Private Cheung Chau Island Hong Kong Tour 2027
A Real Alternative to the Lantau Island Hong Kong Tours
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Me Jamie, your host, I am English and I have lived in Hong Kong since January 2nd 1972 - I know the place.
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Private Cheung Chau Island Hong Kong Tour 2027
Foreword by Jamie
A Real Alternative to the Lantau Island Hong Kong Tours
One of the things that slightly irritates me is how the tourism industry promotes Cheung Chau Island and yes, it revolves around the iconic bun festival, so what is my beef, simple - for a visitors it is a 2 day fluctuating event (the dates change every year) and it is normally in late May and what the Tourism people do not dwell on is that the event comes with massive crowds, massive queues for the Ferry and it just overwhelming but not in a good way, just a personal opinion and for the life of me I cannot understand why anyone would book a trip to Hong Kong just for the bun festival
Hong Konf has many festivals all year round, so there is plenty going on for cultural stuff but most of the festivals are not on a remote island with a 2 hour round trip ferry service
I have been going to Cheung Chau since I was a boy. We arrived in Hong Kong on 2nd January 1972, and the first time I went over was that same year. It looked quite different. More than 50 years on, and well over 150 visits, the ferry from Central Pier 5 still does the same job. You leave the noise, you sit on the outdoor upper deck at the stern, and about an hour later you are in a town that has no private cars, a working typhoon shelter, and a temple that has been there since 1783 and it is quite a contrast to Urban Hong Kong
This post is the 5 hour private tour. Cheung Chau only. It is for people who are in Hong Kong for 2 or 3 days and can give one of those days to an island trip. I also used to run an 8 hour Victoria Peak and Cheung Chau tour, and I am bringing that back. That is a separate booking, and I have put it in its own section. The islands blog post I did on Lamma.Peng Chau and Cheung Chau is still there if you want the wider ferry read.
I have walked this island on my own time for decades, and I have taken guests when the stay was short and the city had already had its turn. It is not a tour I invent on the pier. The shape and logistics of it is fixed by the ferry schedule
Why this is a 5 hour tour
A Cheung Chau tour is the ferry plus the island. I collect you at the hotel. I do not ask you to find Central Pier 5 on your own. Central Pier 5 to the Cheung Chau pier is about 55 to 60 minutes on the ordinary ferry, and 35 to 40 minutes on the fast ferry. We take the ordinary ferry both ways if it is practical. That is not a second best option. The upper deck has an outdoor section at the stern, you pay a small extra tap to sit up there, and for me that hour on the water is one of the best aspects of the tour. I have done the crossing more than 150 times. I still want the outdoor seats.
Do the arithmetic with the ordinary ferry and the shape is still honest. Hotel pickup, about an hour on the water, the island, a meal, about an hour back, hotel drop off. That is the 5 hour tour. The meal is not an extra I might fit in. It is part of the tour. (but you can pass on the meal if you wish) A row of rustic restaurants sits about a 2 minute walk from the pier, cheap and cheerful, and the food is great. Most meals there take 30 to 40 minutes, not a long sitting. That still leaves a proper walk: The Pak Tai Temple, the praya, the typhoon shelter, the lanes behind the pier, and Tung Wan Beach if the pace is right. It does not leave time for a cave adventure, it never has and never will, so I do not do the cave. It can eat an hour before you have started the story.
Coming back, the ordinary ferry is still my choice, and it is the one we book unless you say otherwise. If the afternoon has run long, or you would rather have 20 minutes back, we can take the fast ferry on the return. That is your call, not a default. I will not pretend the fast boat is the same ride. It is quicker, and it is indoors.
The 8 hour pairing I am bringing back
I used to pair Victoria Peak and Cheung Chau as an 8 hour tour. I did it 20 or 30 times, about 10 years ago, and then it faded. I am bringing it back, as an alternative to the Victoria Peak and Big Buddha pairing. Same idea. Peak first, island second. The difference is the ferry instead of the Ngong Ping cable car, and a seafood meal on Cheung Chau instead of the plaza at the Big Buddha. I can make the timing work. What I will not do is walk anyone up a hill on the island. It sounds easy. It is not. The 8 hour version is hotel pickup and hotel drop off, same as the 5 hour. If you want that longer tour, say so when you contact me. The 5 hour island tour is the one this post is built around.
The reason Cheung Chau dropped off my radar is quite simple. Everyone wants to go to Lantau Island and do the Big Buddha and Tai O Fishing Village. That is the Hong Kong Tourism Board poster tour, not a small island with a ferry and a temple. It is impossible for Cheung Chau to compete against that, and the bookings went where the poster went. A blog post might bring a few people back to the island. I am not holding my breath.
Even 10 years ago, when I was still doing the island regularly, most of the visitors to Cheung Chau were Hong Kong residents. They came for a quieter escape, not for a sightseeing list. There are flats to rent, and there is the Warwick Hotel, which is where my wife and I stayed a few times in the mid 1980s. A friend who has lived on the island for close to 30 years says the same thing now. The crowds are still mainly Hong Kong residents, and Sunday is when they come. He has also noticed more Mainland China tour groups on the ferry. That is new. It is not the old weekday private tour, and it is not a reason for me to start taking Sundays.
A Tuesday in October is the island I want you to see. A Sunday is a poor fit, full stop. Hong Kong people flock over, the pier queue starts before you have left Central, and the lanes are not the quiet town. Festival week is a third thing entirely, and I have put that in its own section, because it should not be booked by accident.
What the other listings sell
Only a few people in the private tour circle list Cheung Chau as its own product, so I had a look at what is actually on offer. The pattern is familiar. A 4 hour cultural walk. A 7 hour version with a sampan and a long meal sitting. A 5.5 hour product with a meal already priced in. A festival day boat with a meal somewhere else on the way home. The prices on those listings run from something that looks cheap per person on an OTA (such as Viator) up to a private fee that is not far from a proper guide rate, once you notice the ferry is extra.
Some of that is fine. Some of it is padding. The cave is the main one. It is a real place, and the pirate story is a real story, but getting there and back can swallow the middle of the tour. I do not do the cave. I tell Cheung Po Tsai from the praya, with the shelter in front of us, and we keep the time for the meal and the temple.
The thing most listings skim, once you take the cave out, is the reason the island looks the way it does. The town sits on the narrow middle of a dumbbell. The two ends are hills. The shelter, the temple, the beach and the lanes are all on that middle strip, which is why a 5 hour tour works at all. You are not crossing a district. You are walking a fishing town that still goes to work. I stay on that middle strip. I do not take guests up the hills.
A few figures, so the island is not a postcard image
These are the numbers I keep in my head when someone asks whether Cheung Chau is a village or a town.
About 2.45 square kilometres. The Chinese name means long island, which is why adding the word island is slightly redundant, and why everyone still says it.
19,769 people at the 2021 census. That is a town. Close to 4,450 of them were 65 and over, roughly 22%.
Highest ground about 95 metres. This is not a hike unless you choose to make it one.
No bridge, no MTR (Subway), no private cars. The ferry timetable is the front door.
Pak Tai Temple, 1783, Grade I historic building. Still in use.
Bun Festival main day: the 8th day of the 4th lunar month. Parade day in 2026 is Sunday 24th May. Main day in 2027 is Thursday 13th May.
The ferry is the start of the tour
I pick you up at the hotel and I drop you back at the hotel. That is the start and the finish, on this tour and on the 8 hour pairing. We do not meet at Central Pier 5. I get us there, we take the ordinary ferry, and at the end of the island time I bring you back to the hotel. There is nowhere for a private car on Cheung Chau itself. The ferry is the crossing. The hotel door is where the tour begins and ends.
Sun Ferry runs the service. As of the fare change on 1st April 2026, a weekday adult ticket is HK$16.70 on the ordinary ferry (about US$2.15) and HK$32.90 on the fast ferry (about US$4.20). On Sundays and public holidays those figures are HK$24.80 (about US$3.20) and HK$47.60 (about US$6.10). The outdoor upper deck is a small extra tap on top of the ordinary fare, and it is worth it. Public transport on my tours is covered. The full inclusions and exclusions list sits on the FAQ page and on Prices | Book Now. I am not going to reprint the small print here and then have it drift.
We go up the stairs, tap for the upper deck, and sit outside at the stern. Lantau on one side, the shipping on the other, and an hour that does not feel like an hour. The first time I did this was in 1972. The boats were different, the island was different, and the outdoor seats are still the part I will not swap for a faster cabin unless you ask me to on the way back.
What we actually do
The pier puts you straight onto the praya. Fishing boats, the shelter, dried seafood, the odd village vehicle growling past because it is the only vehucler allowed, and the restaurant row about a 2 minute walk away. I like to see the shape of the place before we sit down. The meal is coming. It is not the first 10 minutes.
The Pak Tai Temple is the anchor. It dates from 1783, it is a Grade I historic building, and it is not a quiet museum. People still use it. Pak Tai is the Taoist lord of the north, the one the fishing families asked to deal with plague and pirates. The bun towers belong to that story, not to a food festival that someone invented for visitors. I will explain the swords, the incense, and why the ground in front of the temple becomes the centre of the island for a few days each spring. If a ceremony is on, we stand back and watch. I do not march a group through people who are there to pray.
From the temple the lanes run south through the town. This is the part I like. Wet market, school bags, hardware, the small Tin Hau shrines, the gap between the two beaches. You can tell who lives here and who came over for the afternoon, and the difference is not the camera. It is the shopping bag and the ferry time they are already counting.
Tung Wan is the east beach, the one with the windsurf sails on a breezy day. Kwun Yam Wan, which most people call Afternoon Beach, is over the rise. The Warwick Hotel sits on that east side. I stayed there with my wife a few times in the mid 1980s, when a night on Cheung Chau still felt like leaving Hong Kong. The rock carvings just beyond it are Bronze Age, declared a monument in 1982. On a 5 hour tour we only walk out there if the pace is right and you want them. They are worth it. They are not compulsory.
The bun towers, and a festival that is not a photo prop
The Cheung Chau Bun Festival, Tai Ping Ching Chiu if you want the temple name, falls on the 8th day of the 4th lunar month. In 2026 the parade day is Sunday 24th May, with the bun scrambling final overnight into the 25th. In 2027 the main day is Thursday 13th May. The lead up runs for several days. Taoist rites at Pak Tai, opera, the three bun towers going up, vegetarian food in the old pattern, and the Piu Sik parade, which is the children balanced on the frames, dressed as figures from opera and story. Tens of thousands of people come over. The ferry company issues special boarding arrangements for monthly ticket holders, because the pier cannot work in the normal way.
A few plain facts, because the pretty version leaves them out. The old free climb on the bamboo towers was stopped after a collapse in 1978. People were killed and injured. The scramble came back in 2005 on a steel tower, with harnesses, for registered competitors. Visitors watch. Visitors do not climb. If someone tells you they can get you up the tower, they are not telling you the truth.
The bun is the blessing. At the end of the festival the buns are shared out, and plenty of Hong Kong families still treat one as a lucky thing to take home. The climb is the late addition, and the bit the cameras came for. The temple is the point. I would rather you understood that order than leave with a photograph of a pink tower and no idea why it is there.
Festival week is a different booking from the 5 hour island tour. I will do it if you want the festival, and you should say so when you contact me, because the boats, the crowds and the timing are not the weekday version. If you want the quiet island, do not book the Sunday of the parade and hope it will feel the same. It will not. If you are in Hong Kong in that May window and you have never seen it, it is one of the few Hong Kong festivals that still belongs to the place it is held in.
The pirate story, told from the praya
Cheung Po Tsai is the early 19th century pirate the cave is named for. He started on the other side of the law and ended, as a lot of successful pirates did, with a pardon and a rank. The story on the island is that he used the southwest rocks as a hide out. I tell that from the praya, with the shelter in front of us. (shades of Jack Sparrow!)
I do not do the cave. The walk out, the sampan, and the crawl through a small hole can eat a large part of the tour, and on a 5 hour run that time belongs to the temple, the lanes and the meal. You still get the pirate. You do not lose an hour to a hole in the rock.
There is a McDonald's and a 7-Eleven by the pier. I mention it because first time visitors often arrive expecting a deserted rock, and the iced coffee is the thing that resets the picture. You are in a Hong Kong town that happens to be on an island. The school run still happens. The hardware shop still matters. The ferry commute is how a lot of working age residents spend the morning.
The meal, two minutes from the pier
The meal is the other anchor, but it is oprional. About a 2 minute walk from the pier there is a row of rustic restaurants, cheap and cheerful, great food, the sort of place Hong Kong people actually sit down in. Seafood, noodles, whatever is on the board that day. A meal there takes 30 to 40 minutes on average. You pay for what you order. I am not going to rush you out in 15 minutes, and I am not going to let it turn into a 90 minute sitting either. Tell me if someone does not eat seafood. There is always another dish. HK$200 to HK$400 a head is a sensible figure for that meal, more if you order a whole fis, I have never strayed from the budget set menue which brings the per head cost to HK$100 - hk$200
No cars, and the buggy you will hear before you see
Private cars are not allowed. The lanes could not take them. What you do hear is the village vehicle, a small petrol buggy that residents and businesses use for goods, and the ambulance or the fire engine when they are needed. The buggies are loud. They are also the reason the wet market functions. Visitors either find them charming for about 10 seconds or spend the walk complaining about them. I tell you that at the pier, so it is not a surprise at the temple., personally if there was ever a vehicle that needed an e version it would be these darn village vehicles
This is why the island still feels different after 50 years of Hong Kong rebuilding everything else. No bridge. No MTR (Subway). No private car at the door. People who commute to Hong Kong Island organise the day around the timetable. That is the modern story, and it is more interesting than another pirate anecdote if I have to choose. The island is not preserved for you. It is lived in, and the ferry is how that works.
Wind, a gold medal, and no hill
Cheung Chau is where Hong Kong windsurfing grew up. Lee Lai Shan, San San, won Olympic gold in the women's mistral class at Atlanta in 1996. She trained on this water. It was Hong Kong's first Olympic gold. On a breezy day the sails off Tung Wan still explain the medal better than a plaque does. I point the beach out. I do not turn the tour into a sports history lecture unless you want that.
I will not hike up any hill on this island. A path on the southern high ground looks easy on a listing. It is not, and it is not this tour. We stay on the town, the praya and the beach edge. The hours belong to you. The pace belongs to the people in front of me.
Who this is for, and who should book something else
This is the tour I suggest when the stay is short and the city tours are already booked, or when someone has said they want one stretch of time that does not feel like Central. Couples do well on it. Parents with older children do well on it. Guests over 60 do well on it, because the walking is flat if we keep to the town and the praya. I will say so if a path is a poor idea.
A Sunday is a poor fit. Hong Kong people flock over, and the island does not feel like the weekday version. Festival week is busier again. I also do not generally take cruise ship passengers to Cheung Chau. A ferry can run late, or break down, and we are a long way from town if the ship has a sailing time. If that is your booking, tell me and I will point you to a tour that stays on the city side of the harbour.
It is also a poor fit if you want a marathon pace. If you want Victoria Peak and the island in one booking, that is the 8 hour pairing, not a squeezed 5 hours. Group size is 1 to 6. Children 17 and under, with a paying adult, are free. I have 800+ Tripadvisor reviews and 2,400+ tours behind me since 2010. The reviews are not the tour. The 5 hours are the tour.
I like Cheung Chau Island, always have, the ferry ride, the slow pace of life and the contrast between urban Hong Kong and the Island is quite something, it is worth your time.
Prices
Prices are the total fee for the group, not a fee per person. I publish in US$. To think in Hong Kong dollars, multiply by 7.80. A fifth or sixth adult is US$70 (about HK$546) extra. Six is the cap. Cash on the day, in US$ or HK$, no deposit. About 90% of guests pay in US$ cash.
Examples only, so the arithmetic is clear. The 5 hour line follows the same grid as the rest of the private tours.
5 hours, 1 person: US$480 (about HK$3,744)
5 hours, 2 people: US$550 (about HK$4,290)
5 hours, 3 people: US$620 (about HK$4,836)
5 hours, 4 people: US$690 (about HK$5,382)
The revived 8 hour Victoria Peak and Cheung Chau tour uses the 8 hour line on the same grid. Examples only: 1 person US$690 (about HK$5,382), 2 people US$760 (about HK$5,928), 3 people US$830 (about HK$6,474), 4 people US$900 (about HK$7,020). Same rule. The live page wins.
Those figures match the way the grid was working in my September 2026 posts. They are not a promise that a number in a blog post has stood still. The only valid and up to date price list is on my Prices | Book Now page. Please use that page, and the calendar and the booking form on it, not this paragraph, if the two ever disagree.
Don’t take my word for it
Tripadvisor has Cheung Chau Island at 4.3 out of 5, from 1,518 reviews, and ranks it 29th of 1,543 things to do in Hong Kong. The written reviews are warmer than that rank. Most people describe an easy escape from Central, a pleasant ferry, no cars, a beach and a seafood meal. The complaints are about Sundays, heat, and the island being smaller than the listing made it sound.
5 things reviewers praise
The ferry itself, ordinary or fast, as part of the day rather than a transfer.
No private cars, and a town you can walk.
Seafood by the pier, plus the giant fish ball and mango mochi.
Tung Wan beach, often called clean, with lifeguards on duty.
Pak Tai Temple and a slower pace than Central. A fair number say 4 to 6 hours is enough.
5 things reviewers complain about
Sundays and public holidays. The word crowded comes up again and again, and they mean Hong Kong residents on a day out.
Summer heat and humidity. More than one review says it would have been better in cooler weather.
The small motor buggies. People arrive expecting silence, then complain about the noise.
"Not much else." A recurring line is that once you have had the meal and the beach, the island is small.
Hills and paths that look easy and are not. A few also call a seafood meal expensive, though that is a minority next to the crowd complaint.
The pattern matches what I say. Tripadvisor likes Cheung Chau as a local escape, not as a rival to the Big Buddha. The Sunday warning is the clearest negative on the page,
How to book
Contact me with the date, the number of guests, and whether you want the 5 hour island tour or the 8 hour Victoria Peak and Cheung Chau pairing. If someone does not eat seafood, say so. If someone cannot do steps, say so. I will come back with a yes, a different timing, or an honest no. Sundays and cruise ship windows are the two I will usually say no to.
The FAQ page has the rules I do not want to argue about on the pier. Prices | Book Now has the calendar. If I am already taken, I will tell you quickly and refer you ro a trusted friend
So there you go.
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