Cingjing | 清境

We woke up early as we wanted to catch an early bus to Cingjing. We walked to the bus stop opposite from where we alighted last night to take the shuttle bus back to Taichung HSR Station.

Checking out from the hostel was as simple as us hanging our room keys on the “office” door just next to the main door of the hostel.

We stopped by macs to get the breakfast. There was a breakfast counter set up outside the store with a lady selling breakfast sets to customers who are on their way to work. Each set consists of a sandwich with either ham or half a piece of McChicken patty with eggs, and either a cup of coffee or iced tea. We got a ham set and a McChicken set before heading to the bus stop to wait for our shuttle bus. Once again, the bus ride is free, but we had to tap our Easy Card on the reader before getting on the bus.

After arriving at Taichung HSR Station, we went to the counter inside the building to purchase our tickets to Cingjing from the Nantou Bus Counter. We didn’t get the next available bus, but the one after as we wanted to explore the HSR Station before leaving for Cingjing. We also wanted to apply for your Taiwan Youth Pass at the HSR Station.

Taichung HSR Station is connected to the TRA Station. The general feel of the station felt as though Singapore copied Taiwan as the Taiwan Station really feel like the newer MRT Stations back home in Singapore. There is nothing much in the station building itself. There was a Starbucks, 7-11, Moss Burger as well as a small eatery on the ground level together with quite a number of Information Counters providing car rentals as well as information for tourists. There is also a Carton King in the TRA Station Building that was closed when we were there. We walked one round trying to look for the Tourist Information Counter and we only found it hiding at a corner next to a counter renting cars.

The boarding of the bus is done by the number tags that is issued to you when you buy the tickets. So the earlier you buy the ticket, you will have more seats to choose from as you will be boarded first.

The seats at the front of the bus where we were sitting at had tinted windows (thus explaining the weird colours to the photos) and we were unable to get a full view of the scenery that we traveled pass on our way up to Cingjing.

We had to travel to Puli before heading up to Cingjing. The journey up to Puli was largely smooth, traveling on highways that rose in elevation gently. The journey upwards from Puli was certainly a different story. The roads evidently got way narrower when we entered Puli and everything after Puli is just mountain roads that goes up to Cingjing. The joruney up though breathtaking, it was also one that is slightly nauseating. If motion sickness is a common problem for you, pills are certainly recommended.

As we traveled up towards Cingjing, the view got more and more varied as we were traveling during the raining seasons. The mist started to come down and from green pastures, we started to “enter the clouds” the higher we travel upwards and the view just came to a point where it just became misty.

Do note that the bus stops at several places along Cingjing, and Cingjing itself basically stretches itself over a long mountain trail. Do check with the mingsu that you are staying at so that they can recommend on which bus stop you should stop at. We stopped one stop before Cingjing Farm and our mingsu was right next to the busstop.

We walked up towards Cingjing Recreation Centre where there is a 7-11 as well as Mos burger, starbucks and a couple of restaurants and shops. The view wasn’t great to be honest and we were quite disappointed after looking at all the photos on the internet and the constant drizzle didn’t help at all. We took a quick lunch from the food that we bought at the Taichung 7-11 which we intended for the bus ride and we walked uptowards the busstop.

While the good news was that the skies started to clear up while we were waiting, we didn’t check on the bus timings before making our way up to the bus stop causing us to stand there for an hour waiting for the public bus to come. And while waiting, we were greeted by countless of drivers who are offering rides up to Green Green Grassland. So lesson of the day, check the bus schedule before heading out. The schedule can be easily found by asking and one of the nice locals around the area.

We stood there and waited for an hour. As the hour comes close, a couple more people started to join the informal queue behind us all waiting to board the bus.

The local bus stops opposite Green Green Grassland, and its basically where most of the people will alight at. If unsure, just check with the bus driver, or ask the person who is sitting next to you on the bus.

Alighting from the bus, you will see a castle-ish looking building across the road. That would be the main entrance to Green Green Grassland. We got our entrance tickets from the counter next to the building and using the Taiwan Youth Pass, we got discounted tickets at NT$80 each instead of NT$160.

After going in, there will be this tiny booth where you can use the chop to stamp on the back of our hands so that you can either re-enter the park, or to enter the “Mountain View Pastoral Area” right next to the Green Green Grassland.

When we first entered, we were rather amazed by the view as the skies was considerably quite clear. However, just minutes after entering the park, it started raining and the mist just came down and started to engulf the whole park. The mist started to cover so much of the park that we can hardly see anything beyond a few meters ahead of us

Caught in the rain, we slowly made our way towards the main show area. The sheep show only happens over the weekends, and unfortunately we were there on a Friday. There wasn’t much for us to see other then some sheep that were grazing by the park, and a lot of visitors trying to either take a picture with the sheep. You can buy food for the sheep from one of the few machine around the main show area. And if you want to get the attention of the sheep, that would probably be your best bet. Super motivated by the food on your hands, I saw one sheep who was obviously more interested in the food that this little boy was holding in his hands and could hardly care much about him.

It stopped raining and the skies started to clear up slowly when we were at the main stage area. We took some pictures of the sheep and motivated by our hunger, we left the park into this market-ish area between the two parks.

As it is not the weekends, most of the food stalls were not open that day. We settled for some simple ru rou fan, beef noodles and a plate of stir-fried beef. Nothing fantastic about it. but it was enough to fill our stomach.

I saw the marble drink on sale at one of the stalls, and I got rather excited about it. However after buying it did I realised it was just a cheap knock off of the original drink from Japan. The bottle wasn’t even made out of glass, but just plastic material.

We head-ed over towards the Mountain View Pastoral Area after eating. At the entrance, there are also shops selling merchandise made from sheep milk, etc as well as souvenirs. There is also a honey shop that has those bee hives boxes in the shop itself.

Entrance to the Mountain View Pastoral Area was by the stamp that was chopped on our hand from the entrance at Green Green Grassland. There was certainly a lot lesser people in this part of the park when we were there. Not sure if it is a less popular spot, or for the fact that it was quite late and nearing the closing of the park itself.

The view was certainly a lot better when we are at this part of the park. The rain has long gone, and the mist has started to clear up a lot more.

We can sort of get a hint of why the views are raved about here as the view after the mist cleared up was really good. And the lack of crowd certainly made this part of the park way more enjoyable then the main park.

The next part of the park is called the Shoushan Ecological Park. Nothing much about that place other then the fact that it is part of the route that leads down towards our mingsu.