The last train was quite crowded, but after the most popular stop on the route, almost everybody got off. There were only three or four people left in my car, all of them seemed to be locals. Jingtong was a popular mining town back in its hay-day. However, the work became too dangerous, so the coal cleaning plant closed its doors forty years ago. Now, the historic street is quiet with a few people going about their business. I took an hour to explore some of the crumbling dormitories for the miners and ate some street food. I also had the chance to have a chat with the gentleman looking over the closed coal cleaning plant. He quickly got off the solitaire game he was playing on his computer as I approached. I must have been one of the only tourists to come visit. He worked hard to give me as much information in English about the place.
After Jingtong, I took the train four minutes away to Pingxi, the next stop. Pingxi’s Lantern Festival has topped lists with Oktoberfest in Munich. However, the town is also quite quiet for 364 days a year. Definitely more going on in the streets compared to Jingtong. As we arrived, people were painting lanterns to release them into the sky. I would take part later.
As I walked down the street, I passed an old gentleman in a workshop with a few lanterns hanging from the ceiling. I ended up buying two of them, which I feel will add to the ambiance of Shisha 23’s balcony (the nickname of my apartment as known around Saigon). After taking quite a bit of time to assemble, I killed some time by walking around the small town and bought a bit more street food. I can only count three meals during my time in Taiwan where I sat down and had a proper meal. The rest of the time I ate from a cart on the road.
Okay, it was time to travel to the touristy town I talked about earlier. It is no mystery why this is the favorite place to visit. The historic road is no road at all. Instead, the train tracks run directly through the town. The operators will begin blowing their whistles a minute before the train comes barreling through. Everybody must squish together on the sidewalk and take their phones out to film the impending train. Once it passes, the tracks become crowded like nothing ever happened. It was a remarkable sight.
While walking down the street, a man yelled out to me asking if I wanted to rent a motorbike. My answer was of course yes. A waterfall was nearby, and to keep to the schedule I made on the train, I wouldn’t have enough time if I walked there. In under a minute and after paying the equivalent of 5 USD and handing in my license, I was sitting on a hot pink electric motorbike built for somebody much smaller than me. I sped off at a top speed of 40 km/h to the waterfall.
I got lost a few times and asked random people for directions. The motorbike guy tried to explain, but he didn’t speak any English besides “motorbike.” I walked along a few suspension bridges and hiked fifteen minutes down to see the largest waterfall in Taiwan.
After my hour adventure, I returned the bike. I’ll stick with my Suzuki Hayate bike in Saigon. It has a bit more kick than the electric cotton candy bike I was driving. While walking down the tracks, many people were releasing the lanterns in the dusk. When in Rome I suppose. I got to painting a red lantern, with the intention of bringing good health to those who select that color. I did my best to write Shifen using Chinese characters. At least I gave a good laugh to the employees at the lantern place. After painting, we went out to the tracks as they took my photo in the most formulaic way. You could tell they do this a lot. I released my flaming lantern into the sky.
Once I spent my two hours in Shifen, the rain had picked up. Did I not mention it had been raining the entire day? Well, it got worse. I had a train and bus in front of me to get to the most famous old mining town called Jiufen. It was clear why this is the number one place to visit in Taiwan outside of Taipei. The historic district was huge, with the cobblestone streets winding through the face of a mountain. The roads were narrow with lanterns dangling down overhead. While walking, I came upon a shop that sold handmade glass art. I’m praying on the plane I’m sitting on right now hoping that the packing job will protect my dragon.
The rain and fog consumed the town. I was keen to get a picture of the facade of the town that I’d seen on Google. It looks like an Instagram star was also there. She was dressed to the nines with her little posse by her side. She seemed disappointed as they struggled to get the perfect picture. Lesson: social media looks way better than what happens. She was cold and frustrated. Whatever picture she ended up posting, it probably looked like heaven. It wasn’t.
I ate dinner overlooking the best looking spot in the town that I could actually see. After dinner, I made my way back to the bus station to find out the buses stopped running an hour ago. Whoops. A single taxi sat waiting for me. When I got in, I asked to go to the train station 15 minutes away. He kept trying to get me to pay to go back to Taipei with him. After finding out he was from Taipei and had to make the drive anyway, I was able to negotiate the ride down to $15 USD for him to take me directly to my hotel. He was so happy, that he pulled over and bought us both dumplings and a traditional warm soy milk drink. I hated it, but drank enough to not offend him.
My third day proves that not all days are the best. After riding a high from my adventures the day prior, I caught the bus to Yangmingshan National Park just north of Taipei. It was cloudy, but it looked like a fine day to hike. I was wrong. Apparently, you could go to an overlook about five minutes from the bus to get a good view of the city. I skipped that being that my eye was on the tallest mountain in the park. It provides panoramic views of both of the city and the surrounding mountains and valleys, so I’ve been told.
About halfway up the mountain, I was still in the forest. I noticed a slight fog. Right then, I should have turned back. I knew it would only get worse. It did get worse; much worse. When the trees subsided, the fog, rain, wind, and cold only got worse. I was tired, underdressed, cold, and very wet. When I arrived at the summit, the wind was terrible. I couldn’t hardly keep my eyes open with the sideways rain. I lasted for a minute before starting the trek down. The route down led me into a different valley. The route down hugged the side of the mountain and had very few trees, just grasslands. Meaning there was no protection from the elements. I ran down most of the mountain. I can’t remember being that miserable in a long time.
I finally saw a parking lot past the street. It must have taken me under an hour to get down. When in the parking lot, I couldn’t even tell where the visitors’ center was located due to the fog. I found it and entered to the greetings of the rangers. They quickly helped me get warm, got me water, and pointed to the nearest hot springs five minutes down the road. I took a few minutes to warm up before heading back out. I won’t talk much about my experience there. I will only say this: I had a truly authentic experience going to local hot springs with only old Taiwanese men. I had no towel, but didn’t care. I felt drier after getting out of the springs.
I caught the bus directly back to the station near my hotel. Truthfully, I wasn’t exactly sure where the bus was going. I assumed it was taking me somewhere in Taipei. I knew for certain it would get me away from the fog. To my surprise, it never rained in the city just thirty minutes south. I walked back from the bus as my teeth clattered and my body shook. I took a thirty minute hot shower and sat in my hot room without the AC before I started fully feeling warmer again.
In the evening, I mustered up the courage to leave my hotel and go back to the center of the city to explore the most popular section where they close down full city blocks to traffic to allow the streets to fill with people. Keeping with my theme of only getting street food, I got a few different things on my walk and enjoyed the street performers and bustle of the city. I walked around that area for almost two hours without walking down the same street twice. Then it started to rain again. I went home.
My flight wasn’t until 7pm on the forth day, meaning I had time to sneak in a free walking tour in the morning. I hadn’t really learned much about the history of Taiwan, but was very curious. That part of history seemed to be left out of all my American and ancient civilization history I learned in school. Ohh wait...
I saw the contrasts between the Chinese and Japanese influences in the architecture. I also explained the political knowledge I learned in the first post.
My last stop before heading to the airport was Taipei 101, the tallest building in Taiwan and one of the tallest in the world.
I loved Taiwan. To end, I just want to say this. The Taiwanese people are some of the nicest people I’ve ever met in my life. Every single one of them did the kindest action you could imagine in that moment. I highly recommend visiting.