Lantau Island – Big Buddha, Po Lin Monastery, Tai O

The image above is from the Big Buddha on Lantau Island – Gary, you would love this! It’s the largest free-standing Buddha in the world.

On our first day in HK, Ton and I arrived very early. After dropping off our stuff at our hotel and a quick breakfast we caught the MRT (underground) to Lantau Island (one of the islands that makes up HK) to visit this incredible landmark.

There are 2 ways to get up to the Big Buddha, as shown below. You can either trek up there on a narrow walk, which would probably take all day, or catch the cable car up the hill. No points for guessing what we did.

The cable car took us to what was basically a whole development of tourist shops. The first time I was here (probably about 10 year ago) there was nothing like this up here. It’s a shame that it’s become so touristy, but I guess everyone needs to move with the times.

From this area, we had to climb stairs to get up the top, which was a nice bit of exercise – no need for a gym.

Once we had a look around we walked back down to have vego lunch at the Po Lin Monastery, which is about 200m from the base of the Buddha. On the way there I engaged in a spot of monk-stalking to get this shot of a female monk preparing some flowers for the Temple there.

Out the front of the temple the faithful were burning incense, including the fattest, biggest incense I have seen in my life.

After lunch we caught a cab to Tai O fishing village. Last time I was there it was a tiny little village with dirt roads. Now it’s a pretty developed little township with a decent wharf. We didn’t end up staying there very long.

Wow, finally finished the first day. Hope you enjoyed. More to come.
KK