Hong Kong · Backpacking
ON A BUDGET
Beds are tiny and dear, but transport, hiking and street food keep Hong Kong affordable.
Chungking and Mirador Mansions
Two warrens of guesthouses on Nathan Road in Tsim Sha Tsui hold the cheapest legal beds in the city. Rooms are minute; Mong Kok hostels are calmer.
What a day costs
About HK$400–700, roughly $50–90: dorm HK$200–320, cha chaan teng and dai pai dong meals HK$120–200, Octopus travel HK$40–60.
Octopus, trams and ferries
One Octopus card covers MTR, buses and minibuses. The Star Ferry crossing costs a few dollars and the double-decker tram is a flat HK$3 however far you ride.
Free by day
The Dragon's Back ridge walk, the Man Mo Temple incense coils and the Tai Kwun heritage complex in Central are all free to enter.
Lan Kwai Fong
The Central bar slope where everyone converges, and where buying from the 7-Eleven and drinking on the kerb is both legal and completely normal.