August 5, 2012

August 5th, 2012

One of these days, am going to figure out how to add a page in the right order. Other than a way to get my gags out to friends, this diary is to document the stuff we do so we can look back on it someday. I know, never look back darling, it distracts from the now, but still. Continuing the recap from our trip, after the bathing cap lesson from yesterday, the next day we mapped out our route to the next beach. Route 1 was a direct path through a twisty looking road called Scenic Route 193. Route 2 back tracked us on the main road, so we all decided that since the storm was still a ways off, that "Scenic Route" was the way to go. As we turned onto it, this sign should have been a warning, but ignorance is bliss Still we trudged on and the road quickly turned into a Lombard Street-esque donkey path. After 45 minutes, and an explanation to the kids what the term white knuckles meant, we hit this. Paul determined we should go for it, and totally respect him for that, but there was no way I would be able to explain the decision to go forward if our car went over the (sheer) embankment to the boss. Took a good 15 minutes just to turn around the car. So we lost about an hour and 45 of the day, but was probably the most memorable part of the trip. Briefly, other cool stuff we saw. Shipting in a huge downpour. Couldn't take the camera out of the bag as it was like a firehose was turned on, but climbing over the exposed lava flows was fun. The flows were being sandblasted by the wind and our faces were stinging from the rocks and such, but still a good time. Jiqi Beach was the surfer's spot, but was closed due to the storm. We did make it to the sand but had to traverse this guys field to do so. We stopped for lunch at this place that served peanut butter or nutella toast. I know it doesn't sound like much, but they use the thick cut style of Chinese bread and put the toppings on before it is toasted so that the peanut butter bakes right into the bread. Such a simple idea but had never had it before and we all were agog. We've been recreating it for snack time since we've been home...genius Fanshuliao bridge was also fun. There is an old bridge next to the new highway one that spans a super deep gorge. Yes, that is Paul peeing off of the bridge and into the gorge. Natures giant squat pot It got late, so we found a little hotel in Chenggong...it didn't seem like they get a lot of westerners there cause no one spoke a lick of English, but the room as cheap and we managed to get fed. We pointed at the menu (look close at that last link...funny shit) and said you cook what you want and we'll eat it. I recognized shrimp, clams, some form of tuna sushi, and a couple things we didn't recognize (which happened to be the tastiest treats). Have got to remember to bring a camera everywhere cause I wouldn't have minded identifying those. Here is a snap of our room that night...we watched Night At The Museum. Oh...forgot that we also stopped at the Tropic of Cancer this day. Self portrait of the kids and I there, along with my life long traveling partner Walter. Darn good day. This was the end of our pre-planned route and were going to turn around and retrace our way back, seeing stuff we passed up (like Taroko National Park), but with the typhoon heading north, we decided to save that for another trip and head to the southern tip of TW to a beach side town called Kenting. Kenting was billed as the tropical paradise of TW and have to say it was pretty nice. We splurged on the resort hotel with pool on the beach, "lavish" buffets, etc. for a couple nights/three days. Again, they wouldn't let us get in the water due to rough seas with Saola, but the weather was OK and our usual vacation itinerary of eat/pool/eat/nap/pool/whiskey/eat with an optional late night swim worked well here A view from the room Then it was time to head back to TPE. We were watching the news and Tropical Storm Saola had just turned into Typhoon Saola and was nailing the entire island. We were coming home up the west coast, which is where the bulk of the population lives, is relatively flat, and there are decent highways. We got in the car and said we would stop wherever for the night if needed. While the rain gushed (35 inches that day on average across the country) the entire time, it never was bad enough that we had to stop. Other than a few other cars on the road, we had the highways to ourselves and made it door to door in 5.5 hours (Google maps said 8hrs). After seeing the washed out roads on the news that night (two of which we had been on a couple of days earlier) and the associated landslides and smashed cars in ditches, probably was a stupid maneuver . But we survived and had a few laughs. Thanks for indulging...will go back to the TPE stuff in future dispatches