Taiwan

April 8th (I didn’t finish writing until April 10th though)

And so ends my time in foreign countries.  We are heading back to the United States.  No more time in far off lands, struggling with the language barrier, trying to find clean toilets, snapping pictures of ancient world ruins, scaling the steps of the Great Wall, sleeping in hammocks in remote jungles, diving with Great White Sharks, or risking life and limb in countless taxis and rickshaws.  Those adventures will have to wait to another time in life.  But before I get too melancholy in my posts (there will certainly be some time for that once I am officially off the ship and back home in a few weeks) I would like to recount my time in Taiwan.
        Taiwan was an unexpected surprise.  When the earthquake/tsunami struck the eastern coast of Japan, everyone pretty much knew that we would no longer be making our original port of call in Kobe, and a few days later we were told that we would be in Taiwan for three days instead.  Of course this news came during our marathon stretch of traveling in Asia, when we were only on the ship for about 6 days over a 4 week span.  Needless to say no one on the ship had much time to prepare or plan out travel in Taiwan.  We left Shanghai on a Friday and by Sunday night were already in Keelung Taiwan.  This included a brief time of anchoring near some of the southern Japanese islands (b/c China and Taiwan have weird political relations, we couldn’t come directly from mainland china to Taiwan, and so we had to stop in Japan in transit), so technically we did make it to Japan. 
        The weather Monday morning in Keelung was rainy and cold, one of the first times in a country where weather looked like it could affect some of our plans.  I knew after China that I wanted time to get out of the cities and touristy destinations and just be outside hiking around.  My confidence in travelling to new locations was pretty high too, so when I decided that I wanted to go to Taroko Gorge National Park I didn’t really care who came with me, how confusing the train system was, how much it would cost, or what the weather was like - the promise of hiking, picturesque views of waterfalls, bouldering down along the river and getting away from SAS people (I love them a lot, but have had more than enough time on the ship to get to know them) was too good.  This determination was the first in the line of several choices that turned out pretty well if I do say so myself. 
        I ended up traveling with a friend a new pretty well, another kid who I kinda knew and a third person that I met the morning we arrived in Keelung port.  Getting away from the group of people I normally travel with allowed me to “get away” and to get to know some new people.  We left the ship as soon as it was cleared and started walking.  After asking a local for the direction of the train station (accomplished by motioning with our bodies and saying “choo-choo”) we had about a ten minute walk to the other side of the port.  A quick stop at the ATM, which warned us in English to “not let the gangster steal your money” and we were at the station, trying to decipher the maps and signs, which were almost exclusively in Taiwanese.  We found a station attendant who spoke minimal English and somehow were able to get on the proper connecting train to the next station and then get on the next train (apparently the last one with open seats for several days) to the parks entrance.  We got off the train and the four of us (actually 6 other SAS kids got off too, so 10 total) walked out of the tiny station into this vacant parking lot with a few buildings and a road.  It appeared we were the only people there, and certainly the only white people but after some investigating, we found a scooter rental store.

NOTE: Because the following story may not follow the strictest legal statutes and definitely goes against some SAS rules, I would like to mention that it is completely fictional* and I only include it to mention what could have happened had we not been such good and fair global citizens. But for the sake of story telling….
*non-fictional

       We had read before that scooters were a great way to explore the park, but that the switch back roads shouldn’t be attempted by novice riders.  Well, I thought to myself, I certainly have been on a scooter at least once before, have seen scooters a bunch before, and definitely know the difference between a motor scooter and a regular non-motor scooter; so this absolutely qualifies me as above novice.  It also happened perfectly that the scooter store had 5 scooters, which meant that there were just enough scooters for the 10 of us to double up and ride.  The lady at the scooter store didn’t speak a lick of English, and all the forms were in Taiwanese, but somehow we were able to pay (10 US dollars each for a full 24 hours!) and get the keys to our five iron stallions.  I think I may have used my student ID card as my motorcycles license and my expired driver’s license served as deposit to return the scooters.  Regardless, we managed to fit two people and their bags on one scooter (my passenger was this tiny girl who had to wear my big pack, and I had her pack by my feet) strapped on our 80s police style helmets and hit the road. 
The scooters were rather easy to drive, but having a passenger and extra bags definitely affected the weight distribution and made turning a little difficult at first, and I had to sit so close to the front that I couldn’t use the side-view mirrors (but all in all still easy to drive).  We stopped at a 7-11 for some scooter gas and then found ourselves at the national park head quarters.  The park infrastructure was very impressive (thanks to the Japanese a few decades back) and would hardly be distinguishable from the national park system in the states, minus the Taiwanese signs and lack of white people.  One of the rangers at head quarters spoke great English and we were able to get the location of some hostels and hotels further into the park, the weather forecast, and some recommended hiking trails.  It was about mid afternoon at this point, and decided we (back to 4 of us at this point) would ride up to Tiansiang, a small town with some lodging.  The ride took about 35 mins and basically consisted of switchback roads next to vertical cliffs, long unlit tunnels, lots of giant tour buses, and portions where the road was so narrow that traffic only went one direction at the time.  It was very similar to some of the roads in the Rockies, Yellowstone or Glacier NP, in both sketchiness of driving conditions and incredible views.  It was a blast on the way up, and felt really freeing riding the scooters and just being outside, after so much time on this trip being spent cooped up on tour buses, trains and planes. 
Tiansiang was right next to the river and literally consisted of maybe 6-8 buildings.  There was a really nice 5 star resort right next to the cliffs and river, and a hostel (not too bad actually) a short hike from the resort.  Surprisingly, and thanks to a “student” discount, the 4 of us were able to get a room at the resort for about the same price as the hostel.  We got our room with about an hour left of light in the day and climbed down a little ways to the river to explore.  There were tons of giant boulders and rocks to climb around and over down the river.  It was a blast traversing through the riverside with these massive cliffs on either side, another one of those “life is great” moments where I was so perfectly and peacefully happy to boulder around the river and just breath in the fresh air.  After the sun set, we decided to venture out on the scooters for a bit and find the trail head to the hike we planned on the doing the next morning.  It was a fun ride, but we definitely went a little slower due to the darkness.  We returned to the hotel around 1900-2000 and decided to just enjoy the amenities our resort had to offer for the rest of the night.
And boy did our resort have some amenities.  In no particular order I enjoyed one of 3 roof top hot tubs overlooking an illuminated part of the canyon, swam in the roof top infinity pool, enjoyed the warmth of the fire pit, listened to the rushing canyon water from our room’s balcony, swam in the giant indoor pool, rested in the indoor Jacuzzi, ate some desserts from the bakery, played in the kiddie ball pit, attended an aboriginal dance performance (I was selected out of the audience and brought on stage.  The emcee spoke to me in Taiwanese for a while and then put the mic in front of my face.  In my confusion I managed a “my name is Ben,” before everyone clapped and I got this awesome braided head band, truly hilarious to watch im sure), stepped inside the sauna, played some ping pong and used our room’s shower (which happened to be a whole room by itself).  We had gone to the Gorge expecting to rough it for the night, but I will never turn down luxurious accommodations, especially inexpensive ones.  
        The next morning we were up at around 5:30am to start our longer hike by 6:00.  Surprisingly, all four of us made it to the trail head by 6 without any grumbling or complaining, a characteristic of travelling partners that is highly desirable and hard to come by.  The hike was supposed to take around 4 hours, but we were confident to finish it in at least an hour less.  It started off pretty level, just following the curves of the canyon.  After crossing a pair of rope suspension bridges a few hundred feet in the air (yes, they bounced and swayed and made me feel like Indiana Jones) we hit the uphill part of the hike.  After about an hour of climbing steps, the trail leveled off again and we reached our destination.  We were at the top of the cliffs and were supposed to see a big pond (and possibly go swimming in it) but it was really cloudy/foggy so we couldn’t see too much of anything.  Regardless, the hike was incredible, the weather was perfect (although the clouds limited our views but provided cool, moist refreshing air to breath) and it always feels good to wake up early and sweat.  We made it back to the scooters just over 2 and a half hours after we left. 
        We made it back to the hotel where we immediately went to the breakfast buffet and feasted on one of the best breakfasts I have had in the past 3 months.  I went up to the roof to do some hot hot tub water/ cold pool water muscle shock therapy to recover from the hike.  We all made it back to the room feeling incredible refreshed and full, and since we finished the hike a little sooner than expected, took a 30 min power nap, with the balcony opened letting the fresh air and sounds of rushing water in.  We checked out, loaded up our scooter again and headed to one of the temples/pagodas up in the cliffs.  A quick 20 min stop allowed us to climb the steps to the top and snap some photos.  Next we rode back down to the park headquarters (going downhill meant I hardly had to use any throttle which was fun) and found the trailhead to a 90min nature walk.  This hike was level the whole time and lower in the canyon, and was a great way to stretch the legs out after riding the scooters.  The walk was great.  I just tried to really soak in the whole environment of the natural beauty, the deep blues and greens of the water, the swirled marbled patterns of the boulders, the sounds of the birds and the rushing water and fresh air.  We found a couple spots to climb down off the trail, boulder around and splash the water. 
        We had to quickly hike back to the scooters and rush back to the train station in order to catch a train into Taipei.  We pretty much had the whole road back into town to ourselves allowing us to really open up the throttles and unleash the 75ccs (maybe 50?) of power our bikes had.  I think I topped at about 90 (calm down, its kilometers per hour) but the wind was rushing into my eyes so fast that I kinda had to squint to keep my contacts from blowing out, so not the safest way to ride a scooter.  We made it with just enough time to return the scooters and buy tickets for the train.  A friend and I decided to continue into Taipei and spend the night there while the 2 others in our group took the train back to Keelung and spent the night on the ship.  We were able to meet up with about 10 other friends at a hostel in Taipei that night (after eating McDonalds for dinner and TGI Fridays for dessert – can’t be cultural all the time).  The hostel wasn’t too bad and had free Internet.  And even though I had to share a room with some Asian people who liked to chant Buddhist prayers at odd hours, I slept pretty well.  The next morning I was up early again to try and locate and orphanage that my sister, Chih, may or may not have been adopted from.
        I had an address of an orphanage (but im pretty sure my Dad just googled orphanages in Taiwan and gave me the address of the first one) that happened to be just a short cab ride from my hostel.  I didn’t really have too much of a plan as to what I would say when the orphanage employees answered the door to a white guy at 8 in the morning, but figured things might have a way of working out.  Sure enough, I found the orphanage, was welcomed in, and was able to speak with one of the social workers there that spoke English.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough of my sister’s information to definitively say whether or not that was the orphanage she came from, but it was still cool visiting.  I was able to tour the orphanage, interact with some of its residents (now it mainly serves mentally handicapped individuals) and learn some of the history of the orphanage.  It certainly is possible that Chih was adopted from there and I have their contact info if we decide to follow up and try to get some more information.
        After about 90mins at the orphanage, I made it back to the hostel just in time to catch the rest of the group who were leaving for Taipei 101.  Taipei 101 is a really cool building, the 2nd largest in the world.  I have always liked the engineering shows about massive buildings and architectural masterpieces, so it was great to be able to experience one of the world’s finest examples.  The elevator to the top took about 36 seconds, an engineering feat in itself.  The views from top were incredible as expected, and they had a lot of cool information on the history of the construction and also had one of the massive vibration dampening pendulums exposed.  All in all a really cool (in a nerdy way) experience.  We grabbed lunch in the food court at the bottom of the building (Auntie Anne’s Pretzels and Cold Stone Ice Cream – I do apologize for our indulgences, but hey - we are, after all, American).  I had debated going to the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial and Museum, but really didn’t have too much of desire to look at artwork (sorry Dad) and instead wanted to get back to the ship and spend some time exploring Keelung. 
        We grabbed a bus from Taipei to Keelung and made it back to the ship around 1500.  I was pretty tired and honestly expected to fall asleep for the afternoon, but after a quick shower (hadn’t change clothes or showered for a few days at this point) I felt refreshed enough to go walk around the city.  Keelung didn’t have too much to offer (at least compared to the massive cities in China we had just come from) but it was great to just wander around by myself.  I found the city park and a couple of cool temples, but mainly it was fun to be alone in a foreign city, the last one I’ll be in until life’s next adventure. 
        So that puts me at today, Sunday.  We don’t have class today for some reason, but I won’t complain.  The Pacific Ocean crossing has been great so far – beautiful weather and just enough rocking to make the weak seasick and the strong sleep well at night (I’m the strong by the way).  I cannot stand not fulfilling promises, and therefore will just not say when I’ll finish up my blogs for Vietnam, Cambodia and India, but they are forthcoming, and I apologize for their lateness (but really, who reads the crap I write anyways?).  I guess it is two weeks from today when I will be leaving the MV Explorer, which is kinda sad.  But that is how life goes, and I just have to enjoy the time I have left and look forward to seeing my family and friends again. 

Do Work Son

-Ben