Taiwan

We have said this in every country we've visited, but we did NOT have enough time in Taiwan! There was so much we wanted to do and see, and when we arrived in Taipei, we found out about even more options!  Although just a small island, Taiwan is packed with a huge mvariety of dramatic landscapes and natural beauties.  After a month of jumping from one big and busy city to another, we did not expect to spend much time in Taipei, "just another city".  Our impression of the city changed instantly upon arrival!

Our friend, Elaine, is originally from Taipei and made the amazing offer to connect us with her parents who are still living in Taipei.  May and Robert opened their home to us, took us to a fantastic Taiwanese dinner, bought us a feast of exotic fruits to sample and spent time telling us all about their beautiful country and city.  As in Korea, having a connection to locals made the experience so much richer!  We ended up staying an extra night with them because we loved the city and the surrounding areas so much.

Dinner with the Chens

Taipei is the smallest big city I have ever experienced.  It is very easy to get around, there are tons of fantastic restaurants, the people are incredibly friendly (and speak a lot of English), and it is quite clean and safe.  The first day we arrived, we wandered out from the house that was ideally located central to EVERYTHING in the city.  A hundred yards from the house was a beautiful park filled with hundreds of people from the community enjoying a skating rink, playground, running trails and basketball courts.  I cheered Blair on as he played a couple games of basketball with the locals.  We then made our way down to Taipei 101, the largest building in Taiwan.  An outdoor performance of a children's play was being performed in the park across the street and the block was buzzing with families and friends enjoying the night out.

Hanging around Taipei 101

The next day we rented bikes from the city's bike share stalls and explored the rest of the beautiful city.  In the afternoon we visited the Imperial Palace Museum that houses the largest collection of Chinese royal treasure.

Chiang Kai-Shek Mausoleum 

National Palace Museum

After taking the time to explore the city proper, we took a day trip to the north coast to see Yehliu Park. What a tourist trap!  We had seen photos of beautiful rock formations that form along the coast and create a unique natural setting.  Unfortunately, they have made it into such a spectacle that you experience the site with a constant sea of people being shuffled through to see a bunch of rocks that have rope and stanchions around them.  The most exciting part of the day was when we jumped a fence to hike to the end of the peninsula that was reserved only for bird watchers.  We had a bit of peace and quiet and much better views!  All and all a pretty boring day, but these things happen from time to time...it's pretty hard to avoid it on a trip like this!

The next morning we said farewell to our gracious hosts and caught the high speed rail to the west central part of the island--to Sun Moon Lake.  The lake and mountains made for a dramatic retreat from the city life.  We could have spent another two or three days exploring the trails around the lake and renting scooters to make the full loop, but we enjoyed the little bit of time we had there taking a cable car with expansive views of the lake, sampling the street food in the small villages and exploring the temples along the shore.

From Sun Moon Lake we made our way to the very south end of the island and visited an aboriginal village called Maolin in central Taiwan that was completely off the beaten path of foreign travelers.  The day was a looooong day of travel!  Bus, bus, train, train, train, train, bus.  The final bus dropped us in the "town" next to Maolin around 7:30pm that was more like three run down businesses that were completely deserted except for a family eating dinner in their scooter repair shop.  Without any clue of how to make it the rest of the way to the De En Gorge Ecolodge, we unabashedly interrupted their dinner to ask for help (we are getting much better at this).  None of them spoke a word of English, but after much pointing at our phones and repeating the name of the lodge, we finally were able to get them to call the lodge to ask for help.  With our ecolodge host acting as interpreter, the scooter mechanic offered to drive us there for $10 and we made our way deeper into the middle of nowhere!

By the time we arrived at the lodge, our terrible dinner had been sitting out waiting for us for 2-3 hours (in an open air building in the middle of the woods with BUGS everywhere), we had missed the guided night time nature walk, and our aboriginal host, "Big Head" that we had read rave reviews about gave us about 5 minutes of his time to point at a map and say we should go to two spots the next day and that it was a shame we had so little time there because we were missing so many things.  We went to bed in a run down room with uncomfortable, dirty bunks feeling super disappointed that we had spent so much time getting to such a shithole.  Also, that we had gotten there too late to enjoy any of the unique aspects of the lodge like hearing the history of the aboriginal tribe.

"Big Head"

The next morning we woke up, had an equally crappy breakfast and set off for the first hike feeling pretty jaded.  It didn't take long for our spirits to rise, though.  The hiking trail that we had all to ourselves followed a river that wound through lush forests and groves of towering bamboo.  After forty minutes, we rounded a bend and were greeted by a massive waterfall cascading down a cliff into a deep pool of turquoise water.  Eager to take a swim in the refreshing pool, we started down the steep rocks along a rope that locals had rigged to aid in the descent.  As soon as I hit the wet rock, my feet slipped out from under me and I slammed into the rock wall.  Luckily, I was able to keep hold of the rope and avoid tumbling the remaining ten feet to the rocky river bed below.

Fifteen minutes later, after refusing to finish the descent, agreeing to try again, falling a second time and slowly inching my way down the slick rock, I finally made it to the enticing pool.   Swimming in the cool water with the waterfall crashing down and not another person in sight was a rich reward that made up for the painful falls and the terrible day prior!  Unfortunately, I slipped and fell AGAIN on my way out of the water and nearly broke my tail bone and sprained...or possibly broke my finger.  Just call me "Grace", people.

Once we arrived back at the ecolodge, Big Head brought us to the main road to find our own way to his next recommended destination.  "Try hitch hike", he says, "People are friendly, very safe here", and then he speeds off into the sunset. So, there we stand, all alone, at the corner of "Nowhere" and "WTF are we???" with a hand drawn map leading us to a suspension bridge. I shrug my shoulders, stick out my thumb and am shocked when the second car that drives by slows to a stop and beckons us to get in.  I look down at my thumb in awe as if it had just turned water to wine--it actually worked!?

Three hitch hikes later, we arrive at the trail to a suspension bridge that crosses a massive gorge and has beautiful views of the surrounding mountains.  We hike for the rest of the afternoon and then attempt to hitch hike to our bus stop to head back to Kaohsiung for the night.  After a few minutes we get picked up by a woman and her two young girls.  She is an elementary school teacher who lives near Koahsiung and she generously offers to save us an hour on the bus by driving us to her home town where we can catch an express bus the remainder of the way!

Blair attempting to plank

I can't tell you how many times already during our travels that I have been completely blindsided by people's generosity and willingness to help complete strangers.  The news so often paints entire groups of people and countries and even regions of the world to be dangerous and evil people, but my faith in humanity is being restored bit by bit, over and over while traveling through Asia.  Sure, there are dishonest and evil people to be cautious of, but as a general rule, I am being taught that people are much more good than bad.

China

So, we arrived in Beijing and I got sick about three seconds after we landed.  No joke.  Between waking up at 3am during our temple stay, four hours of sleep the next night and landing in Beijing on an "extremely unhealthy" day measured on Blair's China Air Quality App, I have come down with the most disgusting hacking, gagging cough of my life. I sound like I've smoked three packs a day since I was four years old. Needless to say, Blair has found me irresistible over the past week and a half!! The silver lining?  In China, it is not considered rude or disgusting to hack up a lugie and spit it on the side walk...so I guess I fit right in.

We have talked to so many people who have raved about Beijing.  "You will absolutely love it", "It's such a cool city!".  I don't know why.  I just don't get it. Don't get me wrong, we are glad we went, just to experience it.  We visited the Forbidden City, Tienenmen Square, Temple of Heaven, Beihai Park...we hunted out dumplings and street food down secret alleyways occupied only by locals...we biked along the chaotic streets...we haggled for goods at the Silk Street Markets and enjoyed a vibrant Kung Fu theatre performance.  We walked out of the markets with a watch, sunglasses and a whole new appreciation for sales and negotiations.  After three days we could not wait to leave the disgusting dirtiness of it all, the constant honking of cars, mopeds and scooters, the smog so thick you could cut it with a knife.  I would never ever want to live in a city like Beijing. I was excited to say hello, and even more excited to say goodbye to China's capital city.

One nice thing it did offer us was close proximity to the Great Wall. We took a day trip out to Jinshanling and hiked along 6km of the wall to Simatai.  We avoided the most tourist heavy site to visit the wall and instead opted for a location three hours outside the city where the air was a bit clearer, the countryside was untouched and we shared the experience with very few other tourists.  The trip did not disappoint!  The views were spectacular and the hike was exhausting.  We went with a group of about 30 other travelers--most were around our age, and ranged from British, German, Australian, Spanish and a slew of other countries. Randomly enough, the only other American couple on the trip was from Chicago as well!  We went for dinner with them that evening and went clubbing with them a week later in Shanghai! Small world.

From Beijing we took an overnight train to Xi'an to see the army of Terra Cotta Warriors. The train was a fun experience--we stayed in a soft sleeper car that had four bunk beds.  The couple sleeping on the bottom bunks didn't speak a word of English, so we just kept to ourselves and enjoyed watching a movie on the Kindle.  We are watching an iconic or historic movie based on each country we are visiting along the way--in preparation for Vietnam we watched Apocalypse Now.  We have been on the go for the entire trip, so a twelve hour ride without wifi or anything else to do finally gave us the opportunity to relax and shut off for a bit.  We slept through the night and arrived in Xi'an around 8 the next morning.

 

Xi'an had a similar vibe to Beijing with fewer sites to be seen.  We checked out the Bell Tower near our hostel, the city wall and the Muslim Quarter.  The Muslim Quarter is a neighborhood packed with street after street of vendors selling souvineers, fruits and vegetables, street food and piles of cow organs.  There were tables piled high with lungs, livers and kidneys for purchase.  We decided to pass on picking up a nice lung for dinner when we saw the number of flies swarming the unrefrigerated meat and a shopkeeper hacking away at part of a cow on the dirt floor of the shed behind the shop.

We spent a day visiting the Terra Cotta Warriors museum. The scale of the excavation site is massive--so much larger than I expected.  We had seen hundreds of photos of this archaeological site, but the scale in person was even more impressive.

Our next stop was Huangshan Mountains.  This was the portion of our China tour that both Blair and I were most excited about--a chance to finally leave the cities behind and enjoy the natural beauty that we prefer so much more than the man-made beauty we had seen thus far.  It took about four hours to hike from the base up to our hotel atop the mountains where we would stay for two nights. The hike was a never ending STEEP staircase that started in the wooded mountain side and ended at the peak that we presumed offered stunning views of the surrounding landscape. Unfortunately, the mountainous terrain was covered in a thick blanket of clouds so we couldn't see much of anything that first day.  Neither of us were too disappointed because we were exhausted from the hike up.  We explored a bit and then relaxed for the rest of the night.

Because we had selected the cheap option to stay in the dorms, Blair was in the guys room and I was in the girls room next door.  Between the wood planks covered in a blanket that they called "beds"; the chorus of of melodious snorers in each room, 100 degree++ temps because people wanted to dry their shoes using the space heater, and the 1.5 year old that was staying in my room having a complete melt down at 1am--Blair and I didn't get much sleep. Still cloudy, but significantly better than the day prior, we hiked all morning and afternoon with a nice long nap in between. Then we got down on our knees and prayed that God would provide us nice, new, QUIET roommates for the second night. It must be because we were nearly touching heaven at the top of these magnificent mountains, but the Big Guy heard and promptly delivered! We both had all new roomies and met a fun US/Chinese couple to spend the evening with!

We woke up after a restful night of sleep at 5am, caught a beautiful sunrise and headed for the "Grand Canyon" hike to beat the crowds that would be swarming the mountain later that day for the Chinese National Holiday. All I really need to say is "Spectacular!!", and show the breathtaking photos of sheer cliffs jutting out of the low lying clouds. The experience was other worldly...this mountain range was actually the inspiration for the floating mountains from Avitar because they seemed to hover weightlessly on top of the clouds.

Our last expedition in Huangshan was to climb to the top of Celestial Peak, one of the largest peaks in the range. The path made a straight vertical ascent up the peak on steps cut out of the sheer cliff face.  Once near the top, a narrow two-way path with simple rope railings led to the top of the peak. A hundred foot drop on either side of the path offered quite a thrill and a healthy dose of vertigo and jello legs--but the risk was well worth the reward!  Stunning 360-degree views of the surrounding mountains awaited us at the top! The trail leading down the backside of the peak offered additional thrills as we ducked under rock arches, shuffled sideways to fit through narrow crevices and lowered ourselves down stairs backwards because they were to steep to descend facing forward.

The next day back in Huangshan City offered a relaxing day of recovery complete with an amazing foot massage and exploring the Tunxi Old City shops and food stands. 

That night we hopped a flight to Shanghai for our last two days in China.  I was expecting a city similar to Beijing that would be a dirty and chaotic mess, but I was completely blown away by what I found.  We visited the French Concession shopping area that was filled with wealthy foreign ex-pats and tourists and far too rich for our blood and then wandered through the city parks, E. Nanjing Pedestrian Street and The Bund.  All were modern, clean and beautiful!  We met up with Will and Val (the Chicago travelers we met on the Great Wall) along with two of their friends on our last night and went to a HOT night club right in the heart of the Bund along the river.  We couldn't think of a better way to say farewell to China than such a fun night out with new friends!