March marks the onset of Springtime, a revitalising and blissful season that welcomes in things anew and the blooming of beautiful flowers across Hong Kong. Notoriously known as an urban jungle, perhaps what is most needed for a refreshing change of scenery is to reconnect with the city’s many forested hillsides, country parks and gardens to admire the sights of natures’ flowers in bloom.
Sakura Flowers
Though the city’s urban dwellers often flock to Japan to witness blossoming Sakura flowers, otherwise known as cherry blossoms, not many know that the city’s country parks across New Territories are also home to these beautifully pale-pink flowers that give Springtime its charm.
Where to find them: Velodrome Park in Tsueng Kwan O, Kwan Kung Pavilion in Cheung Chau and Tai Po Waterfront Park
Cotton Tree Flowers
Cotton Tree flowers grow out of the Red Silk Cotton Tree, nicknamed “hero tree” in Cantonese, because of its tall, straight and fast-growing trunk flowers scarlet-hued flowers.
Where to find them: Lai Chi Kok Park and Hong Kong Park
Bauhinia Blakeana
Hong Kong’s national flower, the orchid more commonly known as Bauhinia is a fragrant emblem of the HKSAR. This beautiful hybrid flower is a vibrant pink-pale purple colour that has a stretch of a flowering period between the months of September and June.
Where to find them: Tai Po Waterfront Park, Kowloon Tsai Park and Quarry Bay Park
Rhodoleia
First sighted in 1849 in Aberdeen, this red bell-shaped flowers bloom during late winter and early spring atop evergreen trees, dangling overhead as if it were a chiming bell.
Where to find it: Aberdeen, Shing Mun Arboretum and various country parks
Hong Kong Iris
These light-blue and white patterned flowers were originally found on the hillsides of Victoria Peak and Mount Davis in 1874. They blossom in shades of blue and purple between the months of April and May.
Where to find them: Mount Davis, Victoria Peak, Wilson Trail on Dragon’s Back, Cape D’Aguilar and Po Toi island
Azalea
Listed as a vulnerable flora species by the local government, these pinkish flowers grow out of an evergreen shrub blossoms during the month of April.
Where to find them: Mount Nicholson in Ma On Shan
Hydrangea
Among a large green field, a Victorian gazebo and colonial-fashioned huts, these large-headed, blue-purple hued flower begins its flowering period between the months of April and June.
Where to find them: Victoria Peak Garden
Pavetta
First discovered between 1847 and 1850 in Happy Valley, these paper-thin flowers come in a cluster of four white petals that bloom between the months of March and October.
Where to find them: Deep Water Bay and near the Lion’s Nature Education Centre in Sai Kung