Taroko Gorge | 太魯閣

Hehuanshan | 合歡山

Our first stop was to travel up to He Huan Shan; the highest peak that we are able to get to in Taiwan via car. Most people who dropped by Congaing would have opted for the morning sunrise trip to He Huan Shan, but we decided not to go for that trip. The journey up to He Huan Shan was a long and windy mountain path. Parts of the road was so narrow that I am personally amazed by how two vehicles are able to pass through it as the same time (it was a bi-directional road). And yet, this narrow mountain road is actually one of Taiwan’s Mountain Range Expressway that cuts across from the West of Taiwan to the East. The rain started to pour and most of the view that we got was just mist and not the picturesque view that we heard so much about in all the blogs that we chanced upon while researching for this trip. On our way up, we also saw a group of cyclist who were cycling up to He Huan Shan as well.

Entering Taroko National Park from the west, this is the first “photo landmark” that greeted us. Our driver stopped and being ready, he took out a huge umbrella from his boot so and helped us to take a photo. There was another group up there with us while we were there, and one can only stop to imagine what the view would be like if the mist were to clear. But there was nothing to complain about since we were probably standing in the middle of a cloud if one were to see us from underneath the mist.

The next landmark that we went to was the highest point of He Huan Shan. This was where we started to spot all the tourist that was in that area. This highest point was however not the main peak of the mountain.

We traveled down and after a short distance, we arrived at the main peak of the mountain. At that area, there was two mountain lodges that visitors can stay for the night. It was also packed with tour buses and tourist who were unaffected by the rain. We even saw a small group of tourist armed with an umbrella trying to climb up a short mountain trail.

The journey onwards from this point took a different turn that we expected. From here, we started to make our way down from the mountain top, and the narrow winding road certainly don’t help in the journey at all. Word of caution, if you are prone to motion sickness, do come prepared with your medications. Though the drivers are equipped with that, I strongly suggest that you prepare one of your own and take it before starting the journey.

The view started to clear up as we traveled down towards the foot of the mountain.

The next stop before continuing the rest of the journey was a simple mountain cafe. At this mountain cafe, you can find de-hydrated mushrooms as well as peach honey. While the de-hydrated mushrooms tasted quite nice, we found alternatives selling at the airport souvenir shop at a much lower price. The peach honey on the other hand was something to die for. At NT$250 a bottle, the sweetness was just nice with a nice taste of peach it in. According to my mum who finished almost the whole bottle, the honey really goes very well with half a lemon and water to make a nice refreshing drink.

I slept through most of the journey down and when I woke up, we were already at the Tianxiang Area of the Taroko National Park. We had a stop over for lunch at one of the hostel in Tianxiang. We arrived quite late and we were basically the last group of people who checked in for lunch. Lunch was a huge chicken drumstick on rice served with some simple side dishes. Nothing much or exciting about the meal, but it filled us up for the rest of the trip. After lunch, our driver drove to one of the information centres to borrow helmets so that we could use it on a later part of the trip.

Our driver asked if we were more interested in climbing up stairs to a pagoda or to climb up a mountain trail to look at the natural scenery. We opted for the mountain trail and he brought us to the Lushui Trail. He dropped us off at one of the ends, gave us an umbrella as well as a torch light and told us to just follow the trail and he will meet us at the other end of the trail.

The trail was an easy enough climb, and there was a bunch of old grannies that walked passed us on our way up.

The start of the trail was rather disappointing as the vegetation was quite thick flanking the side of the path and it blocked most of the our view of the Gorge. The view however started to clear up as we approach the middle segment of it and from there we got very nice view of the Gorge.

Basically the trail brings you up the side of one of the cliffs that runs along side with the Gorge and from one point it provides you with a panorama view of the Gorge that runs at the foot of the cliff.

A suspension bridge connects one bank of the Gorge to another and basically runs across the Gorge itself.

The suspension bridge has a limit as to how many people it can take at any one time. We started to queue up behind a group of Korean tourists. On our way back, we saw a group of tourist who obviously ignored the warning and just walked onto the suspension bridge.

We stopped by this bridge for another classic photo moment. (Basically the driver stopped us at where most of the people would stop by for photos). The bridge was bring repainted as seen from the photos, the paining was still in the words as half of the archway was in one shade of red, and the other half in another shade.

The waters that ran under the bridge was super clear and we could see very clearly what was underneath the water.

The Swallow Grotto Trail was where we used our helmets. The trail basically runs along aide a road where by vehicles also pass by.