Bride’s Pool Road

Bride’s Pool Road is named after a legendary incident where a bride, while being carried to her wedding, died after being flung out of her sedan chair over a waterfall when one of her porters lost his footing. It is beautiful and wild area where one can find a biodiversity unmatched in other large urban metropolises but is also known as one of Hong Kong’s ‘ghostly’ regions due to the unusual concentration of fatalities that have occurred within its boundaries. The sublime beauty of its lush mountainous jungle slopes, brims with a chorus of returning spring birds perched among vibrant flowers and green leaves. These melodies are periodically interspersed with the distinctive and rhythmic howls of Ferraris, Ducati, modded Subaru, and Hondas as they deftly manoeuvre along the precipitous curves of this popular jungle track. The drivers are mostly ‘boy racers’ whose need for speed has unfortunately caused many to succumb to the road's treacherous curves that straddle the reservoir and divide two of Hong Kong’s largest unspoilt green spaces. The lampposts are set against a dense, vibrant jungle, and mark just a few of the numerous crash sites and deaths that have occurred on Brides Pool Road over the years. The recently replaced lampposts and the fresh cement that anchors them serve as 'memento mori'. The patches of grey cement at their bases and shiny posts they hold up also serve as timelines, slowly fading to blend in with the old under the intense unyielding tropical sun. Exploring the surrounding mountain sides and drainage ditches adjacent the posts reveal even more of the road’s past with relics of bumpers, badges, and engine parts from abundant crashes that persist, slowly being swallowed up by the jungle.