Cape D'Aguilar Lighthouse, Protected lighthouse at Cape D'Aguilar, Hong Kong.
Cape D'Aguilar Lighthouse is a round granite tower 9.7 m tall, painted white, standing at the southeastern tip of Hong Kong Island. Its base and arched doorway are framed with stone blocks, and a spiral stone staircase leads up inside. The number 158, its Marine Department serial, is painted below a window at mid-height.
The tower was built in 1875 as Hong Kong's first lighthouse, at a time when ship traffic in the region was growing fast. When the Waglan Island Lighthouse opened in 1896, it took over as the main navigation point for vessels passing through the area.
The lighthouse is a declared monument, listed in 2006 after being graded as a historical building in 2000. Its name comes from the Cantonese Hok Tsui, "crane's beak", after the shape of the peninsula. The Hong Kong postal service issued a stamp featuring the tower in 2010.
The site is on a remote headland and can only be reached on foot, so sturdy shoes are a good idea for the uneven terrain. Clear days offer the best views of the surrounding ocean and coastline.
The original Fresnel lens from this tower was removed in 1905 and installed at Green Island Lighthouse to replace an older system there. This kind of transfer was common across the region's lighthouses, where working parts were moved rather than discarded.
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