Coasting Past: The Last South China Coastal Trading Junks

The iconic image of a sailing junk crossing Victoria Harbor was already firmly planted in my mind before I arrived in Hong Kong in the mid-1990s. Sadly, there were no sailing junks by then; they had disappeared by the end of the previous decade.

Books on old Hong Kong show how ubiquitous this craft was, its role being central to the territory's main activities of fishing and shipping. But it is above all the junk's exotic beauty that captured the imagination, matching the landscape and lending it a timeless and tranquil air.