Hoi Ha () is a place and a village on the innermost shore of

Hoi Ha Wan Hoi Ha Wan () or Jone's Cove is a bay at the north of Sai Kung Peninsula. It is part of Hoi Ha Wan Marine Park, a Marine parks in Hong Kong, marine park in Hong Kong. The village of Hoi Ha is located on the innermost shore of Hoi Ha Wan. The l ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

. It is at the north of Pak Sha O in the

Sai Kung Peninsula The Sai Kung Peninsula () is a peninsula in the easternmost part of the New Territories in Hong Kong. Its name comes from Sai Kung Town in the central southern area of the peninsula. The southern part of the peninsula is administered by Sai ...

. One of the most famous heritage spots in Hoi Ha Wan is the remnants of the lime kilns. It was used to make lime from sea shells and coral. It was likely built in the early 1900s. The name Hoi Ha comes from the same

Hakka language Hakka ( zh, c=, p=Kèjiāhuà; ''Pha̍k-fa-sṳ: '', zh, c=, p=Kèjiāyǔ; ''Pha̍k-fa-sṳ: '') forms a language group of varieties of Chinese, spoken natively by the Hakka people in parts of Southern China, Taiwan, some diaspora areas of ...

word which broadly translates as Seashore or Seaside in English

Administration

Hoi Ha is a recognized village under the

New Territories The New Territories (N.T., Traditional Chinese characters, Chinese: ) is one of the three areas of Hong Kong, alongside Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. It makes up 86.2% of Hong Kong's territory, and contains around half of the population of H ...

Small House Policy The Small House Policy (SHP, ) was introduced in 1972 in Hong Kong. The objective was to improve the then prevailing low standard of housing in the rural areas of the New Territories. The policy allows an indigenous male villager who is 18 ye ...

History

Hoi Ha village was established in 1811 by a group of

Hakka The Hakka (), sometimes also referred to as Hakka-speaking Chinese, or Hakka Chinese, or Hakkas, are a southern Han Chinese subgroup whose principal settlements and ancestral homes are dispersed widely across the provinces of southern China ...

people sharing the family name Yung who arrived at Hoi Ha and started to build houses and farm the land.

Hoi Ha archaeological site

A few coarse pottery sherds, prehistoric pottery sherds, stone implements and ceramic sherds of Tang, Ming and Qing periods were found in Hoi Ha in the two territory-wide survey.

Hoi Ha lime kiln

There are also the remnants of

lime kiln A lime kiln is a kiln used for the calcination of limestone (calcium carbonate) to produce the form of lime called ''quicklime'' (calcium oxide). The chemical equation for this reaction is: CaCO3 + heat → CaO + CO2 This reaction can tak ...

s. There are total 4 lime kilns in Hoi Ha but only 2 remain comparatively intact; these two kilns were restored by the

Antiquities and Monuments Office The Antiquities and Monuments Office (AMO) is a Hong Kong government organization established in 1976 under the Antiquities and Monuments Ordinance to protect and preserve historic monuments. Housed in the Former Kowloon British School, the AMO ...

in 1982 with the generous assistance of the villagers of Hoi Ha (source: Antiquities and Monuments Office) These two kilns, built by the villagers of Hoi Ha in the early 20th century, were used to make lime by burning corals and shells. They were constructed of rubble stone and lined with crude bricks inside. The villagers collected corals and shells from the sea nearby Lime production was once a prosperous local industry particularly at the villages in Sai Kung. The lime was used in agriculture and construction. However, it was gradually replaced by cement after the Second War World The villagers use to send the lime by boat to nearby Hong Kong Island to sell The kilns are located on the eastern shore of inner Hoi Ha Wan. Limekiln industry was one of the oldest industries (1800-1939) in Hong Kong, which refined lime from either

oyster Oyster is the common name for a number of different families of salt-water bivalve molluscs that live in marine or brackish habitats. In some species, the valves are highly calcified, and many are somewhat irregular in shape. Many, but no ...

shells or coral skeletons for construction and agricultural uses. In the processes,

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

, i.e.

calcium carbonate Calcium carbonate is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is a common substance found in Rock (geology), rocks as the minerals calcite and aragonite, most notably in chalk and limestone, eggshells, gastropod shells, shellfish skel ...

, in the shells and corals would be transformed into

calcium oxide Calcium oxide (formula: Ca O), commonly known as quicklime or burnt lime, is a widely used chemical compound. It is a white, caustic, alkaline, crystalline solid at room temperature. The broadly used term '' lime'' connotes calcium-containing ...

by means of heating.

References

External links

Delineation of area of existing village Hoi Ha (Sai Kung North) for election of resident representative (2019 to 2022)
Archaeological sites in Hong Kong Villages in Tai Po District, Hong Kong Places in Hong Kong Sai Kung North {{TaiPo-geo-stub