South Korea & Taiwan Blog 10: Taipei to Hualien
Day 19 – Tuesday, 25 April Taipei to Hualien
Cloudy, 23ºC in Taipei
Cloudy, then rain, 23ºC in Hualien
T$20 = NZ$1
Up at 9am, down to the basement for breakfast then back up to our room to pack bags. Checked out and Dandy Hotel at 9:45am
Down to the Daan Park Metro then on the Red Line to Taipei Main Station, found our way to the TRA ( Taiwan Railway Authority ) platforms and went through the gateline at 10:15am. We bought some snacks then waited for our train ( 11:42am Puyuma Express, which is a 150kph tilting train, T$880/ NZ$44 for 2) to show on the display board, then down to platform 4B to wait ( all of Taipei Main Station train lines are underground.) Our train arrived on time so we jumped on Car1, found our seats and left at 11:42am. We stayed underground for a bit then out through Ruifang and across to the east coast along a windy track with lots of tunnels. After a long tunnel we popped out on the rugged east coast ( this has a very east coast of the South island / Kaikoura coast feel to it ) . Headed south along the coast then out across the plains of the Yilan Area, then after a few more stops we arrived into Hualien at 2pm.
We got off the train, found our way out of the station ( along with a few tourists ) and walked a couple of hundred metres to Meci Hotel ( T$4500 / $225 for 3 nights ), semi checked in ( our room wasn’t ready yet ) and sat in the lobby ( with free coffee and snacks ) and waited for room to be ready. Got the key to our room at 3:15pm and then headed up to room. Small but modern room with a view to the mountains ( if it wasn’t gloomy )
Hualien has an Airforce Base so fighter jets passed over the hotel on their approach to the nearby airbase on a regular basis. We did some washing ( and checked out the roof top deck ), went out for a walk around the neighbourhood, found a 7/11 for snacks etc then back to hotel.
We rested and booked our train to, and hotel in, Kaohsiung ( Train on 28th April, T$1410/NZ$70 for 2 ( 4.5 hours ), hotel Kindness Hotel Houyi Jiuru, 4 nights T$11520 / $575 )
Headed our at 7pm for tea at Japanese place around the corner ( 1 Donburi and 1 Katsu dishes, and 2 large beers T$510 / $25 ), then back to hotel in the rain at 8:30pm
Day 20 – Wedneday, 26 April Hualien
Cloudy, drizzle, cloudy 23ºC
Got up at 7am, got ready and walked to train station for Starbucks breakfast at 8:30am.
Walked to Bus Station ( next door to the train station). Today the plan was to head into Taroko Gorge, using the public buses to get to, and move around within, the gorge. It was a little confusing to figure out the timetables and what tickets we needed, and the staff at the Bus station seemed as confused as we were, but we finally figured out what we needed and bought 2 tickets for the Ubus 310 bus into Taroko Gorge ( T$250 ea / $12.50ea ). This ticket gave all day use of the buses that ran up the main part of the gorge, on a hop on / hop off basis. We sat and waited for next bus at 9:40am. We used this time to plan the places we wanted to get on and off, making sure to allow enough time to see what we wanted, and avoid missing the last bus out of the gorge at 6pm.
We got onto the bus ( which was full, and people were sitting in the aisles )and headed to the gorge. This is a normal commuter bus so there were lots of stops on the way. We headed out past the airport/airbase then north along the coats then into the Taroko Gorge. The first stop in the gorge was the the visitor centre at 10:30am. The bus makes stops at various points through the gorge, to the turnaround at Tianxiang, and our ticket allowed multiple stops, as long as we met the timetable ( 6 buses per day ). We stayed on at this stop and carried on up the gorge.
We got off at Buluowan Terrace at 11:10am ( the buses are running 30 minutes late due to road works on the way up into the gorge, just to add to the complexity scheduling our hop off ‘s and hop on’s ),.
We walked to suspension bridge over the gorge, walked across the bridge ( dodging the selfie takers ), back to the bus stop then out to a lookout point over looking the gorge ( we had this to ourselves ).
Back to the bus stop at 12:00am to wait for the bus, and we caught next bus up to Tianxiang ( arr 12:30pm ), which is the turn around point for the buses. We had decided to see the other stops we wanted on the way out of the gorge as it worked better of rate timetables of the buses.
We grabbed some lunch at the 7/11 as there were no sit down restaurants ( luckily the packaged sandwich and cake selection is pretty good ), sat in the park and ate, then had a look around the bus stop / river area. We got back onto the same bus we arrived on at 1:30pm , and headed back down the gorge.
We got off again at “Tunnel of Nine Turns” at 1:40pm. This is an old section of road which is carved into the cliffs, and has now been bypassed by new tunnels that take the roadway. leaving a 700m long section dead end walkway down alongside the river. We walked back to the bus stop and waited for the next bus ( longer than we thought ) which arrived at 3:10pm bus.
We stayed on to the Shrine of the Eternal Spring ( Changchun ) at 4:00pm ( after delays for the same road works as we got held up by on the way in ). We walked to the shrine and back through a tunnel/notch in the cliff and back to the bus at 5:00pm.
We caught the last bus out of the gorge and arrived back at the bus station in Hualien at 6pm walked back to hotel.
This was a really enjoyable trip through a stunning gorge with limestone / marble cliffs, and a crazy road carved into the walls of the gorge. The weather stayed dry for most of our exploring after drizzle in the morning.
Headed out for tea at 6:30pm, walked to nearby Shangxiao Street, looked at a few restaurants and went to Secret Garden ( a Japanese / Korean mix ); 2 dishes ( pork katsu omerice and fried chicken rice and 2 soft drinks T$610 / $30 ); very nice ( and again too much for us to finish ).
Back to hotel at 8:00pm after stop at the 7/11 for chocolates and a pharmacy for glasses cleaning wipes.