Taitung Half-Marathon

This weekend was half-marathon number two for the year. The previous one was in the geologically splendid Taroko Gorge, this one was meandering through the coastal city of Taitung. Prepared, packed and with multiple alarms (one alarm clock, my cell phone with four alarms set minutes apart, Crystal with her cell phone set, my watch set to three alarms, crystals watch set also....how could we sleep through this one!!). We made it on time, had amazing races (see the pic below to see how well Crystal did!) and left with yet another marathon t-shirt and a whack of good memories .... and sore legs.

Us the night before the race, modelling our new race t-shirts.

Second place, safely. I should add the disclaimer that these times are incorrect, somehow. Crystals time was actually around 1:55:00. We both independently timed ourselves, and I know I came in at 1:50:00 and Crystal not long after. So, there is no real way that 1:39:49 is correct. Unless we get into time dilation because we were running so fast, but then our times should be longer, not shorter than we timed them.

The race was on Sunday, so we had a slow Saturday in Hualien to walk around, grab some ocean time and just generally chill. Catching an afternoon train south to Taitung, we made it for a nice hot-pot dinner, a stroll through the city, stumbled upon a music festival (small, quaint but fun) and craft market and ... a huge house fire. Scary....but the people that needed to be there got there in timely fashion and did their firefighting thing. I don't think we as a society respect firefighters (or any traumatic response professional) with enough respect. They do a damn hard job and they do it damn well, too.


Saturday morning tromp along the coast by our house on the left, on the right a still of the house fire in Taitung that night. Candles, incense, smoking...probably smoking....

After eating, listening to music, downing some water, sports water and some charcoal peanuts (glorious charcoal peanuts....the sinful delight of the legume world!) we hit the sack. Waking (on time....) we did the normal things, got a cab and made it to the race. Stretch, prepare...GO!

It was a fine race, a beautiful sunny day (so cool to run as the sun rises above the ocean, breaking above the tree line and then beaming down heat, heat, heat) and we both made great time. Both blasting our times from the previous Taroko race, we left satisfied. I chose to make the last sprint at the 5 km mark...which left me with jello legs and lungs of burning fire when I crossed the finish line...but it was worth the pain. We both felt super strong, super confident and it was an excellent way to end the marathon season.


Both of us after we return to the race starting point to look for Crystals MP3 player and get some pictures. The race started in the Taitung Forest Park and weaved its way up through the valley, through the mountains into a little village and then doubled back down. Quite nice.


Post-race necessities - showing off the bling, and eating something...anything. Anything! Here Crystal and I down one of the possibly only "vegetarian lunch boxes" in Taiwan. So hard to find, so happy when we do!

The train station as we wait for our ride home, and us, still waiting, killing time outside said train station.

Only in Taiwan. A big election was being held that saturday in Taipei and emotions got the best of some (or, probably more likely, a planned assasination attempt gone bad). The man on stage who ot shot survived, but the shooter also let a round or two go off into the massive crowd watching, and this killed a man. Innocent lives cut short for the stupidity of politics.

After the race we returned to try to find Crystals MP3 player (it broke before the race, she gave it and her bin number to the race official...but it was not to be seen again. We wait for a phone call, email or it to arrive in the mail....wait and see!) and take some pics as we could not bring our camera to the race itself. On the way back I got hit by a man driving a car who was not even close to paying attention to us walking along the side, so I chose to take a nice oppottunity like that to chase him down the street and yell at him and, hopefully, make him think. Im ok, totally more of a scare than a collision. But, making a scene as a foreigner stands face to face with you in the middle of the street and screams at you hopefully makes you think about something...anything at least. At the very least, I got to practice yelling in Chinese....think of it as an impromptu language test.

Once we were ready to go home, with the sunny, hot and wonderful vibes in the air, we then sat down for some juice and coffee and waited for our train home.

And once home, what better way to end a perfect weekend than with the A-Team, wine and some raisins and chestnuts.

Pingxi Old Rail Line: Hiking the Forgotten Land

Peaks among the jungle..

Standing atop peaks among the jungle...

PingXi is a quaint little, now touristy-ish, village to the south-east of Taipei. About 30 minutes by regular train from Taipei station itself, you land in the world of RuiFang...a nice little town in its own right. From here, departing the regular train and hopping on a local train that will take you on a side-branch of the main rail line up and into the mountains. A slow chug uphill...a four car train ponders the endlessness of time as it meanders its way through moss covered rail lines and thick walls of jungle. Finally you arrive in Pingxi. Perhaps the fourth or fifth stop on this line, there is one more after, then nothing. Its almost the end of the line.




A forgotten place in terms of the momentum of development, but traveled enough that the trains are regular and the choices of things to do there momentous. Momentous, that is, if you like to hike. Here the Taiwan Mountain Climbing Association has taken the rugged choice to make multiple un-scalable peaks...scalable. In a country where everything is too dangerous and trails are destined to be closed even before they are built because people are afraid of the danger, we came across a network of trails that unleash before you rugged spires to climb with ropes, cables, chains and overall the most elaborate set of devices. Danger takes centre stage. But, not the "well, you might die" danger, more of a "be careful and you will be fine, mess up and .....well, you might.....". Anyway, its a supremely amazing place, and a place we had never even heard about before. So, imagine our surprise when we get there and the trails are awesome, we are climbing pitoned spires of rock to heights that give us a birds eye view of the jungle below. Simply amazing.

Crystal scaling the aluminum ladders that make the peak possible.

We killed a good 6 hours hiking the network of trails, made it to 6 separate peaks and still, after perusing the trail map once we reached civilization again, realized that we had to plan at least two more 6 hour days to see the rest of it. This is a place we will return to.

Pingxi is famous for a few reasons, most predominantly because it is home to the annual Lantern Festival which is a celebration held one month after lunar new year (so....early February-ish). Thousands of people come here to buy/make traditional lanterns (about the size of a school desk in height and width). The tradition is to write a wish on them...a wish for you, the world, a memorable declaration for the future....and to light the flame and watch it fly off to the heavens and reach the eyes of those who celestially make choices for our world...

Pingxi village from the top of the first spire. Nestled in the moutains south of Taipei it is a somewhat forgotten world within a most dramatic landscape...and has absolutely stunning hiking trails!

...or, to splash a bit of reality on that....they light the flame and the lanterns fly off to the sky until, by laws of physics, they can go no higher and the begin to travel longitudinally, and land somewhere in the forest. Remember that they are on fire. This is both a heavy tourist time, but also a heavy fire brigade time. There is work to be done when the forest catches fire! However, remember that the 'rain' part of the rain forest is quite precise, and there is never really a dry patch of tinder to light enabling a massive burn. Small ones, though, do apparently get their start in many places.

Snacking on freshly steamed nuts (I know, not actually nuts...) and then hitting up a noodle shop for a post dinner, ost snack dinner-snack. Some veggies and a beer, while a stray cleans up the rest of the meal from other guests after they leave.

For us, this weekend all started innocently enough - me, google and the phrase "Taipei day hikes". Tired of the same places, we were driven to see new faces of Taiwan. It ended with us taking a train to RuiFang, crashing in a cheap cheap hotel with huge rooms, drinking a pint with a dog and a noodle shop snack, and waking in the driving rain in a town that was all new to us. Coffee....dress....porridge.....more coffee.....to the train. The reason we stayed in RuiFang was simply for proximity; arriving from the east it makes no sense to go all the way to Taipei. We stopped in RuiFang specifically because this is where the smaller local train starts its journey into the mountains.

Crystal at the Ruifang station, waiting for our mountain train. On the right is Pingxi station...quite a stark difference!

Fresh (supposedly) meat hanging and waiting for the throngs of eager consumers on the left, while a bird awaits its own bit of fresh meat from the river below.

So...where were we...ah yes, coffee. After coffee (mmmmm......) we boarded the train and watched, as the sky poured an ocean of water on us, the weaving rail line takes us to the mountains. Once in Pingxi (Ping-She) we got some gloves (old work gloves, once thought to be a ridiculous necessity for hiking but after dealing with the cables and ropes we were certainly glad to have them!) and hit the trail. The first 30-40 minutes or so is straight up on stairs and through a patchy network of road-trail-road montages.

Pingxi station fom the other side of the tracks, tucked nicely into the vegetation and rocks. Crystal, on the right, taking early steps on the first peak.

Then ... the base! From one junction there are three spires to ascend. Scrambling on wet rock, savaged by driving rain, we made our way up and down each in turn. A awesome, amazing amount of effort went into setting up these routes, and I applaud every moment of effort that the Taiwanese have put into it. Without proper rock climbing gear all of this would have been impossible to climb.

Hike, hike hike....climb, climb, climb....wet, wet, wet....happy, happy, happy...

Climbing up and up and up...

The view from the top of the third peak...in the distance you can see the first spire and the surrounding landscape of Taipei County. Not the usual mental image of Taipei, I presume!

Crystal climbing up on the left, the view down on the right.

More views from along the trail; left is the view down and the right is a section that skirted another peak, circling the base and then climbing in similarly steep fashion.

Lunch was perhaps the most ominous moment of the day for, despite the amazing jungle around us, the epic peaks we were standing upon and the misty mountain scape before us, we were able to sit down (on one of the peaks) and have lunch while the only sound in the background was the loud and eerie muntjack (barking deer). A critter the size of a large fox perhaps, this deer has a call like a monkey/dog. So....so weird. We have yet to get a picture of them, but we have seen many in the woods scampering away with only their white bum dancing through the green woods as evidence of their existence. It was a calm, memorable moment to be eating our bread and carrots with a muntjack off in the jungle.

A view, and a critter.

Lunch! Homemade buns, raisins and carrots. Nothing beat a trail lunch!

The day ended bravely, with us tramping our way back to the train station after a day in the wet, tropical-orange muddy soil. Dirty, wet, tired and elated. We grabbed a coffee, another coffee and waited for the train back. Slept for this ride....so tired!

Taipei. Hostel. Whip off muddy clothes, whip on dry clothes (although my "dry" clothes were just as wet as my "wet" clothes, just much less orange and muddy!). Dinner. Sleep.

A bridge in the making. Taiwan is replete with supension bridges and to see one inthe making was quite a different view compared to the regular, and rather aged, wooden ones we see along most hiking trails.

In the morning we set off for part 2 of our weekend, a small yet popular village of Wulai. This place is famous for its traditional culture (Atayal People) and the verdant hot springs that are piped into hotels, restaurants and can be found in the river bed itself in many places. Also a massive waterfall. And a gondola that takes you over the massive waterfall. All in all, pretty spectacular place to spend a slow day. However, we were looking for a fast day. Apparently, somewhere in them hills are trails, a huge network of hiking trails that would make a Canadian weep. So we were told. But...after a day of looking we found no such trails. Research, and return! We will find them! We spent the beautiful day walking around, checking out the food stalls and caught a few amazing shots of the river valley and the misty jungle that surrounded us.

Prayer fires; bloody rediculous waste of paper and source of air pollution (imagine everybody in the country, once a month (almost) burning fires outside their homes and shops for imaginary sky-faries to bless them. Bah!

The view along the Wulai river, where you cnn see (if you click on it) myriad pipes sendint hot spring water from the south side of the river to the north where the majority of hot spring hotels and pools are.

Lunch on the left (not for us...), and streets packed with people selling and buying...mostly fod. The man in front of Crystal in this picture eventually won us over and we were served a traditional Atayal (one tribe of fifteen on the island) meal of bamboo, papaya, tofu and banana rice. Mmmmmmm...banana rice......

These are pretty self explanatory - bananas for sale, and on the right a typical noodle/rice shop where you can go and point at a bunch of veggies and order what you want. Mix and match. Toss in some rice and a dash of a local specialty and you have yourself a Taiwanese meal to die for!

Along the streets of Wulai there were not only food stalls trying to feed you lunch, there were also places to buy raw produce and supplies. Here, on the left, is a wide sleection of mushrooms and on the right is a more snack oriented preserved egg in a vacuum sealed bag or deep fried ostrich eggs. For some reason, we passed on both the egg varieties.

Ok, ok...the English is bad. Forget about that. All English signs in Taiwan are bad. Its the intended meaning that is worse. I love Taiwan, with all my heart. Its a naturalists playground, an oceanic and mountianous adventure all wrapped up in a biodiversity hotspot and a splash of weird and wonderful cultures and a pretty intense an cool language. But...the people really dont like to take risks. A little rain turns them all to prissy children. So, this sign is put up to warn people not to get their clothes dirty. Taiwan needs to be reunited with its natural side...a culture of urban-centric peculiarities pervades here.

Crystal walking along the swinging bridge that was set up for people like us, tourists, but that represented actual games and tests of worthiness of the past times in the Atayal culture. Actually quite tough to walk across!

Back to Taipei, home. We are already planning our next jaunt in the same area...now we know how to get there, where to go, what to look for....so we can jump right into the juicy mountains and see more crazy biology, geology and history (huge old coal mining area with remnants of old rail lines sitting in a timeless daze in the forest - moss covered and forgotten bridges, houses and mine shafts that tell of a time long past). Taiwan not only has epic nature, but epic epic history that makes the journey of learning about this place exhilarating and endless....

Listen carefully...aside from the wind you can hear the elusive Muntjack, or Barking Deer, off in the misty distance of the forest. Listen carefully!!

Concrete turns to Jello...

A hefty and respectable 5.0 earthquake smack dab in the middle of our city...

When the plates start shunting their way past each other, its like walking on Jello. Or, so it seems. Never quite got around to walking on a classroom-sized mat of Jello....but one can assume...