the island of Cheung Chau was devastated by a plague and infiltrated by pirates until local fishermen brought an image of the god Pak Tai to the island. Paraded through the village lanes, the deity drove away evil spirits. Villagers also disguised themselves as different deities and walked around the island to drive away the evil spirits."

Apparently, the buns bring good luck and they chase away the loose spirits. It's all meant to bring good luck to the island. We didn't actually get to see the bun festival, but we saw the preparations leading up to it. Incidentally, the whole island goes vegetarian three days before. The last day we were there even the McDonalds was serving veggie burgers. Excellent for me, not so good for everyone else.

I couldn't get the pictures in order of the trip, but you'll get the jist.



There is a pirate cave on the island. We hiked up to it, and Joe explored. Sophia and I stayed on the outside. Sophia did, however, find this crevice and claim it as her home. Pooh, Piglet, Roo, Kanga, and Eeyore all had homes nearby.
Hiking and hiking.
An old tree growing on top of a roof.
There were several temples on the island. We saw three or four of them.






This is the Pak Tai temple, the temple of the god that got rid of the pirates and plague.
Street workers cleaned the stairs and roads throughout the town. Their hats are interesting to me.

The lucky buns. Many people worked to string them together and to put them on the towers. They are filled with a sweet and sticky rice and sesame goo.

Effigies for the ceremony.The great bun towers.


The most popular form of travel, bikes. They are everywhere!
The typhoon shelter is full of boats. We enjoyed the sunset one night at dinner along the water. Every night we would walk down to the main strip along the water and have dinner. Mainly Chinese food, but tons of seafood. There was also a Thai restaurant, Indian restaurant and, of course, McDonalds.
We got in a couple of nice days at the beach. The kids didn't want to go in the water anyway. They just loved playing in the sand. Sophia was cracking herself up by pouring water on her hair.


After a gardening unit during Earth Week at school, Sophia is very into tending her "garden" and watering her flowers.

We hiked up to the Mini Great Wall. We didn't even realize we were walking on this mini-Great Wall. We were looking for it, and then we realized they must just mean the path we were on.

There were several boulders that had earned names for their resemblance to other things. This one is Elephant Rock.The rocky coastline.

Fire beaters along the path. Never seen those before!Sophia made it up all the stairs. I'm sure it felt like the Great Wall to her.A view of the island from above.Not sure about this sign. Does it mean tie your dog here or make your dog go the bathroom here?Boats in the harbour.There were fish drying everywhere. You could buy bags of dried seafood. We tried out the dried shrimp. It really stunk, but Sophia loved it. She's a big seafood lover.


Lots of vegetation and some typical apartments.

Overall, our trip was great. When we got back, Sophia was crying and crying. She just kept saying, "I want to go back." After a good night's rest, she had recovered. Who knows what her next adventure will be.