An Aborted Hike

We consider ourselves fortunate to live on the edge of town. The downside is that we do not have a wealth of variety in small restaurants and other stores outside of our door. But, it is quieter and I like to believe less polluted. One of my favorite aspects is that in a town full of concrete, we see a lot of green from our windows.

This weekend, we decided to go for a hike in the Dakeng Scenic Area that is located in the hills near our apartment. Long weekend bike rides have taken me through this area but we had not yet ventured onto the trails. Thinking of restaurants, we made an amazing find out on our way to the trail head. Tonton Philou is located just down the road from us. I am not sure what would bring an amazing French chef to a small restaurant on the edge of Taichung but we wandered in hoping for a treat. We were not let down. Quiche and a rosemary chicken risotto were whipped up in front of us and we left quite content.

Several minutes later we were at the trail's parking lot and began heading up a paved path too small for a car but not a hindrance for the ever present scooters. The path quickly gained elevation and we soon arrived at the official trailhead, a suspension bridge crossing a trickle of a river. Audrey did not like the crossing and hunkered down as low as possible with her toes spread wide. She shuffled across the bridge to find the trail.

From Dakeng

Up it went. The trail consisted of small logs formed into a ladder arrangement. Audrey is an athletic dog and charged up. Great! we thought. She can do it and we followed. The path got steeper and she began to have more and more difficulty. She would occasionally slip between two logs and take a hard hit. After several tumbles, we decided the risks of serious injury to our smiling pooch were increasing and turned around with little complaint from Audrey.

On the way down, we saw this monkey up in a tree and he came down to lay claim on an orange another hiker left out.

From Dakeng