Lamma Island

Yesterday was a spectacularly clear and hot day and a group of us from my church headed off to Lamma Island (one of Hong Kong's many outlying islands). The plan was to stop for lunch upon arrival at one end of the island and walk to the other end (a good hour's walk) with a refreshing swim along the way. We had the lunch. Some of us had the swim, but the hour's walk was happily forfeited (by me at least) with the view of tackling it at a later and rather much cooler date. Lamma Island has no roads because there aren't any cars (or is it the other way around) and it has a wonderful holiday, bohemian feel to it. There are bars and restaurants and shops selling all manner of things from clothes and knick-knacks to seafood, fruit & veg, snacks and plastic things to play with at the beach. It's great! In fact I started day-dreaming about living there until I thought through the logistics of carrying shopping home from Hong Kong island (there's no supermarket on Lamma), or purchasing something large like say, a fridge... and I decided it may be more fun for day trips or holidays.

The beach was a 15 minute walk from where we had lunch, by which time we were wet with sweat from the stroll in the heat. One of the girls taught me how to say "my clothes are wet" in Cantonese which I think might be a useful expression as an answer to "how are you?" eg. "How are you?", "my clothese are wet". It pretty much sums up the situation... basically saying, "well, hot and bothered actually, thanks for asking". I was really looking forward to having a swim and was BITTERLY disappointed to find that the water was FILTHY. I mean, we had plastic bags in every stage of disintegration and all manner of other waste. It quickly became apparent that none of the foreigners on the beach were going in. Apart from that it was warm and the whole effect was like a tepid soup going off in the sun. It's not always like that we were assured by an expat resident. It was coming from the River Delta in China. China has a lot to answer for!!

After not swimming at the beach we had a cup of cold elderberry tea at a little tea farm and then 3 of our gang went on to explore the windmills and the rest of us turned around and headed back to the ferry. Which we missed by 30 seconds. Note to self: now THAT would be annoying if you were heading to work in the morning if you lived here. So we went back to the nearest bar to take the edge off the disappointment and general 'hot and botheredness'. The drink did wonders and before we knew it the next ferry was due and we headed home. Can't wait to go back. Check out the pics - the link is under 'my pics' called "Lamma Island July 07".