Where to Stay in Hong Kong, Hong Kong

What is Hong Kong known for?

Hong Kong is known as a special administrative region of China, gathered on the country's southern coast. Three parts make it up. Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon peninsula hold the dense core, while the New Territories stretch inland toward the border with Shenzhen.

The harbour between the island and Kowloon is the feature that has shaped the place. British influence, layered over a mainly Chinese population, still marks the streets of this coastal territory.

What are the main landmarks in Hong Kong?

Hong Kong sets its defining sights along the harbour that divides Hong Kong Island from Kowloon. The water is the landmark. On the island shore the central business district rises straight from the harbour edge, its towers climbing the slope behind the waterfront.

Across the crossing the Kowloon peninsula answers with its own dense front of streets facing the same water. Beyond both, the New Territories carry the built-up land north toward Shenzhen and the mainland of China.

What is the history of Hong Kong?

Hong Kong grew from a cluster of coastal settlements on China's southern shore into a single territory of three parts. The harbour drew the first port. British administration began on Hong Kong Island in the middle of the nineteenth century, spread across the water to the Kowloon peninsula, and later reached inland to take in the New Territories north toward what is now Shenzhen.

From these steps the three areas came together as one place under a single administration, the island, the peninsula, and the mainland stretch joined by the harbour between them. The long British period layered its influence over a mainly Chinese population, and that mix still shows in the streets. Later the territory returned to China as a special administrative region.

Through all of it the harbour stayed the constant. The deep water between Hong Kong Island and Kowloon carried the trade that made the place, drawing people and cultural threads from ports as far apart as Vietnam and Vancouver, and it holds the two dense shores together to this day.

Where is Hong Kong?

Hong Kong sits on the southern coast of China, just south of Shenzhen across the mainland border. Three parts form it. Hong Kong Island lies offshore, separated from the Kowloon peninsula by the harbour that runs between them, while the New Territories fill the mainland ground reaching north from Kowloon.

Steep hills back the built-up shores on either side of the water. This division of island, peninsula, and inland territory, all knit by the harbour, gives Hong Kong its shape on the coast of China.

What is the climate of Hong Kong?

Hong Kong has a warm coastal climate set by its place on the southern edge of China. The sea keeps it humid. A long hot and wet summer brings heavy monsoon rain and the risk of storms off the water beyond Hong Kong Island, giving way to a cooler and drier winter.

The harbour and the hills temper the extremes. The nearness of the South China Sea keeps the air over Kowloon and the island mild for much of the year.

How do you get to Hong Kong?

Hong Kong is reached by air, sea, and land, set on the southern coast of China. Ferries cross the harbour. Boats and crossings link Hong Kong Island to the Kowloon peninsula and the wider water, while road and rail run north through the New Territories to the mainland border at Shenzhen.

An airport serves the territory from the western islands. From the arrival points the harbour front on both the island and the Kowloon side lies within easy reach.