Silvermine Waterfall, Mui Wo, Lantau Island – Enjoy a BBQ in Beautiful Surroundings

I live in a lovely part of the world: Mui Wo on Lantau Island in Hong Kong.

Mui Wo sits on Silvermine Bay, South Lantau, so called because there was a silver mine in the hills behind the bay, that was worked in the second half of the 19th Century – 1862, until work stopped in 1896.

The entrance to the mine was a cave, which you can still enter, but which has been sealed off about 20 meters in.

Today, though, I want to take you to the Silvermine Waterfall, which is right next to the old mine and about a 25-minute walk from the Mui Wo ferry.

There is a signposted route to the waterfall, which takes you through Tai Tei Tung and up to Pak Ngan Heung on the way.

But there’s a prettier route – particularly if you like lots of greenery.

It starts at the ferry terminal, and the pictures that follow show you the way.

So when you exit the terminal bear to your right:

Follow the path past the Mui Wo Cooked Food market (some wonderful seafood to be had in the restaurants in there), past some small shops and some restrooms (a good idea to go if you need to, as there aren’t any others for a while).

After the restrooms you’ll pass a refuse site (nice, I know) and you turn onto the path down to the walkway:

Follow the walkway around the edge of the bay (there are some nice views across the bay) and when you come to the end turn right across the bridge over the Silver River:

Cross the bridge and keep straight on towards the hotel (the Silvermine Resort) but turn left just before the Resort:

Walk down that path but when the track turns right just keep straight on past that big tree and some shops on your right, to where the path crosses a road:

When you get to the road and the end of the shops, turn right, up the rise and head for that white wall you can see in this picture:

When you get close to that wall you will see this track going down the hill:

Follow that path and just keep going. At the bottom there is another rest room (last chance!) and you’ll pass some houses on the left.

You’ll be walking along beside a small river and eventually you’ll come to a fork in the path – take the left one:

From the ferry pier it will have taken you around 15 minutes to get here, depending on how fast you walk, of course!

So follow the path and soon you’ll see some wetlands to your right:

Continuing along the path you’ll climb up a small hill, and from the top you’ll see this path leading down the other side:

When you reach the bottom, the path bends round to the right and you’ll see some more wetlands – quite often there will be small herds of water buffalo there, grazing or chewing the cud:

The path will then turn to the left, over a bridge and you’ll come to some steps. At the top of these steps you need to turn sharp right, almost back on yourself:

You need to be heading in this direction (you can see the path you’ve just come up in the bottom left of this picture):

So follow the path until you get to this fork, and take the right one:

And you’ve arrived! (It will have taken you about 20 – 25 minutes from the ferry).

This is the BBQ and picnic area. Those yellow balls in the BBQ pits are there because we’re under Covid-19 restrictions at the moment, and gatherings of people are prohibited.

I climbed down into what would normally be the stream below the falls to take the picture below. It’s looking up to the top of the falls.

We’ve had a very dry winter and spring, so there’s very little water coming over the falls at the moment, but in the summer when we’ve had some rain it looks a lot more spectacular:

And, turning around, this is the stream flowing away from the falls. You can swim in those pools – in the summer the water is wonderfully cool and absolutely crystal clear:

This is looking up from the stream to the shaded part of the BBQ and picnic area (it’s all pretty shaded, actually, there are lots of trees around!):

This place gets quite crowded over the weekends, but a group of us meet up in Mui Wo occasionally during the week and take a picnic up to the waterfall.

It’s a great place to have a BBQ and to chill out, especially as you can swim in those pools and you have plenty of shade from the sun.

But I do recommend going during the week if you can – unless you like the crowds, of course!

Getting there

From Central take the ferry to Mui Wo (pier 6 at the Central ferry piers). You can check the ferry times here.

Once you arrive at Mui Wo pick up the trail from the images above.

There are two types of ferry: the fast one takes 30 minutes and the slow one takes 50 minutes.

If it’s a nice day, and you’re not in any rush, the slow ferry has an open deck at the back where you can sit and get a great view of the islands as you cross to Mui Wo.

Of course, in the summer it’s pretty hot so you may prefer the fast ferry, which is air-conditioned..!

Have you visited the Silvermine Waterfall? What did you think?

If you like hiking in Hong Kong you might find this app useful. It details Hong Kong hiking trails – maps, routes and other details:

Cheers,

Martin Malden
The Expat Traveller