2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival Celebrations – Hong Kong century-old tradition – float parade, bun snatching, Cantonese opera and more

2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival, or called 2025 Cheung Chau Da Jiu, is not only one of the most important local cultural events, but also on the National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of China.

After the past 12-month preparation, the whole island of Cheung Chau is looking forward to celebrating this unique event and have been busy making costumes, papier-mâché effigies of deities, baking buns, building the bamboo tower for the Bun Scrambling Competition and designing and decorating floats.

Last year, there were 25 thousand visitors taking ferry to Cheung Chau for the Bun Festival. Be aware this year’s Bun Festival (Buddha Festival) happens to fall into the Golden Week Holidays of Mainland China. Thus, it is estimated there will much more visitors and tourists sailing to Cheung Chau to enjoy and participate this local activity.

Besides the formal traditional celebration, Hong Kong will welcome this special holiday with extra activity “Bun Carnival 2025” on the 27th of April 2025.

What is Cheung Chau Bun Festival?

Cheung Chau Bun Festival, also known as Cheung Chau Da Jiu, in Cantonese 太平清醮， is an over-a-century tradition on the small outlying island “Cheung Chau”. “Da Jiu” is the pronunciation of its Cantonese name, meaning a kind of Taoist ceremony praying to god for safety.

This festival is called “Bun Festival” because on this day everyone will buy a lucky bun, a special bun printed with Chinese character “平安” (meaning safe), for good luck.

Every year, the whole island will organize a weeklong celebration, including three days of the vegetarian, parade of floats, tribute to deities of Tin Hau and Pak Tai and Bun Scrambling Competition. Time Magazine listed Cheung Chau Bun Festival as Top 10 Quirky Local Festivals.

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When is 2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival?

Cheung Chau Bun Festival usually is held during the 5th and 9th day of the fourth month of the Lunar calendar. In 2001, Hong Kong government and the islanders decided to fix the ceremony on the same day of Buddha festival as it is the public holiday of Hong Kong and more people can join the celebration.

For 2025, Cheung Chau Da Jiu will be on the 5th of May 2025 (Monday). From 2nd to 6th of May 2025, you can come to the small fishing village and enjoy this traditional event with islanders and visitors.

READ MORE:
2025 Hong Kong Public Holidays and Key Events: Plan Your Trip Wisely

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Highlights of 2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival – What to expect?

In 2025, Cheung Chau will have 5-day celebration full of traditions, including Taoist ceremonies, parades, lion dance, kirin dance, drum beating, Cantonese opera performances, bun snatching and so many local special food.

Most of the celebrations are around the Pak Tai Temple. It is the oldest temple on the island and the community center for the islanders.

Highlight 1. Piu Sik Parade – Floating Color 飄色巡遊
– 1:30pm – 3:30pm, 5th of May, 2025

The most anticipated highlight of the celebration is the Piu Sik Parade. Usually it will attract the most visitors and photographers standing along the parade route. The Piu Sik (Floating Colours) Parade is a dramatic re-enactment of the ceremonial parade held to drive away from the plague a century ago. The Carnival-like procession will proceed through Cheung Chau’s small and narrow lanes.

Over 20 decorated floats as well as lion dancers, musicians and acrobats will join this colorful parade. Each float will have two young children dressed up as deities and modern celebrities balancing on poles and “floating” through the air. Usually the selected kids should not be taller than 42 inches with the weight within 35 pounds. Parents will be very proud when their children are chosen for Piu Sik Parade.

Some of the floats are still carried through the narrow lanes with the traditional way: four strong men carry the heavy float on their shoulders. Originally the characters of Piu Sik are dressed to be the deities for bring good luck to villagers. Nowadays, it also adapts to modern life and includes cartoon and well-known characters.

When is the Piu Sik Parade?

The celebration will start with Kirin dance and Kungfu performance at 9:30am. The Piu Sik (Floating Colours) Parade begins around 1:30pm and ends around 3:30pm. It takes around 2 hours to walk around the village.

Route of Piu Sui Parade – Where to watch the parade

The parade starts from Pak She Street, passing San Hing Street, Tai Choi Yuen Road, Tai San Back Street, Sun Hing Back Street, then returns to Pak She Street.

You can easily find your way by the colorful flags and waiting crowds along the streets.

Highlight 2: Traditional ritual – Returning the deity statue (走菩薩)

At the end of Piu Siu Parade, each team will send the gods back to the shed in a rushing manner. The faster arrival is considered to have better luck in the coming year.

Along with a rush of gongs and drums coming from far to near, each of the parade teams led by Chinese Unicorn (Kirin) quickly runs into the shed one by one. Kirin will first bow to the shed, followed by the sedan chair with the gods carried by four people.

Best location to watch

All the deities will return to the shed next to Pak Tai Temple. The opera stage is usually set up nearby. It is one of the best spots witeness the ceremony.

3. Bun Scrambling Competition
– 11:30pm – midnight 12:45am, 5th-6th of May, 2025

The Cheung Chau Da Jiu reaches to the climax on the Bun Snatching Competition. Every year, the selected contestants will climb up on the thousands of buns covered, 23-feet-tall bun tower and grab as many lucky buns as they can during the 3-minute race. Usually, the contestants rush to the top of the bun tower because the buns on the top have the highest value or score.

The Bun Snatching Competition starts around midnight at the Soccer Field of the Pak Tai Temple Playground. Tickets will be given out for free on a first-come-first-served basis from 10:00pm.

4. Cantonese opera, lion dance performance and others

Aside from the Piu Sik Parade and Bun Snatching Competition, visitors also have chances to enjoy the Cantonese opera performances, Lion and Unicorn Dances, Kung-Fu performances as well as traditional ritual.

Traditional Cantonese Opera

Cantonese Opera will be performed from 7:30pm to 11:00pm at Pak Tai Temple Playground during the 5-day celebrations from 2nd to 5th of May 2025.

Lion Dance and Kirin Dance Performance

For those who love Hong Kong traditional lion dance and Chinese Unicorn dances, mark down the time on your schedule. Both performance will be on the 15th of May at Pak Tai Temple Playground.

Free lucky buns

To share good luck with everyone, free lucky buns will be given out at Pak Tai Temple Playground at 9:00am, 6th of May 2025.

5. Try a lucky bun on Cheung Chau island

Make sure to try one of the Cheung Chau lucky buns. The “lucky buns” are made of flour, sugar, and water and usually come in the three flavors: sesame, lotus or red bean paste. Traditionally, the buns are stamped with the red Chinese characters “平安”, meaning peace and safety. The islanders and visitors love to get one of these buns for good luck.

Recent years, some bun shops have mixed the traditional ideas with the popular cartoon characters, such as Hello Kitty, Pompompurin, Gudetama. This year the crossover lucky buns have stamped with the cute black bear Kumamon.

6. Only vegetarian food to respect to the tradition

One of the most important parts of Cheung Chau Bun Festival is all the islanders will consume only vegetarian food for three days in order to purify the body and spirit, and also to commemorate those died in the plague.

During the celebration of Bun Festival, most of the restaurants (over 80%) on Cheung Chau island have agreed to serve only vegetarian food to respect this old tradition.

In the previous years, the only McDonald’s on the island also sold only vegetarian burgers during the 3-day vegetarian period.

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Why is it so important? – History of Cheung Chau Bun Festival

The Cheung Chau Bun Festival originated in 1894, the late Qing Dynasty, when the islanders battled a devastating plague on the small island of Cheung Chau. As the last way out, the islander petitioned the Taoist god Pak Tai to drive away from the evil spirits by parading statues and other deities through their village. The plague finally ended after the performance. However, the ritual remains for hundred years to commemorate the people who died in the plague.

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What else can you do on Cheung Chau Island?

Besides the Bun Festival, Cheung Chau is also a popular holiday and weekend resort for locals. Thus, apart from joining the 2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival, there are lots of other things for you to take a look on Cheung Chau Island.

Hidden in the small alleys and footpaths, you will find many snack stores, artist workshops, coffee shop, bars as well as local restaurants. Cheung Chau is also famous for seafood dining.

Bring your swim suit if you are a beach lover. Cheung Chau’s Tung Wan Beach is a great place for a relax afternoon.

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How to get to 2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival

Going to Cheung Chau Island from downtown depends on the ferry service from Central.

Simply take the ferry from the Central Pier 5 to Cheung Chau Island. The ferry ride takes 35 – 40 minutes (Fast Ferry) or 55 – 60 minutes (Ordinary Ferry). The ticket prices for holidays are about HK$ 43 (Fast Ferry) and HK$ 22 (Ordinary Ferry) respectively.

Ferry operates between 1:30am to 00:30am on holidays at the intervals of 30 minutes per sail. Usually during the celebration of Cheung Chau Bun Festival, additional ferries will be added to service and extra ferry will depart around 1:30am on the day of Bun Scrambling Competition. For more details, check the official site of Sun Ferry.

How to get to Central Pier 5?

You can either take MTR to Central station and walk to the ferry pier or take Star Ferry from Tsim Sha Tsui Star Ferry Pier to Central Pier directly.

How to leave Cheung Chau Island?

Same with going to Cheung Chau, the return ferry is the only way for most of the visitors. Thus it usually ends up with long waiting time. To avoid queuing in line for hours, try to leave Cheung Chau before the ceremony finish or wait until most of the visitors leave. Cheung Chau is famous for fresh seafood. You can consider having dinner on the island and leisurely getting back to Central after dark.

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Bun Carnival 2025

From every Sunday from April 6th till May 27th, 2025, Hong Kong LCSD prepare another celebration “Bun Carnival 2025” at the soccer pitch of Pak Tai Temple Playground on Cheung Chau. Participants can learn and train how to climb bun tower and how to scramble buns. Two rounds of competition will be held on April 13th, 2025 to choose the finalists for the Bun Scrambling Competition of 2025 Cheung Chau Bun Festival.

On the May 5th 2025, the carnival day, visitors can enjoy many activities including game booths, handicraft workshops, bun snatching demonstrations and street performance.