Hot Springs | Taiwaneers

Boredom Survived or Chinese New Year Break at Home

Michael's Posts, Our Taipei Life, Taiwan, Travel & Exploring No Responses »

Jan 292012

For a Taiwanese person Chinese New Year break (a week of vacation from work, school, etc.) is full of meals, mahjong, poker, sightseeing, etc., with extended family. But, for foreigners it’s basically a week to do whatever. Normally Emily and I are gone on a trip somewhere, but this year we are trying to save money so we just stayed here in Taipei. Well the short and skinny is that it rained basically all week…except for like a day and a half. I’ve played so much Grand Theft Auto Vice City during the past week that I am chomping at the bit to get back to work again tomorrow. Oi vei! It has been supremely boring and mind numbing to wake up late, drink coffee, eat food, play video games, read, watch a movie, surf around the web, eat more, play more video games, go to bed, and do it again over and over and over. I don’t understand why people who can afford to travel when they have vacation time don’t and instead hang out at home….maybe that’ll make more sense when I have kids.

Emily and I did do a few notable things. A Taiwanese friend, Jasmine, invited us to her extended family’s Chinese New Year Eve dinner in Keelung and that was a lot of fun. We had some great food, played mahjong and poker, and sang our hearts out on their karaoke machine! And they even gave us each a hong bao. We were so grateful for their hospitality and including us in what is normally a family-only affair.

Another fun thing we did during the week was visit a hot springs we’d never been to before. Emily was stir crazy even before the break began so by Tuesday she had cabin fever bad. Even though it was raining we saddled up our trusty steed, Bessy, and headed out with our friend Nan to find and enjoy Ba Yen hot springs up in Yangmingshan National Park. It took about an hour and a half of driving on our scooters up over the mountain to reach the trail head and then about a twenty minute hike back to the (technically illegal) natural hot springs, which weren’t too crowded and simply fantastic for their beauty, water temperature and general awesomeness. We spent a few hours soaking and enjoying ourselves and chatting with other bathers before getting suited back up for the ride home in the dark and rain…and thankfully hot showers upon arrival. Sitting in the hot springs made me realize that there really is something to all the people who install hot tubs in their backyards. Soaking in hot water outside when the weather is cold is fantastic. I definitely have a preference for the natural hot springs though! Too bad every place can’t be so volcanic huh?

Saturday it didn’t rain…yay!!!….so Emily and I went out to Xizhi City (world headquarters of Acer actually), east of Taipei, to do a little half day hike. We found the hike (number 6) in Taipei Day Trips Volume 1 by Richard Saunders. The hike started at Tian Hsiu temple and took us past Hsiu Feng waterfall before reaching the overlook on the top of “Big Sharp Mountain” (literal translation). The waterfall was pretty romantic and the view from the top of the mountain was beautiful. Great place for taking wide shots of Taipei! All in all the hike was only about 3km and pretty family friendly. Not super strenuous, but you still felt like you had gone on a hike, afterwards.

Once Emily and I get back to Michigan we’ll have to invest in traveler’s guides like Lonely Planet and all that. We want to discover Michigan like we’ve discovered Taiwan.

Too Much

Michael's Posts, Taiwan, Travel & Exploring 4 Responses »

May 262010

*This post has been updated with a few pictures*

So much has happened since my last post. My problem has been that since so much was happening I kept on meaning to post but then I would be overwhelmed by how much there was to talk about so I would put it off only to be faced with a bigger problem as there was even more to talk about. I’m finally biting the bullet but alas I have compromised with myself and it will be an abbreviated bullet.

So after my birthday Emily and I left for vacation. We are trying to save money for a trip home in March for a wedding so this year’s vacation was not a jaunt off to some other east-Asian country (like the Philippines in 2008 and Korea in 2009) but instead a trip around our own Formosa (one of Taiwan’s many names.) After thinking about what we could do we decided upon a moped trip around Taiwan. Setting out with with one other friend Rachel, on her own moped, Emily and I piled our big backpack, our tent, and ourselves onto our moped and fled Taipei. We traveled down the west-side of Taiwan’s mountainous center stopping only one night to stay with friends near Nantou before completing the journey down to our friend’s house in DongGang, a coastal town south of Kaohsiung (Taiwan’s second-biggest city).

Rachel and Michael on a rare picture break…we drove 8 or 9 hours a day!

We stayed and hung out with Laura, our DongGang friend, for about a week and camped for a few days on Xiao Liu Chu, a small, coral island not far from DongGang. It was warm and sunny. We camped out on the beach and read and we even went snorkeling in the surf. It was fantastic and a great departure from the much colder north.

Campfires on Xiao Liu Qiu (小琉球)

The black beach in Dong Gang (東港). We’re not sure if the sand is black because of pollution or because of…nature.

Emily celebrated her birthday while we were in DongGang. I took her to Kaohsiung for the day and we hiked and road bikes and had fun together exploring the city. She’s a quarter-century old if you can believe it.

What we discovered during our hike on Kaohsiung’s (高雄) Monkey Mountain – an ancient tree with pterodactyl-esque nests tangled in the top. Jurassic Park, anyone?

Megan, my sister, joined up with us the day before we left DongGang. Now there were four of us on two mopeds for the trip back to Taipei and oh man were we funny looking all packed on to our tiny, little 125cc scooters.

We took off north and hopped on Hwy 20, Taiwan’s southern cross-island road. There was a ton of road damage from mud-slides and it was very precarious in spots…it’s a very good thing that no mothers were on the trip is probably where I should leave the description. We came across many construction crews repairing damage and were even held up by one that hadn’t completed a little dirt trail to connect each side of the road from where a bridge had collapsed. Emily’s pictures will be invaluable for you all to see and get a better idea of what I’m talking about!

Three generations guard the family food stand near Mei Nong township (美濃)

There’s an awesome story behind this picture. We came upon a part in the road that was absolutely impassable, until this dude talked to the man in the backhoe and sped up the operation a little…they worked out a sort of ramp and helped push our scooters up! He came up with this pose himself, by the way.

We made it through eventually though and camped at LiSong, a natural hot-springs that LonelyPlanet says is Taiwan’s most beautiful hot-spring. It was very beautiful but oh man was it a hike to get down to it at the base of a ravine. I’ll leave that story for Emily to share.

Li Song Hot Spring 5

After a few days there we took off up the east coast of Taiwan. The mountains and the east coast of Taiwan are so beautiful; so untamed compared to what we were driving past going south on the west-side.

After a night at Hualien‘s Formosa Backpackers Hostel (recommendable) we headed into Taroko Gorge for a few days of camping and hiking. Another great story and another one I’ll leave for Emily.

Hiking up to Lian Hua Pond (蓮花池)

Aboriginal hospitality (ie liqueur, songs, and a raging fire)

After leaving Taroko we continued to head west and north through Taiwan’s mountains. It was slow going and very foggy in places. We stayed one night at a place called Wuling Farms and while it was a nice place we arrived too late in the day to truly enjoy it. Plus, we were pretty far north at this point and as we were camping we were less enthused about being outside and “doing stuff” due to the drop in temperature.

Snow! Snow! Snow!

Wuling Farms (武陵農場)

Our last day driving from Wuling Farms to Taipei was the most grueling. It was cold, rainy, and foggy and we were way up in the mountains in the middle of these clouds that were causing the rain and the fog…and we were riding on mopeds…brr.

We finally made it back to our house last Friday evening. Since then we’ve been hanging, reading, and enjoying each other’s company. Megan had to leave to head back to her home on Kinmen today. Monday Emily and I start school.

Vacation is over.