Category Taiwan
Since we had seen most of the really worth while sights on Saturday we took it pretty easy on Sunday. Penghu is supposed to be a good place for snorkeling and diving but all the diving tours seemed to have closed for the winter, so I simply bought a cheap mask and snorkel from a sports store on main street and then we headed out to one of the many beaches.
At the far end, near some tall cliffs I found a nice area to explore. It was by no means as good as a coral reef but I still … Read the rest
The main island of Penghu is actually made up of three islands connected by bridges to form a large horseshoe. We live in the biggest town on one end of the horseshoe, today we decided to go sightseeing on the far end.
We started by heading back out to the little islet connected by the tidal road, and got there just in time to see the tide close over the road. That was kind of neat.
We continued out towards the far end of the island, stopping first … Read the rest
Yini and I decided to make this weekend and long one and travel to the small island of Penghu. We both left work early on Thursday then headed to the airport and we arrived here in the evening. Our original plan was that we would go to the even smaller island Qimei today, spend the night there then come back to Penghu the morning after. However, when we learned that the weather forecast was promising high winds and rough seas for Saturday, which might cause the ferry service to stop, we had to change our plans. Instead we joined a … Read the rest
Today was the last day of our central Taiwan trip. We started slow, getting up late and having a long breakfast, leaving the hotel around eleven. The evening before we had checked up a few places we wanted to go and the first one was some kind of statue park. When we got there it was closed even though the sign on the gate said it should be open. The next one was a long suspension bridge across a river. It was, in fact, so long that there were two pillars holding it up, basically it was three bridges connected … Read the rest
We left our hotel pretty early in the morning thinking we would reach the wedding ceremony in good time. When we were just a few kilometers from Sun Moon Lake however, we got stuck in a massive traffic jam. When we finally made it into town the main street was closed for cars so we had to go around. When we got to the other side, that was also blocked and it took us a while to figure out a way past; by the time we had parked the car we had already missed the ceremony. Luckily that is just a … Read the rest
One of Yinis cousins is getting married this weekend and the wedding is in Sun Moon Lake. It also happens to be a long weekend due to the national day, so Yini and I decided to go play in central Taiwan for the weekend. We would stop by for the wedding banquet Saturday lunch then continue playing on Saturday afternoon and Sunday.
We started after work on Thursday evening driving south to the small town Puli on the edge of Nantou county, just so we could cut down the driving distance today. This morning we got up at a decent … Read the rest
There are several places down in the south east I’ve wanted to go to, so we planned to do it this weekend. Since the place we were heading is in the north end of Taidong county, we figured the quickest way would be to approach from Hualien which is just to the north of Taidong. However, there were no train tickets available so we decided to drive.
On Friday evening we packed up our stuff then drove north towards Taipei, followed the road eastward then turned south. About an hour and a half later we had reached Suao in Yilan … Read the rest
This weekend Yini and I were planing to take the motorbike out, stay over for one night, then ride back the next day. However, Yini had some kind of parents day at her school on Saturday and when she came home she was too tired to go out. So, we turned it into a one day trip instead.
We rode into the moutains outside Hsinchu, and after an hour or so, we came to an abandoned house that we had seen during a trip July but never went into. There was a rather poorly constructed gate across the driveway which … Read the rest
Every time we drive south on the highway we pass a series of cliffs and ridges formed of orange soil, that are commonly called Flame Mountain. Recently Yini found out there is a walking trail there so last weekend we went to check it out. Since my scooter has been feeling tired and slow lately I bought a new one on Friday and to test it out we went there by scooter. It was more or less just a long slog on boring roads but thanks to the new scooter it felt effortless.
The trail itself starts a few paces into the … Read the rest
There are a few more islands that belong to the Matsu archipelago but we never managed to arrange a good schedule for going there. However we still had a day left and had already seen most of the two main islands so we decided to take it easy. We slept till fairly late in the morning then went out and rode around leisurely checking various minor tourist attractions.
The giant Matsu statue 
vegetable gardens in the center of a small village 
A post warning you not to stray from the path because there are still landmines in the area.
Eventually … Read the rest