I set out to find another hash route up Mount Davis, which
sits on the northwestern edge of the island a mile from our flat. It is riddled
with ghost villages that were once fortifications and later occupied by now-departed
squatters.
I misread the map. Where a trail should have joined a road,
I wandered into dense forest with barely discernible path. I pressed on – it had
to pop out soon.
Ten minutes later, I had lost the trail. All around was bamboo,
gnarly trees and spider webs. I couldn’t even make out the way I had come.
I found a dry riverbed to clamber down, using trees to jump
from rock to rock. As I started to get desperate, I stumbled upon a drainage
channel. These always lead to civilisation!
It emerged abruptly facing one of the hillside cemeteries
that dot HK. After heaving myself over a chest-high wall, drenched in sweat, I
walked around the beautiful graves. After admiring how immaculately kept it was for some time, it began to feel eerie – I had
not seen another soul and I could see no roads,
buildings or entrances.
I rounded a bend and saw fields of plots populated only by
orange/white stalk-like birds that flapped lazily away. A dream?
Eventually, I found a man in front of a big gate. Startled,
he jumped up looking terrified and stammered, “Is private property!” I gestured
at my scrapes, muddy knees and the hill and looked lost. He fumbled open the
lock, eyeing me strangely.
Only later did an old HK-hand point out that, with my white
skin and being covered in earth, the poor man may have actually thought I was a
ghost...
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