When you live and work in a country, it’s easy to become neglectful of it, bypass its charms and always seek “greener pastures”. This is partly why we always do our Harley trip away in the winter: we’ve become so much more attuned to the little (and bigger) serves of beauty and interest that Australia has to offer since we’ve been away. Until now, Taiwan has been a place to escape from. Even though we know this sprawling metropolis, Taipei, better than Newcastle these days and we’ve explored more than our fair share of the northern and north east coasts, we’d never really scratched the surface of this place. Well, suffice to say, we have now! We’ve just returned from a 9 day circumnavigation of the island, crossing it 2 and a half times as well, and we are in awe of the beauty and the rich differences in climate, topography, vegetation and lifestyles of the people we met and saw along the way. I’ll write about it in two parts, the mid and the west and the south, then later, the east. This trip has rocketed right up into our top trips ever with a bullet!After our hectic end of semester, a half day at the death enabled us to get home and pack, fix everything up for the girls etc. so we could get going in the morning. We set out after breakfast, determined to keep only to a vague timetable which would enable us to do everything we wanted, without exhausting us: after all, it was a holiday. Down the expressway for a couple of hours to Taiwan’s premier wood carving/selling village of Sanyi. We explored an endless array of shops, all displaying a dizzying array of wood carvings great and small, tasteful and awfully “style free” gigantic Buddhas and dragons! It was a real buzz, topped off with a traditional Hakka meal, our pledge to get in and try whatever foods were around paying off first time with delicious meals of steamed fish and mountain vegetables. The off to the romantic ruins of the Longdeng mountain train bridge, which semi-collapsed in the great Hsinchu earthquake of 1928. My Chinese was already working overtime as I disturbed some villagers playing mahjong and asked if we were heading inn the right direction. They were excited to indicate that we were! It was a special sight, huge chunks of bridge lying beneath still solid pillars as the forest slowly but surely reclaimed the spot from the steam trains that used to ply the route. Onward to Sun Moon Lake!
One of Taiwan’s premier destinations, we arrived with the dusk and found a brand new, yet miniscule room at a hotel in the main strip. The car safely secreted at a public park down the road, we savoured a Starbuck’s and gazed out at approaching night across the lake. It was spectacular and beyond our expectations. Real Chinese meal in the main street for tea and the first of a few Hang pao chickens for me. The next day, we hiked around the foreshore for a few hours and up the hill till we boldly investigated Taiwan’s only 6 star resort hotel, The Lalu, which was an amazing edifice. The only drawback from this the certainty that we’ll be going back to stay here at some stage after Cassy got a good look at the place! After a morning at the beautiful, really beautiful lake, we had planned to head away from the foothills and cross the western industrial plain via small roads and three different expressways to Cigu.
First however, I was keen to explore an area about 25 km from the lake that had, according to my guide book, a quite megalithic and incongruously flamboyant Buddhist temple. It was 37 stories high at its grandest point and coated in gold. Surely, a guide book beat up? After traversing some back roads and finding nothing, we rounded a bend to see this incredible sight. The temple glinted blindingly in the sun perched high on a small mountain and the roads lining the entrance were home to at least 250 full size tour buses! We found out later that we had stumbled upon their biggest day of the year, a day of prayer and a rally for peace between Taiwan and China. The opposition leader and various dignitaries were at an official ceremony just as we arrived and we became minor celebrities ourselves as the only foreigners among a 50,000 strong crowd…it was a total spinout! The temple was just awesome and seemed to hold to the adage of the great cathedral at Albi in southern France which we had visited: build it to such epic proportions that man feels belittled and in awe at the presence of god (or something like that). After fireworks were lit and thousands of balloons released we explored this, the most impressive of all Asian temples we have seen…incredible!!
On the way back, we stopped and checked the quaint Japanese era train station and village at Jiji. Some hours later, after a few minor navigational errors, we dropped off all the big roads and wound through a few country byways to arrive at the Cigu salt mountains. These were left, virtually overnight when the Taiwan salt industry collapsed, ironically because Australia cornered the world market with a superior and cheaper product. What a sight! Two megalithic mountains of salt, a dirty grey one to climb (a little guy was drilling out new steps as we went up) and a fresh white one to frolic in, like snow! There was a real carnival atmosphere, and Cass and I enjoyed some “little eats” of milk fish (with salt of course), forgoing the pleasures of salt flavoured popsicles and most other foods you could name! It was one of the most bizarre tourist attractions we had visited anywhere and well worth the trip. After quite a trip to get there, it was starting to get dark, so we headed toward one of the west coasts big cities, Tainan, to find a spot to sleep for the night. We eventually settled on a “love hotel”, set up ostensibly for amorous couples to escape for a few hours of indulgent pleasure, but an excellent alternative for a night’s stay. The rooms tend to be well furnished, large, opulent and extremely clean, which this one was, and judging by the crowd at breakfast the next morning (lots of families) we weren’t the only ones who are onto the “secret”.
Today was the day to discover the allures of the southern tip, the oft talked about Kenting and beyond. I’ll write the next chapter in a day or two!