BAD JENNA

Sorry. I know it's been almost a month.

I'm just...busy. I'm getting married in three weeks. In a large wedding. That we planned from the other side of the planet. A wedding on something of a budget in which huge sections that most people delegate to paid professionals...are done by us. DIY. And while B's family has been fantastic, mine have been a little on the dramaaaaatic side. I love them anyway, but it's true.

And yeeess, I took the photo above. I did not rip it out of a calendar or scan a postcard. I took that!

Just goes to show that no matter how much the Taipei basin overpopulates, and no matter how much crap fills the air from China next door (cough cough, wheeze), and now much industry blights the west coast (industry that keeps the economy humming, I know), there's a reason why Taiwan is also called Formosa. It really, truly and deeply is a gorgeous place. It's east, northeast and south coasts, islands and northern mountains along with the central mountains are absolutely stunning. No two ways about it. They say China is beautiful and in some places, it's true. Taiwan still has that beauty - I can't help but think that huge tracts of it have been destroyed in China - tumbled temples, ravaged environments and filthy ecosystems, razed meadows and forests, blanched mountains, depressing zoos, bilious rivers.

It's truly a gem of a place and it's too bad that so many people don't realize it - they think "Taiwan" and it's synonymous with "my keyboard was made there". Not with "mind-bending mountain vistas and cloud seas". Or, if they're a little more astute, maybe they associate it with Sun Moon Lake or Alishan or some such. Eh. I'm sorry, but the sheer vastness, the gut-punching raw beauty of the drive from Puli to Lishan and down to Yilan shoves those tourist-blighted spots down to pale also-rans. And yet you see so few travelers up there.

Which is good, in a sense. I have it all to myself when I go - which is every few years when I need a soul-resting break and a reminder that I am truly insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Vistas like the one above are good for things like that. When you're planning a wedding - a large wedding, a DIY wedding, a nontraditional wedding, from a distance, you need that perspective sometimes.

So we rented a car - the bus is an option, but it sucks - you can't scream "WOOOO!" out the windows, play burned mix CDs, lean out the window and stop where you please to eat, take pictures or run around shouting about how beautiful it all is. We burned piles of music, grabbed the car at Taizhong HSR Station (CarPlus - recommended. Very good service though their good cars book out fast - we ended up with a Mitsubishi Colt when a Toyota Camry or Altis (Corolla) would have done better. You can return the cars elsewhere for a $1200 NT fee - we returned ours in Taipei. They do insist that you have an International Driver's Permit and they do check.

Anyway, here are some photos of our recent weekend in Lishan for you:

Farms of Lishan with Snow Mountain peaking out the top.

Drew and Emily in the creepy abandoned church.

View from the ridge just below Lishan's main town.

Side doors of creepy abandoned church.

View, I believe, from Fushoushan.

Creepy abandoned church.

One of the peaks of Hehuan Mountain. At this point I turned back toward the soaring views beyond and shouted "WOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOHOOOO!" at passing cars. A lot of people shouted back!

And no, the roads are not that safe. Drive carefully, use your horn, watch the mirrors and be prepared to brake at a moment's notice.

Clouds rolling in.

Emily at Fushoushan.

Happy folks from Tainan on a weekend trip. It is amazing, the hospitality up in the mountains - we shared tea, shared food, swapped stories and had conversations with so many people.

Books in the abandoned church.

Drew in a sniper hole at Fushoushan.

Maple leaves at our farm homestay, right outside our door, from the porch. I loved that in the evenings we could sit out there, drink tea, futz around and enjoy the cool (cool!) air.

Fruit and tea grown near Lishan. Lishan's fruit, vegetables and high mountain tea are superb.

Harvesting snow pears in Lishan.

Awwwww. Me and Brendan.

The new, less creepy, church.

This reminds me of the lyric of a favorite song, "Falling Is Like This" - One minute there was road beneath us - and the next just sky..."

Flower at Fushoushan.

"WOOOOOOO!"

"The Old England: Since 2009"

Rose after a nighttime rain in Lishan

Pears at Fushoushan.

The owner of our farm homestay - Mingxiu (明秀) - it's a kilometer down a steep hill from the top of Lishan proper, but totally worth it. Not cheap ($1500-$2000 /night for a double room with electric blanket, cable TV, hot water and other amenities in a cabin built with local wood) but the best deal in town for what you get and the lovely setting, if you ask me. The owner and his family are very friendly. Drop me a comment if you are ever interested in staying there - I highly recommend it.

More farming near Lishan.

Street food stand with the best damn view in the country.

Since 2009.

Tea at a farm stand just off Hehuanshan.

Farming near Nanshan in the Lanyang Valley.

Lanyang River Valley - after Lishan you basically head down, leaving Taizhong county and entering Yilan County. The signage is terrible once you hit Yilan.

Lanyang River Valley from the top of the mountain on the way down.
View from pagoda on the way to Tianchi lake at Fushoushan Farm about 4km up from Lishan and walkable for those hardy enough - though we drove.

Fushoushan trees.

Caoling Old Trail and Wankengtou Mountain (草嶺古道和灣坑頭山）

Last weekend we did a one-day hike up the Dali (大里）side of the Caoling Old Trail （草嶺古道）- you can get there on the local trail to Su'ao, getting off at Dali, which is a few stops beyond Fulong (the other end of the trail, which we could see at a distance on the upper reaches of this hike). It's walkable from the station. The coast is quite beautiful here, but the views from the train station are marred by fences, wires and poles. Fortunately, before you get to the temple where the trail begins, you can follow a path along a stream under the road and tracks (the sign calls it a "Wild River" - which is hilarious) to better admire the scenery from the beach.

I, however, prefer this view that keeps all the industrial-ness of the railroad in the picture, inc contrast with the beautiful cliffs in the distance. This looks so much like those old railway postcards you can buy in souvenir shops in Taiwan when tinted sepia that I'm just a sucker for it.

From the outset, Turtle Island is visible, looking very much like a turtle from this vantage point. (When I'd previously seen it from farther south along the coast, I'd wondered how it got its name).

From the temple - which is very well-marked, as is the trailhead - just north of Dali Station, you start climbing. You can climb a short ways and then catch a road winding up the hill, or you can stay on the stairs, which will take you to a gorgeous lookout point and then back over to the road, where you can pick up the staired historic trail.

Joseph had done the staired trail before and I HATE STAIRS (I really, really hate them) and can move much faster on hills or even steep trails than I can on stairs, which exhaust me. So we decided to take the switchbacked road instead of the stairs leading straight up to the ridge. From the top, the route we traversed looked like this:

...and the road, which had no shade (but also had fantastic views as there were no trees in the way), was a perfectly good walk up the hill. Partway up both the trail and the road reach a forestry station with bathrooms and vending machines. On a hot day, there's almost no shade so I recommend stocking up on water here if you did not bring enough.

Not far from the top of the pass - the lowest point in a ridge of mountains where the trail begins to descend to Fulong - is the Reed House. Reed House is the ruins of an old inn where one could stay along the trail, now just some heaps of rock and a faux reed hut for people to rest in and get some shade. This is also visible from both the road and the stairs.

Not long after that you reach "the top", although of course it was not the top for us. There is a wide area with tablets and a small shrine to Tu Di Gong and some other guy (or his wife; who can tell).

...and not long after that, you pass over the top and begin the descent to Fulong. About ten meters below is the famous Tiger Tablet, a historic landmark.

A Chinese official traversing the trail during inclement weather in the 19th century grabbed some grass and twisted it into a brush, painting the symbol for "Tiger" on this rock to quell the winds (an old Chinese saying goes "Clouds obey the dragon; winds obey the tiger") - it is apparently a female tiger, not that I can tell. The inked character was later carved into the rock for posterity.

This area gets buffeted by very strong winds coming in from the Pacific, and as such beyond a certain point trees do not grow, or if they do they are stunted. The upside of this is that the view from that point on is stunning and completely unobstructed.

(The sunlight was too direct to take a good picture of the entire Tiger character - 虎 － though frankly it totally doesn't look like "tiger" to me. I am sure this is because I am an uneducated Philistine).

Anyway, we did not continue along the trail because, as Joseph put it, "other than one more tablet that isn't even all that exciting, there's not much else to see on the way to Fulong".

Instead, we began a path to higher territory - we walked the ridge to its peak at Wankengtou Mountain (灣坑頭山) - the trail to that begins here, veering uphill at the rest/lookout pagoda. It's quite clear which way is up and which continues along the trail.

We were assured by Joseph that it would be "up and down", with a few peaks and then more or less easy going. Joseph's a damn liar, but we still like him anyway. After a good rest and then a hot&sweaty climb up stairs - damn stairs! - to the next lookout point, we were assured that the next peak may be the top. I had my doubts.

This, however, was not the top.

We rested and kept up the climb - fighting the good fight, as it were - up to another rest station and over a somewhat flattish area. Assured that this was quite likely the top, we huffed it up there pretty quickly.

This was, however, still not the top.

From here, we could see the top, though. That was reassuring. Looking down from this part of the ridge is breathtaking - near the trail the cliff drops straight down, and you can sometimes see wisps of clouds or sea mist below.

Yes, that is, in fact, straight down. Pretty awe-inspiring and worth the stairs.

From the far side, the little rest pagoda was quite picturesque against the teetering mountain.

The path did finally head down after this, albeit briefly. We gave our calves a rest as we wandered over hills and rises, occasionally passing grazing cattle and fences&stone posts to keep them reigned in. Cow poop and the rustic smell of cattle (and their assorted waste products) wafted in the air but it was not unpleasant.

This part of the trail offers spectacular ocean views as well as views over Taipei County - various posted signs at scenic points highlight the distant peaks - some as far out as Shiding and, apparently, Keelung Mountain peeking out in the background. In the foreground, green grass, cattle and mist gave the place a very New Zealand, Lord of the Rings sort of feel. Extremely panoramic. Ponds for bathing cattle here and there dotted the grassy hillsides.

After some time we finally made one final push up the big mountain and a sign at the top assured is that this was, in fact, the top.

The top. Finally.

Not long after we reached the top, mist began to pour in earnest over the hillsides, creating not just a "cloud sea" but what is apparently called a "cloud fall" (like a waterfall but with, err, clouds). The misty air made it that much more magical, though obscured views over longer distances.

We reached the top at 3:30pm (we rested a lot on the way and it took us longer than it should have), and figured we had plenty of time to get back down. The map indicated two paths down through the Taoyuan Valley and grasslands （桃源谷), one of which seemed to descend quickly as well as being quite close by. No problem, right?

Wrong. We walked and walked - mostly down, a little up - with no route down in sight. The sun dipped lower and lower and the light soon became good for photos again...though maybe not so good for people on a mountain ridge with no discernable way down except possibly Death Toboggan (I suggested Death Tobogganing down; my idea was rejected for some reason).

Finally, after passing a few more ponds and scenic outlooks, we reached another high point that had quite a few visitors even in this advanced afternoon hours. A road led up to a parking area nearby. "If there's no path down here, let's take the road and stop at the first farmhouse we see to ask for help in calling a taxi," we decided.

Fortunately, I had thought to bring flashlights so we had some source of light once the sun set. This would be quite handy later.

After this point it was no longer possible to take good photos with my dinky little out of date Canon Powershot, so I put it away. We did find a path down, and after a long scramble down some stone steps came to a temple about halfway (maybe a little less) along. "You guys have flashlights, right?" they asked (in Chinese).

"Yeah, we have two."

"Good, you're going to need them. It's already dark farther down on the ocean side of the ridge."

"How much longer until we get to the highway?"

"About an hour's hike."

"..."

"..."

"...and until we get to the nearest town?"

"Daxi is about a half hour farther south down the highway."

"..."

"Oh."

So we girded our loins and took off after refilling some of our water supply at the temple. Flaslights soon came on as the path wound down the mountains, over the folds and in places straight across the ridge. Not going straight down meant that it did take a good hour, through some scary parts. One area was landslided out, and we had to cross it - a short section but still a terrifying one - with ropes. There was about 3 inches of mud to hold you up, rock on one side and a steep drop-off down several tens of meters on the other. Brendan, who is not afraid of heights, just went across. I am afraid of them just a bit and I freaked out, slipping at one point to land against the rock. Fun times.

Another part has the path following a stream, where it's slippery, pitch black from the set sun and clouded moon as well as thick overgrowth, and hard to make out where the path ends and the stream begins. We followed that for awhile - after that it was fairly easy going. Over another fold in the mountainside and down to the highway, where we walked that half hour (no choice really) to the bus station and ran-limped (run-limping is great, isn't it?) onto the local train pulling in.

For dinner - and we were starving - we went to Luodong 40 minutes south, ate ourselves silly at the night market and boarded an express bus through the Xueshan Tunnel back to Taipei, which we reached at midnight.

So, as we decided at the night market, our day was not just seized. It was throttled a bit, thrown to the ground, and kicked in the dust for good measure.