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 park in Hong Kong. The village of Hoi Ha is located on the innermost shore of Hoi Ha Wan. The location has a high biolog ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

. It is at the north of

Pak Sha O Pak Sha O () is an area and a village of Sai Kung North, in Tai Po District, Hong Kong. Administration Pak Sha O and Pak Sha O Ha Yeung () are recognized villages under the New Territories Small House Policy. History It has been reported that t ...

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 administrated 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 (, , ) forms a language group of varieties of Chinese, spoken natively by the Hakka people throughout Southern China and Taiwan and throughout the diaspora areas of East Asia, Southeast Asia and in overseas Chinese communities around th ...

word which broadly translates as Seashore or Seaside in English

Administration

Hoi Ha is a recognized village under the

New Territories The New Territories is one of the three main regions of Hong Kong, alongside Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula. It makes up 86.2% of Hong Kong's territory, and contains around half of the population of Hong Kong. Historically, it ...

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 Han, or Hakka Chinese, or Hakkas are a Han Chinese subgroup whose ancestral homes are chiefly in the Hakka-speaking provincial areas of Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan, Hunan, Zhej ...

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 (material), lime called quicklime (calcium oxide). The chemical equation for this chemical reaction, reaction is :Calcium carbonate, Ca ...

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) was established in 1976 under the Antiquities and Monuments Ordinance to protect and preserve Hong Kong's historic monuments. Housed in the Former Kowloon British School, the AMO is responsible for iden ...

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 not al ...

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

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

, i.e. calcium carbonate, in the shells and corals would be transformed into

calcium oxide Calcium oxide (CaO), commonly known as quicklime or burnt lime, is a widely used chemical compound. It is a white, Caustic (substance), caustic, alkaline, crystalline solid at room temperature. The broadly used term "''lime (material), lime''" co ...

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)
* https://www.afcd.gov.hk/english/country/cou_vis/cou_vis_mar/cou_vis_mar_des/cou_vis_mar_des_hoi.html Archaeological sites in Hong Kong Villages in Tai Po District, Hong Kong Places in Hong Kong Sai Kung North {{HongKong-geo-stub