True Taiwan Travel

Going South on the train.

Huge river channels flow out of the mountains every so often.  These must be raging at times.

Taiwan is hot and therefore has huge bugs.  Stacey has been bit by hundreds of mosquitoes.

This is how the average Taiwanese dresses on the hottest day of the year and doesn't even break a sweat.  I have no idea how this is possible but it is of course opposite of what you would do.

We rented a scooter and drove to the Taroko Gorge National Park.  The road was insane and amazing.  The way people drive was even more insane and amazing they are not all dead.  This is the best place we have seen in Taiwan.

This is a temple for all the people who died building the road.  It has been wiped out by land slides 3 times.  

Derek came down and we went cruising up the mountain to the clouds and the cold air.

Driving in the clouds.

This was a crazy little cable tram that was being used to transport cabbage from a different mountain or valley to where this picture was taken.  It had a wild pulley system and a man operating the engines while smoking and chewing bettel nut.

The views in the mountains were so good and not hot.

We found a nice little swim hole and had it all to ourselves.  

This is the rafting operation: boats being towed, little red boat getting ready to ram a boat to shore, no splash wars because the boats are too far apart, and no one paddling with their tiny paddles.

The people we went rafting with drove us to the next town and took us to get some fresh ice cream at a famous dairy.  Taiwanese people are the most generous of all the people we have met so far. 

 

Derek, Stacey and I enjoyed a few wheat beers for my 27th revolution around the sun.

We have been traveling along the East Coast of Taiwan for the past week.  We have seen lots of beautiful scenery, rented a scooter, drove the scooter up to 2, 600 meters above sea level, seen a 3,000 year old tree, slept in 92 degree hotel rooms, passed out from the heat, laid around all day watching movies due to the rain, traveled on a train with standing room only, and made new friends while rafting on my birthday. 

The rafting part was completely opposite from what you would imagine.  We are on the opposite side of the world, what else would you expect but the opposite.  There were about 200 people there and no guides in the boats.  We were given paddles about the size of your hand.  We didn't even need paddles because instead of having guides that ster you, they had 10 guys in inflatable boats with motors that would ram you out of the way of danger.  They even towed us through the rough sections because they knew that no one was capable of making it through.  The Taiwanese are not into rafting for the thrill, they are in it to get wet and splash the other boaters.  We experience 3.5 hours of constant splash wars even through the roughest sections with 5 and 6 foot waves.  I think I had my eyes shut for over half of the trip. It was completely shocking and a great experience.