Destination: Taiwan
Duration: 13 Days 13 Nights (Nov 18~Dec
01, 2015)
Day 9: Hualien
We were joining a day tour in Hualien to visit
Taroko National Park (太鲁阁国家公园) &
ChiShing Tan (七星潭) today for
TWD700 per pax through our Minsu. Our Minsu - Maple
Bed & Breakfast (枫之宿)
provides breakfast and it was basically Authentic Taiwanese breakfast which
included Soya Milk (豆漿), Pan
Fried Pork Bun (生煎包), Nirana
Box (韭菜盒子) and some
Taiwanese pancakes (蔥油餅). I
must say this kind of breakfast was way better than hotel breakfast spread as
we could sample the local’s everyday breakfast. The pork bun had very thick
chunk of pork inside and it was super filling. I am not a big fan of Nirana
thus I felt the taste was too over-powering. However, the minsu owner told us
this Nirana Box was one of the most popular & famous breakfast there.
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| Taiwanese Breakfast! |
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| Look at all these carbo-overdose! |
After the carbohydrate overdose, we were picked up by the
bus and off we went to our 1st destination - Qingshui Cliff (清水斷崖). It’s
the highest coastal cliff with gorgeous scenery of green and cerulean. The driver
gave us sufficient time for photo-shooting thus we simply enjoyed the view and
cold (but not too cold) weather.
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| Two Train Tracks underneath the mountain |
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| The Cliff! |
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| Let's take a picture! |
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| Just to prove that this is the correct place! LOL!!! |
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| Don't fall! Don't fall! |
The bus then stopped at the entrance of Taroko National Park
for us to take some picture before continued on to Taroko Gorge (太魯閣) –
the impressive marble-walled canyon. The canyon looked really majestic but also
dangerous. In fact, there was a fatal accident on the day in the national park
whereby a huge rock felt and hit a car and someone died. Due to this accident, the
deeper part of the park was closed since the authority needed time to remove
the huge rock and the wrecked car which we saw when it was tolled out of the
park. Therefore we missed out some sites such as Chimu Bridge (慈母橋).
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| The Entrance |
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| Not enough stream i guess.. |
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| Let's stand in the middle of the road! |
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| A Shrine from afar! |
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| Another Scenic Bridge |
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| Waterfall from afar! |
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| A Swallow |
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| Look at all the falling rocks on the river bank |
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| One for car & one for pedestrian - closed though! |
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| Well, at least we were there.. :p |
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| A Lookout Place to admire the Canyon |
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| Sammy: NNOOOOO!!! |
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| HELP!!! |
Our next stop was Swallow Grotto Trail (燕子口步道) and
we were all given safety helmet be getting dropped off the bus to walk the
trail. It was wet and dark at some point but it was a nice place to admire the
canyon. There was also one famous spot there a rock looked like the head of
tribe leader. At the end of the trail, there was this little alfresco foodcourt
which also happened to be our last minute lunch spot since our original lunch
restaurant could not be accessed due to road closure after falling rock
incident.
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| This was way down!!! Don't fall |
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| We even need to wear the safety helmet |
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| The force of Nature resulting this canyon |
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| A little pool |
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| Almost there! |
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| This is the face of the Chief! |
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| We finally reached the pit stop! |
The menu was very limited and we ordered the spicy chicken
meal & dumpling meal. The meal was pretty forgetful since I guess it was a
last minute arrangement anyway. After lunch we just walked around the area
since the time given was long. I guess that was because of missed sites thus
they had to give us more time for other accessible site.
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| Someone famous? |
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| Spicy Chicken |
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| Dumpling |
Our next destination was Eternal Spring Shrine (長春祠) – another
landmark at Taroko National Park with the view of the mountains and the
waterfall. In order to reach the shrine, one had to walk through some narrow
alley and stairs but the view at the end was worth it. =)
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| This looks nice! |
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| Look at that picturesque Shrine at the back! |
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| A Zoom in!!! |
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| It's a long way to the Shrine - beginning with this bridge! |
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| Another Shrine on top of the Mountain |
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| We were nowhere near yet |
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| The long way DOWN! |
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| A Tunnel |
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| Long way to go! See the little trail along the left? |
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| Going up! |
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| Finally! |
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| The route at the back was closed though |
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| Beautiful waterfall at the back |
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| Lookout from the Shrine to surrounding places - see the red bridge? That was where we started! |
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| Selfie time! |
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| Going back! |
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| Another long way back! |
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| Dark in some places |
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| Almost there! |
We were then dropped off to Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑步道) aka “mystery
valley trail” for more trekking! *facepalm* In order to reach the trail, we had
to walk down some staircase before reaching the trail along the river cliff. We
just walked along the turquoise river, enjoyed the view and reached a spot with
lots of rocks where people could get close to the river before turning back. I think
it was 1.5km per way and this was not the whole trail as other website
mentioned the complete trails took 3-4hours to complete (round trip). Anyway, we
were kind of in a rush during the return journey as time was running out so we
were basically running (more like brisk walking since we couldn’t run) to our
bus. *sweat* Thankfully we were just 1 minute late! LOL!!!
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| The Shakadang Trail! |
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| Sammy & Lion! |
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| The Entrance! Do we really need to do this?! |
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| Finally at the trail! |
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| Just Keep Walking! |
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| Never-ending trail! |
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| Along the river... |
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| Why is the river so dry? |
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| Are we there yet?! |
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| This is as far as we can get! |
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| With people at the stream! |
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| Nice! |
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| Oops, it's time to run back! |
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| And run up to this stairs!!! |
Someone from the bus was asking the driver on green onion
pancakes (蔥油餅) and
the driver was kind enough to stop right in front of the stall and let us
bought some to try. I think the stall owner was surprised at the crowd! Anyway we
chose the spicy version with egg and it was delicious!!! How I regret that we
only bought one! *cry*
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| Hungry Ghosts! |
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| I think she was overwhelmed! |
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| This is really yummy!!! |
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| The Egg is in the middle with spicy sauce |
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| Guava Drink from the grocery shop behind the stall |
Our last destination was ChiShingTan (七星潭)
which was nothing much to see as it was just a beach. One might rent a bicycle
and ride along the beach but we did not do that. We ended up resting there and
went back to the bus once the time was up.
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| A Beach! With small rocks but no sands! |
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| Strong Wave! |
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| Since we have too much time on our hands! |
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| Admiring the Seaview? LOL!! |
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| The Bicycle Trail |
The bus made 3 stops after the tour – the Hualien Dongdaemun Night Market (花蓮東大門觀光夜市),
Hualien Train Station or Zhi Qiang Night Market (自强夜市) and
we could choose which stop to disembark. We ended up at Zhi Qiang Night Market
again since we simply loved the food there.
This time we bought the BBQ mushroom from 1st BBQ
Meat Stall (第一家烤肉串) again
since it was really yummy when we ate it last night. We bought some deep fried
crab (炸螃蟹), mayo
pineapple prawn toast from Jiang’s Toast (蒋家花连创意官材板) and
Avocado Milk from “妙不可言果汁店:” before
settling in Lee’s Cantonese Porridge (李記廣東粥) for
their century egg porridge. The porridge was more like congee and there were
lots of ingredients in it which was the way I liked my porridge. =)
We were really full thus we simply walked around the night
market and played some claw machine which we failed miserably. We finally
bought the Japanese Ebiko Tamagoyaki (玉子烧)
before calling the TWD100 taxi to get back to our Minsu. Anyway, the tamagoyaki
was really nice but unfortunately was cold when we ate it. I think it should
tasted nicer if we were to eat it on the spot. Thus this ended our long day in
Hualien – we would be departing for Taipei tomorrow without any pre-booked
train ticket! Let’s see whether luck was in our side!
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| OMG! Look at the long queue for fruit juice! |
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| Craving for some Tamago! |
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| Wow! Lots of Ebiko! |
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| Look so yummy! |
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| This should be yummier if it was eaten HOT! |
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| Our Dinner for the Night! LOL!! |
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| Yoghurt Drink BEER!!! LOL!!! |
Next Day (Hualien -> Taipei)
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