Time out in Taiwan
22/04/11 17:40 Filed in: April 2011
As a compensation for our cancelled holiday (we had
planned a skiing trip in Nozawa the week after the
earthquake) we met Sarah in Taipei. Taiwan is very
different from Japan. The streets are broader, but
not quite so neat and tidy; herds of scooters charge
the junctions, nobody plays with their keitei (mobile
phone) on the metro (people actually talk to each
other), no beer and booze shops in the night market
(imagine Musashi Koyama without sake), the temples
gaudy and the roofs exotic.
We spent two nights in Taipei, then took a train to Jiaoxi on the spectacular east coast railway, the train rocketing into tunnels as chains of coaches crawled up cliff roads. I’m so glad we didn’t hire a car.
The Taroko resort hotel was fairly luxurious for us, well up in the mountains. Sitting above the Taroko gorge. Magnificent, maybe 7-800 metre cliffs in places, sheer into the river; where the soil is deeper, rainforest trees cling, in a tangle of vines. On the Thursday, we were dropped off at the start of a trail into the mountains.
The original hill-tribes, the Altayal, were forced out of the mountains by the Japanese, down onto the plains. When WWII ended, the tribal lands were pinched by Han Chinese refugees (veteran soldiers, presumably KMT,must have been similar to the returned servicemen scheme in NZ) but growing vegetables and fruit can’t have been profitable in that climate (wet and very far from market). Eventually, the farmers aged and left for an easier life on the coast. So the land has been taken over by the national park administration, leaving neat little houses and a tiny church to the monkeys, birds and jungle.
We had a neat days walk. All sorts of flowers, garden plants in New Zealand, here in the original habitat, neat birds we couldn’t identify, though it was slightly unnerving to see the bent guard rails on the track, where boulders had come down.
Back to Tokyo to pick up the pieces. Linda’s students gradually returning. The editing goes on, though I am not sure I am cut out for proof reading. It can be pretty heavy going sometimes and I miss an awful lot.
Never mind, the weather is warming. We went walking in the Miura peninsular last week, saw Japanese green woodpecker.
We spent two nights in Taipei, then took a train to Jiaoxi on the spectacular east coast railway, the train rocketing into tunnels as chains of coaches crawled up cliff roads. I’m so glad we didn’t hire a car.
The Taroko resort hotel was fairly luxurious for us, well up in the mountains. Sitting above the Taroko gorge. Magnificent, maybe 7-800 metre cliffs in places, sheer into the river; where the soil is deeper, rainforest trees cling, in a tangle of vines. On the Thursday, we were dropped off at the start of a trail into the mountains.
The original hill-tribes, the Altayal, were forced out of the mountains by the Japanese, down onto the plains. When WWII ended, the tribal lands were pinched by Han Chinese refugees (veteran soldiers, presumably KMT,must have been similar to the returned servicemen scheme in NZ) but growing vegetables and fruit can’t have been profitable in that climate (wet and very far from market). Eventually, the farmers aged and left for an easier life on the coast. So the land has been taken over by the national park administration, leaving neat little houses and a tiny church to the monkeys, birds and jungle.
We had a neat days walk. All sorts of flowers, garden plants in New Zealand, here in the original habitat, neat birds we couldn’t identify, though it was slightly unnerving to see the bent guard rails on the track, where boulders had come down.
Back to Tokyo to pick up the pieces. Linda’s students gradually returning. The editing goes on, though I am not sure I am cut out for proof reading. It can be pretty heavy going sometimes and I miss an awful lot.
Never mind, the weather is warming. We went walking in the Miura peninsular last week, saw Japanese green woodpecker.