Stanley

Narrow lanes under a roof mean rain will not send you away. Most shops lift the shutter around half past ten in the morning and close at dusk. Come after dinner and you find them down. Silk and embroidery are expected to be haggled over.

The building did not start here. It was raised in Central in 1844 as barracks. In 1982 it came apart stone by numbered stone, and in 2001 it went back together on this shore. The columns left over were set up separately in the park behind.

People who went out to sea built it in 1767, and families from the fishing side still keep it. A tiger skin hangs on an inside wall, labelled as an animal taken nearby in 1942.

At the Tuen Ng festival the dragon boat races run just offshore and the sand fills with people shouting at them. Otherwise the bay keeps the swell low, and a centre by the sand hires out windsurfing gear.

Few people come. The main beach is 20 minutes away on foot and no bus reaches here. There are barbecue pits along the back, and at weekends a boat leaves the pier here for the islands to the south.

On one slope there are graves of the 1840s and graves of the 1940s. The earlier ones are garrison families; the later ones are people held on this peninsula during the war. The gate stands open and nobody is on duty.

The canopy is another thing that moved here. The iron roof came off a pier in Central, spent years in a park, and was fixed onto this jetty in 2007. No boats call now; the deck belongs to people fishing.

It exists to show what the inside of a jail looks like. Cells are reproduced at full size, a gallows stands in one room, and no ticket is sold. It shuts on Mondays unless that Monday is a public holiday, and closes for the first two days of Lunar New Year.

Carry more water than you think. The ridge offers almost no shade. The climb starts at the To Tei Wan stop on Shek O Road and follows an easy-graded ridge that drops at its end to Big Wave Bay, where a bus waits. On clear days paragliders launch off the crest.

Four masonry bridges of 1907 still carry the road over the hill north of Stanley. The path round the water is surfaced well enough for a pushchair, and macaques sit along the edge, so carrying food in the open is a poor idea.

A crescent beach on the Stanley bus route. By the Kwun Yam shrine at one end, the Longevity Bridge is said to add three days of life per crossing. The wavy flats behind have a huge hole through them, a feng shui gap for the mountain dragon to reach the sea.

A theme park split between the Wong Chuk Hang shore and a headland summit, linked by a cable car out over the sea. Giant pandas have their own house, and a separate water park opened beside it in 2021. In high wind, a train through the hill takes over.

From the Aberdeen promenade, little wooden sampans carry passengers among the fishing boats and houseboats of the typhoon shelter. Descendants of the boat-dwelling families still run them. Fix the head count and ride length, then agree the fare.

A small village at the southeastern tip of Hong Kong Island, its beachfront lined with restaurants mixing Thai and Cantonese. Behind the village a footbridge leads out onto a knob of rock in the sea. Dragon's Back walkers come down here to rest at the finish.