(written by Cait)
When traveling or being on my own, I try to take certain precautions so I don’t attract unwanted attention. On this day on Lantau at Cheung Sha Beach, the plan was to keep my nice Nikon DSLR camera hidden safely in my bag until after I left the beach (basically I don’t want my shit stolen off my towel when I go into the water to cool down). Well that plan went to hell five minutes after I stepped on the sand. Gazing at the mountains and bright blue sky, something dark up on the beach caught my attention. What the…? Are those water buffaloes? Indeed, they were, but not grazing in the grass like I had seen on my last trip to Lantau, see Don’t Feed the Feral Cows. I was looking at two water buffalo heads, sticking out of a little pool of water that had collected up on the beach (from when the tide was high). Guess they needed to cool off. Can’t blame them, it was a really hot day out and the sun was merciless (especially on my nose and shoulders). I wanted so badly to get closer to the edge of the water to get a better photo, but two things were holding me back: 1. my healthy fear of animals, especially ones with horns, 2. the hot sand was scorching the bottoms of my feet, forcing me to hop around and not stand still for a clear photo. I took this one below while I was standing in the surf, looking up towards the mountains:
Bathing Water Buffalos
Not being able to take the heat on my feet, I ran over to the closest spot of shade, which happened to be the edge of a small woods. Then right in front of me, I saw an alternative to missing out on a close up to the gentle beasts. A tree! I quickly scaled the tree and wedged myself in between branches, ready to click away on my camera. I’m pretty satisfied with the results.
After taking a bunch of pictures, I now had to deal with the predicament of getting out of the tree, without damaging my camera or myself (the camera taking priority). A memory came back to me of when I was very young, and had climbed a tree near my house. I climbed so high, that I was too scared to make my way down. My dad was gone working, and I remember several of my tallest neighbors trying to coax me to come down. A couple times I was doubly scared because of the added mustache my neighbors had. It was the 90s and bushy mustaches were in vogue, but they scared me; so any man who had one, therefore scared me as well (that fear hasn’t completely left me). And I didn’t come down until my teenage neighbor, Brandon, climbed up to get me. I digress. Getting out of the tree on the beach wasn’t so bad and the minor scratches and scrapes were worth it.
This could not have been an everyday occurrence because even the lifeguards were interested and they too took pictures. One put a toy boat in the water with the buffalos, which momentarily interested them, but not enough to leave the cool water. What I didn’t get a good picture of was when the buffalos got out of the water and galloped down the beach. I had my back turned when the pair decided they’d had enough of soaking and silently got out and took off. That must be a once in a lifetime experience.
Before coming to Hong Kong, I pictured water buffalos in brown rivers or working in rice paddy fields. I never would have thought to see them on a white sand beach, frolicking in sparkling ocean water. Hong Kong water buffalos are living the life.