Reply To: Hong Kong’s Historic Boulder Trails

#8837

Email from Guy Shirra:

https://sites.google.com/site/hongkongbouldertrackways/

How You Can Help

When you are out running or walking in the countryside, please take note of any of Hong Kong’s ancient roads or boulder trackways and stone bridges and waymarkers you encounter. These are paths made hundreds of years ago for the movement of people and goods between towns and villages and are surely worth preserving as part of HK’s heritage. A HK wide survey is now being conducted to build a complete record of all that remain. We then hope to get them way-marked and included in The Countryside maps in a distinctive manner.

當你於郊外遠足或跑步時,請留意路上任何由大石砌成的古道。這些道路已有上百年的歷史,是昔日居民往返兩地鄉鎮及運送物資的主要通道,絕對值得保存。我們現正為這些古道進行一項全面的野外調查及紀錄,繼而將其標示於香港的郊區地圖上。請幫忙填寫這份表格,連同相關照片電郵至

Assistance has already been offered in the Sai Kung area by Outward Bound and the Friends of Sai Kung but Guy Shirra is looking for volunteers to assist him initially in locating boulder trackways in Sai Kung District, photographing them and building up a complete map of them.

He is also hoping to find volunteers in every rural district, including Hong Kong Island, who can do the same.

The eventual aim will be to submit the results of the survey to the Secretary for Development/Commissioner for Heritage and relevant government departments in order to:

1.      have them recognised as the oldest surviving examples of Chinese “built heritage” in Hong Kong and preserved and protected as such

2.       have the best examples declared Monuments, the ultimate form of protection

3.       have them, where necessary, sensitively restored and maintained (without the use of cement or concrete)

4.      have paths, and bridges in particular, which have been unnecessarily concreted over uncovered and restored

5.      have them marked in a distinctive manner on all future editions of the Countryside maps for the benefit of walkers, runners and tourists

6        have them distinctively way-marked on the ground

Further information and a Survey Form can be found under Project Documents.