Taiwan - Life's a Peach

On Day 3 we went south into the mountains, towards Lalashan Forest Reserve (拉拉山国有林自然保护区). We decided to set off a half-hour earlier than usual, since we wanted to get there before mid-day when mountains tend to get clouded over. This time we skipped the municipal meandering and got on to the highway fairly quickly. It was a smooth ride on the three-laned Highway 3 until we had to branch off to a smaller single-laned road leading to the mountains. Henceforth, the road started climbing and twisting through increasingly rugged country.

We only stopped at a few viewpoints en route to Shangbaling (上巴陵), the last township before the reserve. The weather was kinder than we expected it to be. A north-bound typhoon heading towards the Guangzhou seaboard was expected to bring rain over the entire island. The morning dawned mercifully - there was just enough cloud to make it a comfortably cool day, but not enough to obscure the many mountain vistas along the way.

Below: Goldilocks-zone weather, cool enough but not too cloudy otherwise; and the kind of views we enjoyed on our way up the mountains.

We had entered Atayal territory, and the relief was unforgiving - ridge after lofty ridges gave way to deep valleys via precipitous forested slopes. The Atayals were one of fourteen recognised aboriginal tribes in Taiwan. From the early years in the twentieth century, they fought a vicious, on-and-off struggle against the Japanese in these mountains. The remote, rugged terrain ensured that these aboriginal fighters were able to hold off for a good while their better-equipped, numerically superior foes in the Imperial Japanese Army.

Progress reached with its asphalt fingers into such country through a minor engineering miracle, with roads that hugged tightly any level hillside space and bridges spanning the yawning chasms which opened in between. Sometimes Nature would reassert its sovereignty with occasional rumbles and rockslides. And this, depending of the strength of its riposte, literally closed the road to Progress.

Below: if roads were the asphalt fingers of Progress, then bridges were its steel joints.

We had thought that we would see a lot less tourists along the narrow roads leading to this lesser-known locale (no public transportation too). But we underestimated the signature lure of the locally-grown 水蜜桃 (the honey peach) and the supple dexterity of the coach drivers. Not without reason is the county known as Taoyuan (桃园), peach garden. A profusion of roadside stalls littered the way to Shangbaling, to which these tourists flocked like bees. We only tried the fabled peaches in its iced blended form - and trusted that its delightful sweetness was natural.

Shangbaling was a string of houses built along a ridge at nearly 1,200 metres above sea level. The sun was still shining when we arrived shortly before lunch, but the surrounding mountain tops were already laurelled with the first silvery wisps of afternoon mist. With time and visibility both running out, we decided to skip the tree-hugging at the Forest Reserve and lap up the sumptous valley views. True enough, we had no sooner set up the tripod and taken a couple of shots than the valley below us vanished into the gathering mist.

Below: Shangbaling, sitting prettily atop a ridge like a Tibetan village; could at a very quick glance be Shangri-la.

Below: valley views all around, in descending order of visibility; observe how quickly the clouds moved in.

We returned by the same way, as the hypnotism of a slow, winding descent lulled us into heavy torpor. This lifted a little as we drew closer to Xiaowulai Falls (小乌来瀑布). Visitors could admire the falls from three different levels - from a nearby platform looking down onto it, then a sky-walk built just above the drop and finally by many steps to a wetter close-up at the foot of the falls. By then a drizzle had started, and this got steadily heavier. However, rainy days are amongst the better times to see waterfalls. These guarantee a torrent of water and a trickle of visitors, and not the reverse on pleasanter, dryer days. Once again, I very hurriedly stole another forty minutes and laboured down to the foot of the falls. The distant panorama of the falls previously belies the number of steps that led higgledy-piggledy - now neat wooden steps built on packed earth, now rattling metal steps, now half-broken planks and shaky stone - down to the bottom of the wooded ravine. That bracing close-up was worth the rest of the day I spent shivering.

Below: Xiaowulai Falls, the beautiful and the bracing. I should have wiped my glasses.

Our last stop was the restored shopping street in the old suburb of Sanxia (三峽老街), just a short way off Highway 3. Once a trading hub in the northern Taiwan until before the Second World War, industrialization and modernization have since shifted the economic centre of gravity further northwards to the parent metropolis of Taipei. The elegant red-bricked arches with their familiar five-foot ways on both sides of the shopping street housed a motley collection of shops selling everything from cheap toys to ornate ceramics. Again, the persistent rain and our late afternoon arrival made for a less crowded experience.

Below: Sanxia Old Street - Chinese shops, Japanese simplicity, Baroque trimmings, and one very colourful umbrella.

It was a good weekend with a bit of everything - the sun (just enough for a tan, but not for perfect blue sky) and rain (mercifully light, on the whole), the sea, shopping, mountains, waterfalls and good food. Northern Taiwan and Taipei are diverse like that - the aforementioned attractions do not seem to necessitate more than a hop and a skip beyond its municipal boundaries. With the exception of Shangbaling, all the places we visited in Days 2 and 3 were easily accessible from Taipei by public buses. That many travelers base themselves in Taipei means that the expanding city today is almost synonymous with the its northern Taiwanese hinterland.

And so it was that we returned to Taipei for the last, city leg of our short trip.