Discovery Bay, Hong Kong

Monday March 9th, I took a 25-minute ferry ride around 3:30 pm from Hong Kong Island to Lantau Island to the community of Discovery Bay. I had been curious about it and finally just decided to check it out. It was an interesting contrast to the Cheung Chau ferry. This was definitely a more comfortable ferry ride. The ferry was filled with after-school students in uniform. Many of the teenagers were chatting and laughing and the younger ones were literally running up and down the aisles of the ferry racing each other.

On board, I read the Discovery Bay magazine, which discussed houseboats, dog etiquette and golf cart rules. From what I could gather in the magazine and a few other things I read about the place, as well as from my afternoon there, Discovery Bay is quite a family-friendly and pet-friendly community.

Upon disembarking from the ferry, I immediately walked into a modern Spanish-like waterfront shopping mall/plaza/community town center. There is a beautiful large beach immediately to the right, and the town center is straight ahead. I felt at ease walking past some ubiquitous Hong Kong businesses, like Pacific Coffee, Dymock bookstore, Mannings (like Longs in Hawaii) and seeing dogs walked and children walking with their mothers or helpers. It offered many common Hong Kong businesses, but in a quite non-Hong Kong type of environment.

I immediately thought I was in a place like Newport Beach, CA (sans the expensive cars!) or somewhere quite other than Hong Kong. It definitely had an upscale vibe, as well as relaxing, clean and almost eerie perfect like a Stepford world.

It was obvious this place has a huge expat community. On this quiet Monday afternoon, dozens of students were walking about, many with blonde hair and blue eyes. I walked past the plaza, where helpers and some mothers were tending to young children and dogs. It actually had a nice community feeling with all the conveniences of stores, restaurants, ferry to Hong Kong Island, doctors offices, real estate offices, etc all centered around this big plaza.

I strolled through the plaza and on to a pleasant promenade that took me between the beach and some wonderfully-located residential properties. I would love to live in one of those properties right there! Being a little chilly on this day, the beach was quiet, except for a couple being photographed and what looked like a rare Chinese person getting in an afternoon walk. Mostly I saw either caucasians with kids and dogs, or Filipino helpers with kids and dogs on this afternoon in Discovery Bay.

I was enjoying hearing the birds flying and looking at the water, away from the hustle and bustle of busy Hong Kong Island, so I phoned David to take a ferry ride to Discovery Bay when he was done with work. We had dinner at a Mexican restaurant at D Deck, one of the "oceanfront alfresco dining" offerings in the development, as the businesses are marketed. There is a promotion to get a free ferry ride back to Central for spending a certain amount of food eating at one of the D Deck restaurants, so I was sure to take advantage of that.

One of the interesting things about Discovery Bay is that people do not have cars there, but there are golf carts available for the residents. Otherwise there are buses and certain businesses are allowed to have vehicles. This allows for the air to be much cleaner than in areas like Central. This a community with private golf clubs and marinas offering memberships. It's almost like a resort. With the ease of the ferry, it's quite convenient for people who need to work in Central. Also, it's about 15 minutes bus ride or taxi ride to the MTR (train system). I thought it was a pleasant place to visit and I can see why it appeals to some people to want to live there.

This text is straight from Wikipedia website for some interesting information on Discovery Bay:

Discovery Bay (DB) is a mixed development comprising of a residential development and private and and public recreational facilities in Hong Kong situated on the north-eastern coast of Lantau Island in the New Territories. The development spans an area of 650 hectares, and includes two bays, the Tai Pak Bay (大白灣) and Yi Pak Bay (二白灣). Most of the development was rezoned as conservation area after the hand-over when the Government finally had to acknowledge the the development actually breached it's Land Grant.
DB has a current population of around 16,000 residents[1] with a sizeable community of expatriates from over thirty countries. DB is located 2km west of Hong Kong Disneyland and approximately 12km west from the nearest point on Hong Kong Island, with the co-ordinates of 22°17′44″N 114°00′59″E / 22.29556°N 114.01639°E / 22.29556; 114.01639.
As of today, DB consists of 13 residential development phases with properties ranging from garden houses to high rise towers of up to 24 storeys. The development also features a public beach (no life guards), 4 private membership clubs including a golf club and a marina club and a large public park but this has no public recreational facilities at present. The absence of public reacreational facilities is a bone of discontent with the residents especially in view of the fact that the developer has an outstanding obligation to provide 300.000 sqm of them (http://www.aud.gov.hk/pdf_e/e43ch06_summary.pdf). Though is considered a low-density development by Hong Kong standards due to the amount of open spaces (plot to development ratio), DB is however the second most populous district (after the New Town of Tung Chung) on the sparsely populated Lantau Island. Unlike many other developments in Hong Kong, pets are allowed in DB, whereas other developments generally ban them due to limited space.