thegorge

and so we come, finally, to the culmination of my round-island trip. this leg of the journey, though covering much more, was dominated by our visit to Taroko National Park. Taroko Gorge is rightly known as the crown jewel of Taiwan's natural treasures; hopefully you will get some idea of the gorge's splendor from the photos below.


an example of Taroko Gorge's stunning scenery

after we finally got our bus tickets (see thecircumnavigation) the trip from Taitung up the East coast was very smooth, at least for Taiwan, and our bus made the 170 km (100 mile) journey in a blistering four hours! honestly that's quite fast for this place. there's no such thing as a real highway on the East coast, so we went through every little burg imaginable, and were waved down at all kinds of random points along the way. i was actually stunned that their time projection for the trip was so accurate. anyway, the scenery on that drive was no less spectacular than the views in the gorge, blue water stretching forever on one side with impossibly green mountains towering in dramatic relief on the other.

though we didn't get any pictures of that scenery, you'll get some idea from the Taroko pictures, since it is set in the same mountain range. one thing to which i wish we could have got closer was the San Shian Tai--the Platform of the Three Immortals. it appears to be a small islet off the coast just North of Taitung, connected to the mainland by a rather spiffy looking bridge that is composed of eight distinctly arching sections. i assume it's supposed to be evocative of the archetypal Chinese dragon; either way, it's an effective visual statement. though the circumnavigation was quite a whirlwind affair, it has enabled me to focus in on the areas i would like to see in greater detail. since the San Shian Tai is one of these, i hope to have pictures at some future date, so stay tuned.


another Taroko view

the terminus of the bus journey was the fabled Hualien (or Wha-lien). though Taitung was endearing because it seemed like a normal city, Hualien was much more entertaining. they seemed to have better coast and more ways to enjoy it, and it seemed to be a slightly hipper city with more going on in general. Taitung felt a little too sleepy for our big adventures. and besides, Hualien is very convenient to Taroko, and we found someone to rent us a scooter. actually that's a lie. some hotelliers found us someone to rent us a scooter. as you exit the train station in Hualien, you are greeted with a stunning view of... dozens of hotels. on the way down to them we inquired after scooter rentals and were turned down at a couple of places, for not having Taiwanese driver's licenses. so we decided to ditch the bags at a hotel and keep looking. in the middle of a street we were accosted by a lady using very broken English to pitch her sleeping establishment to us, but a little quick thinking made her give us more than just the room she had been counting on. i told her that we were looking for a scooter first, and wouldn't be checking into anywhere until we had one, so as with the girls at the middle-of-nowhere gas station, our problem became hers, though more because of the almighty New Taiwan Dollar than for the joy of helping. it didn't matter to me though; in no time she had us hooked up with a new-looking 125cc scooter for NT$500. that's about US$15, so i guess the NT is not so mighty, and this is without any security and on an expired California driver's license. pretty good deal. actually, at one point before we'd found that place, it sounded like the hotel lady was going to make her husband lend us his scooter, just to get us to stay. maybe the NT is mightier than it seems.


Jill and i at the entrance to Taroko National Park, home of Taiwan's best sight--Taroko Gorge

Taroko Gorge is accessible through the Central Cross-Island Highway of Taiwan, much of which West of the gorge remains shut to anything larger than motorcycles since the 9/21 Earthquake of 1999. this epicenter of this earthquake was in Puli, the geographical center of Taiwan, but was strong enough as to level numerous parts of many cities and cause tremendous rock slides. it is said that the peak of Taiwan's highest mountain is now eight meters higher than it was prior to the earthquake (that's about 25 feet). Feng Yuan was quite devastated by the quake, and many of our students have friends or family members who were killed as a result. the highway is the main road running East-West in the center of the map below.


a map of the gorge area

what i really want to talk about is engineering. the following photos show some good examples, some bad examples, and some downright scary examples:

a rather fetching bridge in Taroko Gorge, along with another, though perhaps slightly less fetching example:

the problem is, when you are familiar with the ethos of Taiwanese engineering, all Taiwanese engineering becomes very scary, regardless of its elegance. what i would like to give a sense of is the stairs. the Taiwanese appear to be constitutionally incapable of constructing a uniform set of stairs--too many are the times i've skinned a shin on a too-high step. so when they undertake feats like building eight flights of totally unsupported stairs, as in this pagoda whose insides are pictured below, one is led to question one's own sanity when climbing those stairs.



looking up to the top of the pagoda, and looking down. note well the suspended stairs, low railing, and fully open center.
absolutely terrifying



but climb i certainly did, with the wind gusting and the doors on all sides of the building slamming open and closed; i even went out on the eighth floor balcony and we got a shot of the view. very scary but well worth it i think you'll agree.


the view from the top

and then we trusted ourselves to the various bridges of less stable-looking character. that's a good burst of adrenaline, at least, as if trusting yourself to a scooter on a windy mountain road wasn't doing it for you.

so what do you think we did next?

you guessed it

finally, before we went back to Hualien to head home via Taipei, we had to stop by the Chang Chun, or Eternal Spring Shrine, which looks very picturesque set way up there in those verdant hills, straddling a waterfall. look:


the Eternal Spring Shrine in Taroko Gorge, where i learned the secret of immortality

apparently this shrine was built in memoriam to the 400 or so workers who died while constructing the Central Cross-Island Highway, and their names are all inscribed on stone tablets inside the building at far left of the picture. its a bit of a walk through caves and such to get to the shrine, but the shrine itself acts as the head for one of the many supposedly spectacular trails in the park. supposedly because thejayfather can't comment on any of the trails, not having walked them himself. but we did see this curious little thing on the trek over to the shrine, hidden in one of the caves:


the awesome Buddhist "Staircase to Nowhere", where i learned why being short is a blessing

there appears to be some mystical power associated with stairs that lead nowhere. perhaps they lead to enlightenment, or a new state of mind and being, diverting your crass western mind from its compulsive drive to get somewhere. whatever the purpose, even the people here don't seem to know why their religions do what they do, so until i take the staircase next time, i won't be able to enlighten you.

theforeknowledge

listen to Bob Newhart. he knows how things work. before i move on to cover the rest of the round-island trip, let me go back to the first leg and tell you how i know. there are many buses that run the route between Kaohsiung and Kenting, with many different bus stations close to our Kaohsiung hotel, so we thought it would be no problem to find one after getting some breakfast. little did we know how easy it would be. i found a small hole in the wall "restaurant" where i got a baked potato with cheese goo and bacon bits--it was actually quite edible. the guy who served me spoke some English, which i warmly complimented, as is the politic thing to do. then i assumed he was just showing off when he asked me where we were headed, though he quickly proved me wrong. "Do you need a bus?" he asked. i told him we did, thinking he would tell us where to get one, but he did one better. in a moment that eerily reminded me of The Grace L Ferguson Airline and Storm Door Company, my new friend produced a large stack of bus tickets and told me his breakfast store was also the station and stop. in a land where folks set up scooter repair shops in their living rooms, i should not have been remotely surprised, but i suppose that even thejayfather just wasn't ready for Sum Fat-gai's Breakfast Goo and Bus Shack. thanks for the heads up, Bob. i'll not doubt again.

the ever-insightful Mr Newhart

thename

what's in a name? well i'l let you decide for yourself. here is mine in Chinese characters:

保 - bao - to protect

時 - hsiuh - time

捷 - jie - fast

as i mentioned earlier, this name, which was given me, is the name under which Porsche cars are marketed in China, which makes the name quite appropriate, and it also sounds quite like Porsche.

thecircumnavigation

so finally we get to the circumnavigation of Ilha Formosa. below is a basic map of the country; won't you follow along with me as i outline our journey?


a very simple map of Taiwan.

we started, of course, in Feng Yuan, which is slightly less far north of Taichung than Chang-hua is South of it, and took the train to Taichung. from there we caught the luxury bus to Kaohsiung, a journey of about three hours. the distance is around 200 kilometers, or 120 miles. we had planned to head for Kenting, supposedly the most hip spot in the country, that night, Saturday the 2nd. Kenting lies at the very southern tip of the island, on the west coast. that weekend was a large music festival called Spring Scream, which basically turned out to be Hippie Fest, so even when we did get to Kenting we didn't hang around much. anyway, knowing it would be crowded, we stayed in Kaohsiung instead, which is Taiwan's second largest city, and the largest seaport in Asia. i'm told it's the third or fourth largest port by volume in the world. while there we visited a small island on the far side of their bay, which seemed very nice as we walked along the beach but became just another filthy Taiwanese town when we returned along the street.

when we finally got down to Kenting the next day by bus, another journey that took far longer than its mileage would suggest, i found it was indeed way less than the hype suggested. it's one of those little beach towns that has "quaint" shops with "character" all along one street--such character, in fact, that they have the same souvenirs as every other little shop in the country. and of course the town was filled with all kinds of hippies trying to get their fill of the "authentic" travel experience. only Kenting has become one of those homogenized places that looks just like every other beach town in the world, and largely due to the presence of those people, i suggest.

looking a bit hippie-ish myself (note the long hair and giant backpack) at the entrance to the Kenting National Forest Recreation Area.

so we left. and went to Taitung (say Taidong). or at least we tried to get to Taitung. as you may have gathered, Taiwan's highway system leaves something to be desired, so we had to go about halfway back to Kaohsiung before there was a road or train track to take us eastward. we were supposed to be let off the bus in a place called Fengliao (say Fongliao), but our bus driver had the radio up so loud that even if he had made the stop announcement, we wouldn't have heard him. when i started thinking we had passed our mark, i went up to talk to him, and through a combination of hand waving and head bobbing we came to the conclusion that we were indeed past the mark and we should be let off there. he wanted me to pay him for the extra distance we had traveled, and even had an English-speaking passenger explain that to us, but i argued about it, through this hapless intermediary, for long enough that he was worried about his schedule and just wanted us off the bus.

so that plan worked, but now we were on a deserted road in the middle of nowhere. this part of the story is becoming much longer than i had intended it to be, but the next two events do a good job of explaining a couple of seemingly opposite Taiwanese attitudes. there was a convenience store nearby, so we went in there and tried to make contact with the sales clerk. we asked for Fengliao and pointed, hoping he could tell us in which direction to start walking. he did, but when we asked again just to be sure, he pointed the other way. which was very helpful. now we were confused, so we showed him the Chinese characters for train station in our handy little guidebook, hoping he would point in its direction. he had a hand on the book, and just kept staring at it and smiling. we could tell he didn't know what it was saying, but it was thoroughly bizarre that he wouldn't indicate that, other than with a sheepish grin and to keep holding onto our book. finally we were done with him and just said xie-xie (thank you, say shie-uh shie-uh) and set off along the road the way we had come.

more than once during that hike i thought about raising a thumb, and would have done so if i hadn't given it a last ditch effort at the gas station we came to. we tried the same routine with the three Chinese-only girls working there, and even though they didn't really get what we were trying to do, they decided that this was now their problem too. over the course of about ten minutes, they managed to instruct us to stand on the street under the lights from their signs and thumb any bus that came along and ask for Taitung. thumbing a bus on rural roads in Taiwan at night is rather a terrifying experience. along that stretch they were actually going quite fast, and you pretty much have to walk out in the middle of the road to ensure they see you. when they do of course, they have to lay on the brakes to avoid hitting you, so i was glad that the girl from the gas station volunteered to do most of the flagging for us, motioning for us to sit down all the time. about half an hour after our problem had become theirs, our helpful hosts, who had been running back and forth all that time to pump gas and then wave down buses, they had realized that there were no direct buses to Taitung on that road, and we would have to take one back to Fengliao and catch the train. we did this with no small thanksgiving to our new friends, and we did make it to Taitung without further ado, though the train was painfully slow.

the train station is at the heart of most Taiwanese towns, but Taitung has built a new one quite a way out of town. they have also built a lot of wide new roads to get to it, all of which were used to their greatest advantage by our taxi driver, who seemed to think he was in training for the Taiwanese Grand Prix. it was midnight though, and no cars around, and frankly it was nice to break the snail barrier for once.

not much to say about Taitung. it was nice and seemed the least Taiwanese of all the places i've seen, but was pretty unremarkable. it is apparently known for its fruit, so we got some wax apples and tried the famous custard apple, which i found less than spectacular. at least it was edible though. we tried to rent a scooter to drive up the coast, but all the places were so funny about us not having a Taiwanese license that we gave up and decided to head for Hualien by bus.

though that trip will have to wait for the next post, it is worth relating how we found the right bus station. there was a visitor bureau close to our hotel, and one lady there who spoke fairly good English, so I told her we were trying to get to Hualien, pronouncing it Wa-lien. She gave me this totally blank look like she'd never heard of the place, so i tried again. nothing. finally i caught a brainwave or a slice of inspiration or something, and tried Wha-lien. "Oh, Wha-lien. It's that bus right over there," she said, pointing. seriously nonplussed, we wandered off to buy our tickets, not for Wa-lien, for Wha-lien. i will not make that mistake again.

themartyrs

with all the technical difficulties of late and the endless travelling thejayfather has been doing lately, the blog has suffered. sorry. but that does mean there is a lot to catch up on in the next few days. first, themartyrs:


entrance to the Martyr's Shrine in Taichung.

i had heard there was to be an annual ceremony on March 29 at the Martyr's Shrine in Taichung. i reluctantly dragged my sorry rear out of bed at the crack of eight to make it down there for the published start time of nine, which was duly missed. no matter, the sights were entertaining enough. as you will see below, the rank military personnel involved in the ceremony were arrayed in the most fabulous uniforms--and i mean fabulous. unfortunately, you will probably not fully be able to appreciate the Department of Defense's uniform contracting skills: the exact pastel mint green hue of the shirts strongly suggests the Gap as their supplier. very trendy.


soldiers in pretty green pastel uniforms line the entryway during the ceremony.

so far as i've been able to gather, the 29th is the anniversary of a military massacre of several students back in 1978 or so, hence high school juniors and seniors have the day off school, and the dead are remembered as martyrs. the ceremony itself was predictably bizarre--it was Taiwanese after all. ten minutes past the appointed start time, a cadre of official-looking folks, including politicos and military brass, paraded into the shrine looking a bit vexed to be there. then a high school band hidden off to the side of the shrine started to play the worst dirge i've ever heard, and the emcee began yelling in his best Kermit the Frog voice. though i'm sure that what he said was very inspirational.

compounding the oddity of the spectacle was how seriously the people took their spectating. for a nation that doesn't seem to know how to line up, on this day they were awfully concerned about maintaining perfect columns facing the shrine. we were the only white people in attendance, and weren't too bothered about the lines; i think we only got away with our sloppy non-conformism because nobody wanted to deal with the "engerrish".

the best part though, and what transformed the strange into the absurd, was just what those snappily-dressed privates were doing. i had seen it before, during the changing of the guard at the Dr Sun Yat-sen Memorial in Taipei, but the supposed solemnity of this occasion made it hard to bear without laughing. you see, the Taiwanese military, in its attempts to look ceremonial, usually ends up looking more like a high school drill team. one guy leads the way, pointing his toes all over and waving his hands around like a Bolshoi ballerina, and the rest of them follow his lead by stomping around and periodically freezing with their legs and arms in mid air.

i'm sure the experience could only be appreciated by being there, and i'm glad that i was. though it only lasted 15 minutes, it's nice they recognize their mistakes of the past. and what better way to say "i'm sorry we slaughtered your children" than to prance around in pretty green shirts while holding guns?