Visit to the mountains and Sun Moon Lake
Trip Start
Apr 26, 2008
1
13
20
Trip End
May 09, 2008
Yuchih,
Nantou,
Taiwan
Friday, May 2, 2008
I woke up about 6:00 this morning, not because of jet lag but because I forgot to pull the heavy drapes in my hotel window before I went to bed last night. They do not practice daylight savings in Taiwan, so the sun comes up before 6am. I paid $200NT for an internet connection last night, so I called home this morning (last night in NC) using Skype. I spent way too much time on the phone, then scurried around packing up to go.
I got to breakfast just as everyone was leaving. I wasn't that hungry any way, so I just had some cereal. We met Dr Wu downstairs at 8am, so that we could leave to catch the High Speed Rail. We piled into two taxis and rode for about 10 mins to the Taipei rail station. The Taipei railway station reminded me of a modern version of Penn station in New York City. Three different train systems stop here on three different levels of the station: the HSR, the MRT subway system, and the traditional railway system. Dr Wu bought us 9:00 tickets for the HSR, and we sat down in the waiting area.
The HSR was right on time. Our seats were in car 5, which was only about 1/3 full. We are headed to Tai Chung to meet David and Alan who are driving from Tainan to Taichung to pick us up with a van so that we can travel into the mountains. The train ride only takes about 48 mins to cover about 150km. Once again, the ride was smooth as glass, but this time since it was light outside we could take photos.
Cheng Kai Shek memorial hall
Or at least attempt. Our inexpensive digital cameras do not like to take photos when there is a lot of action going on. Neither Ted nor I could get a very decent photo, but we sure tried. That was ok with me, as it gave me some time to write out post cards. When we walked off the train at Taichung, we were greeted at the top of the escalator by a Starbucks coffee. Ted was happy as he hadn't had breakfast. I opted to indulge myself with a chocolate chip muffin. It cost me about $4US, which is outrageous, but it was oh so worth it. Alan and David arrived about 5 mins later, and we set off in the van.
Our first stop was at the city Tsao Tung and the 921 Earthquake museum. In 1999 a magnitude 7.3 earthquake struck central Taiwan at about 1:45 am. Around 2,400 people died, over 11,000 people were injured, and 29 people were never found. The Taiwanese government decided to turn a highly damaged middle school campus site into a National museum for the purpose of educating for the future and well as honoring the dead. The museum is enormous and a lot of work went into exposing the fault in the ground so everyone could see it. They structurally secured classroom buildings so that they would not fall down under their own weight, but the damage caused by the earthquake could be easily seen.
It is a shame that so many people had to be injured in order to get a museum that really talks about nothing but geology, but it is by far the best earth science museum I have been in. There were many videos, interactive displays, and photos to see.
Taipei Courthouse
There was even a room that simulated a magnitude 5.1 earthquake so that you could sit and experience your own earthquake. I've experienced 2 magnitude earthquakes over 4.0 in my life. The simulator was very accurate. I probably could have spent another 4 hours or so at the museum, but Dr Wu has a pretty tight schedule to keep us on, so off we go.From the earthquake museum, we headed to lunch at a restaurant Dr Wu picked out especially for Ted. The restaurant's specialty is cooking dishes that contain no meat, but tastes like you are eating fish, beef, or chicken. I would have been fooled had he not told us in advance. The waitress brought each of us 12 different small dishes total, but each one was served every 5 mins or so apart. I think 2 of the dishes were made of mushrooms, several used soy, there was brown rice cooked with some sort of crunchy things, pumpkin and cream soup, sweet potato chips battered and fried like french fries, dragon's beard salad, and much more. I ran out of room by the 8th course, but tried everything. Dessert was slices of fresh watermellon and fresh passion fruit juice made from passion fruit grown on the grounds of the restaurant.
As we departed from the restaurant and headed up into the mountains to Yuchih and the SunMoon lake area it began to rain steadily. Boy was I glad I had the forethought to put a scopamine patch behind my ear this morning before leaving the hotel. I would have easily been carsick. The roads were windy and twisty, two lanes that crawled up over mountains, and down valleys into small villages.
Taipei rail station
I now understand why the Taiwanese geolgists said the geologic map of Taiwan was not completely accurate as there are areas where only "a monkey can go". I think the mountain slopes here are even more steep than those found in the Rocky Mountains. It also explains the dry riverbeds we kept crossing at lower altitudes that looked 2000 feet wide and strewn with boulders the size of Volkswagon beetles. During the rainy season, runoff must come off the mountains very quickly.We arrived at Yuchih and the SunMoon lake area about 4:15. We were supposed to take a boat tour of the lake, but that got scrapped due to rain. Instead, we checked into our rooms then headed out to visit a very famous Buddist temple (Wenwu Temple) near by before it got too dark. The temple is enormous and sits on the hillside above the lake. It is guarded by 2 very large red lions, sitting with 1 paw on huge spheres. As with all Buddist temples, the attention to details by the artisans who designed and painted the temple is phenominal. The floors were all made of marble, the carvings in the columns were intricate, and every inch of the ceiling was decorated. My photos will not do it justice.
We headed back to the area near our hotel to have dinner. I was still stuffed from lunch but went anyway. Again, we had 8 courses of food, most of which were made from chicken or fish. Two of the dishes were something that I would have never touched in the US, but I ate so that I wouldn't seem impolite. They were actually tasty, just visually unappealing to the western eye.
HSR ticketing
The first was small fish about the length of my pinky, gutted, battered, and deepfried so that you ate them still with the head and tail attached. The second was shrimp cooked with black tea leaves, which contained medium sized fresh water shrimp cooked with the head, tails, and legs still attached. Surprisingly, both were rather pleasantly tasting, though I would have liked some melted butter for the shrimp.After diner we set out to walk around in the tourist gift shops. There were lots of things to look at and purchase, but nothing spectacular that I couldn't live without. SunMoon lake is the honeymoon capital of Taiwan, and there were lots of couples walking about. This was our first chance on our trip to walk around, mostly unescorted, and get to mingle with the Taiwanese people. I really enjoyed it a lot. Ted took off with David to go get a foot and head massage while Melinda, Shuying, and I headed back to our hotel to get some rest.
The hotel we stayed at was called "the Honeymoon Hotel", because it is marketed at honeymooners. Melinda and I had separate hotel rooms, but they shared a common entrance. Both our rooms looked out front over the street, but mine was closer to the hotel advertising sign attached to the building. It gave the room an interesting glow when the lights were out. The room was rather sparse, but did have a bed, an 42" wide screen plasma TV, and a western style bath, so I really can't complain. This was also my first experience with leaving my shoes outside the door and wearing plastic flip flops while walking around so as not to scuff up the floor. Since there wasn't internet access at the hotel, I decided to watch CNN (the only English speaking channel on the TV other than movie channels) and pretty promptly fell asleep.
