Taiwan 2014, Part 3

On June 25th through the 27th, we left Taipei and headed down the east coast of the island to Taroko Gorge.  This was a spectacular trip with some very stunning scenery.

We left Taipei on the morning of the 25th and road the train to the town of Sincheng.  We were staying at the Leader Hotel inside the park and arranged for a van to pick us up at the train station.

Waiting for the Train

We hung around the hotel area at Buluowan on the first day.  There was a wonderful buffet dinner both nights and a cultural program afterward out on the lawn with a bonfire after it got dark.  There are a couple of short trails near the hotel, but to really see the gorge you need transportation of some sort.

Our Hotel Room

The Lawn at the Hotel Grounds

We hired a cab on the 26th and drove up and down the gorge.  We did to fairly long hikes at Shakadang near the mouth of the gorge and at Baiyang much further up.  We also did a couple of short hikes along and above the road at Yanzikou and Lushui.

With our Cab Driver

On the 27th we slept in and then arranged for a cab ride to the train station. We were hoping to trade our tickets in for an earlier train, but no such luck.  Instead we grabbed lunch at a restaurant that obviously catered to tour buses.  They took us anyway.  Then we waited for two hours outside the station and got bitten by some sort of mini mosquito.  The major symptoms of this did not show up until several days later when we were in Korea.  Poor Joan had it the worst and it took about a month for them to go away.

 

 

After arriving at Taipei Station we walked across the street and spent one night at the iTaipei Serviced Residence.  It was substantially more expensive than Airbnb, but we kind of splurged for one final night in Taipei.

The next morning we caught a cab to Taoyaun Airport and flew to Korea on Hello Kitty Airlines.

I am not kidding when I say that the whole airport and airplane had gone way overboard on the whole Hello Kitty thing.

 

 

I'm headed back to Taiwan again this June for another conference.  This time its Computational Economics and Finance.  My son, Alan, is coming with me.  Maybe we'll hit Sun Moon Lake this trip.