Discover big heart in small fishing village

SAI Kung town is a great place to wander around. Its bustling harbour and seafood market are fascinating, and its variety of restaurants is above-average for a small fishing port.

The town's trawlers, kaidos and sampans ply their trades under the watchful, but distant, gaze of Tin Hau, the patron goddess of seafarers. Her three-hall temple stands near the junction of Hiram's Highway and old Po Tung Road.

Supposedly founded seven centuries ago in the Sung dynasty, the present building was extensively renovated in 1916, when Sai Kung was at its peak as a market town and the temple flanked the harbourside.

Tradition-conscious town planners have left a symbolic ''fung shui lane'' of open space in front of Tin Hau's shrine, so she can ''see'' and guard the harbour.

Turn your back on her world and go behind the temple for an amble through the shrinking remnant of Sai Kung's century-old market town. Its maze of narrow lanes contains some derelict yet imposing merchants' mansions, old general stores, and the sounds and aromas of a rural market.

It is an old-style world of beancurd manufacture, herbal medicines, mahjong games, fresh vegetables and dried goods.

Emerging on the harbourside, enjoy the open-air sights and aromas of Sai Kung Hoi, the Inner Port Shelter whose island-studded waters formed a secure anchorage and prompted Sai Kung's original function as a boat-people haven.