I was shocked by reports of a fire that destroyed many lovely stilt houses along an estuary in Tai O. Pictures of the wreckage stood in sharp contrast to the peaceful scenes that impressed everyone who has ever visited that fishing village, which, fortunately, has been largely ignored by the tourist hoards.

After reading that saddening news, I went through my photograph collections and found the pictures of the stilt houses I took many years ago on my first visit to Tai O. That time, I spent a night in a small inn with a few friends making preparations for the three-hour trek up the hill to the Po Lin Monastery early the next morning. There was no cable car in those days.

But we found the fishing village so irresistible that we decided to postpone our trip to the monastery for a few days to experience the peaceful life and savor the idyllic scenery that was such a novelty to all of us born and raised in the city. The stilt houses were, of course, the major attraction which fascinated our young minds.

I can still remember seeing an old man sitting on a wooden stool by the window watching the tide wash in from the open sea. He told us that all those years he lived there, the water level never rose beyond the stilts on which his house was built. He also emphasized that the stilts had to be made of a certain wood that could resist the erosion of seawater.

Indeed, the row of stilt houses along the mouth of the estuary might look flimsy, but they were apparently strong enough to withstand the battering of the occasional typhoons.

Beyond these charming houses were hectares and hectares of salt beds where seawater was trapped and evaporated in the sun to yield salt crystals. Some of that salt was used by the local fishermen for making salt fish, dried squid and the aromatic shrimp paste that were prized by gourmet Cantonese restaurants in the city.

On my second visit to Tai O many years later, I was delighted to find that the place hadn't changed as much I have seen in other parts of Hong Kong. Of course, most visitors to Po Lin Monastery would opt for the cable car rather than making the climb from Tai O. But there are still many people, like me, who love to come to get a glimpse of what a real fishing village must be like before they were all engulfed by housing projects in what have now become new towns.

When I was there the first time, the only way to cross the estuary to the other side of the village was to hire a sampan. Now, that stretch of water about 50 yards across is spanned by a quaint bridge of iron. The bridge, painted in a lighter shade of blue the last time I saw it, adds to, rather than distracts from, the overall scenery. One of the better pictures I took was taken on this bridge of fishing boats negotiating the estuary against the setting sun.

There were quite a few newly opened restaurants and cafes on the main street in the village. But there are no mega restaurants like those on Lamma Island to lure the tourist crowds on weekends. In fact, people don't come to Tai O for the food. They come here to see, among other things, the wooden houses on stilts and the fishing boats returning in the evening with their catch.

The salt beds are gone, I was told, because nobody wants to do the backbreaking work of tending them for a meager return. Instead, there are many more shops selling locally made salt fish, sun-dried squids and salty shrimp paste that are still considered by Hong Kong connoisseurs to be the best money can buy, provided you have a taste for them.

Tai O may not be a tourist attraction like the Peak, Repulse Bay or Lamma Island. But it is worth preserving for the benefit of locals like us. Let's start by rebuilding those stilt houses destroyed by fire and making the entire area safer from future hazards.

The author is a current affairs commentator.

(HK Edition 05/15/2013 page1)