A very lush and green Sham Chung awaited us on 23 August 2009, when we went on a field trip to look for a few things: a datum boulder that HK Maritime Museum Director Stephen Davies had told us about, and lithics from the pre-historic period, noted in local archaeological journals. We were also hoping to interview local residents for information related to underwater heritage sites that might contribute to our project.

Unfortunately, we were out of luck with the datum boulder (a reference point marker for maritime surveys), which would have been of historic interest, but we did find a pebble beach with scattered chips of black rock, possibly the same as that described in the journals (see photo below). We also met a very friendly Mr Lee, owner of a restaurant in Sham Chung, and found out that most of the land in the area had recently been acquired by Sun Hung Kai Properties, who had approval to develop it into a Spa Resort.

Later that afternoon, we visited Tap Mun and Ko Lau Wan to interview local residents about some wreck sites noted in our records, but no one seemed to know about these. They did, however, tell us about several other sites, including one around Tap Mun, where some stone lions had been sighted. Ricky, a passionate scuba diving instructor, set us up for our next trip, which is detailed in the Tap Mun Stone Lion News article.

(Below: Map of Sham Chung and Tap Mun, an abandoned section of Sham Chung village, chips of black rock, the Tin Hau temple and a model junk at Tap Mun)