Taroko Gorge

Is it better to drive steep, narrow mountain roads during the day or at night?  Daylight does give a sense of assurance but it's often tempting to peer off the edge or to think of the absurdity in constructing such a narrow road on the edge of mountains.  Nighttime gives focus.  Follow the lights up and everything will be alright.

We left Taichung after school and headed east.  The plains of the west coast quickly give rise to steep terrain and our poor Freeca strained to move up the inclines.  Our goal was to get into the mountains, sleep and then make our way into Taiwan's Taroko Gorge the next morning.  Coming around a curve, we were almost blinded by the many lights on the hills ahead of us.  As we got closer our minds had trouble processing the scenery.  The lights showed a quaint Tudor style village.  What?  Are we in Taiwan? Tourist areas are sometimes build up with crazy themes and this one had struck upon a European model.

From Taroko Gorge

Setting up in an area that appeared to be a campground, we got a few hours of sleep before an early start to beat the traffic on the small roads.  The early morning was beautiful with few cars as we continued climbing up and up. Near the mountain pass, remnants of snow were piled along the sides of the road and the air had a crisp quality to it.

From Taroko Gorge

Cresting the pass near Mt Hehuan, we began heading into the Taroko Gorge National Park. This gorge was formed by the collision of the Philippine Oceanic Plate and Euroasian Continental Plate and rises steeply from sea level to almost 3500 meters. With the collision of these plates, marble was uplifted and creates the walls of the gorge.

From Taroko Gorge

About halfway down into the park, we found a nice area above the river to set up camp and enjoy the afternoon along the banks of the Liwu.  The water is moving quite fast at the moment so Audrey had to content herself with swimming in small eddies.  The clear and cold mountain stream was not one that I wanted to jump into if she got pulled into the current. While she swam, we enjoyed finding amazing rock samples - marble, granite, pyrite, serpentine, black schist, gneiss and more were scattered everywhere on the banks of the river.

From Taroko Gorge

The road itself is quite the engineering feat.  Constant rock falls and landslides have the potential to shut down portions at any time and the road passes through tunnel after tunnel. This is also earthquake country so we decidedly did not focus our conversation on the prospect of having the ground shake as we drove or walked underneath an overhang.

From Taroko Gorge

The Changchun Shrine Trail, or Eternal Spring Shrine, was built to honor the workers who died while building the highway.  The trail is carved into the rock and climbs, climbs, climbs.  We reached a high point at the Bell Tower and on the descent came across our first Taiwanese snake.  It was a decent sized one - at least three feet - but quickly slithered under a rock and out of our way.

From Taroko Gorge

Bell Tower

After our hike, we decided to head towards the mouth of the gorge and the Pacific Ocean. It was great to spend some time in both mountains and in the gorge.  Early morning mist and lots of ferns brought back memories of our days in the Pacific Northwest.

From Taroko Gorge