Taiwan Trip: Day 12 (31/07/2013)

Boat trip on the pure Sun Moon Lake

We allowed ourselves to rest a bit more on that day (until about 7:30am) as we had booked on the previous day a boat trip around the Sun Moon Lake (日月潭) starting at 9:00am. Once our nice American breakfast (eggs and bacon!) finished, we headed towards the pier. The tour was actually quite short and we were happy to have paid only NTD100 for it. We had 1 onshore stop nearby a temple but stayed close to the boat as we didn’t understand how long the stop would last (only Chinese was spoken on the boat). We nonetheless enjoyed the second part of the trip on the forefront pontoon of the boat, which was all ours as Taiwanese and Chinese tourists remain afraid of the tanning sun. We sailed nearby the scrap of island named Lalu that is worshipped by the local Thao tribe and thereafter went back to the departure harbour.

Majestic WenWu Temple

Back onshore, we bought some souvenirs and packed. We rode our bikes around the lake with great pleasure and stopped at the WenWu temple (文武廟), located on the northeast side and overlooking the lake. You can therefore enjoy breathtaking views of the sky-blue water thanks to one platform sitting on the temple’s roofs. Despite works going on, the sacred venue remained impressive with its well-kept stone-carved façade, beautifully ornamented roofs and massive size.

20min hike = 20l of sweat

We then headed towards ShuiShe Village (水社村), the main tourist resort of the lake. From there, we looked for the start of MaoLanShan trail (猫蘭山步道) but ended up driving back and forth with the sole help of our Lonely Planet guide’s undetailed map. We eventually found the remote starting area and climbed the very steep slope towards the weather station in less than 20 minutes. The Lonely Planet guide was presenting the trail as a 2-hour walk so you can easily imagine how soaked with our own sweat we ended up. Some local hikers even made fun of us on their way down. Nonetheless, the view of the lake was much worthwhile and we took it easier on our way back to ShuiShe, where we had a bowl of noodle soup for lunch.

An old classic for lunch

At that moment, heavy rain started to fall and made us quite worried about the trip that was ahead of us. We still took our time for dessert and Louis treated me with a warm waffle as it was my birthday – he even managed to find a candle. Bellies full, we left the Sun Moon Lake and headed north as we had to be back in Taipei the next day. However, we were forced to stop 10kms later near PuLi as heavy rain soaked us and blocked our vision. We waited inside a convenience store for 30mins, twisting and mopping up our clothes, probably ruining the cleaner’s work.

Heavy rain made it trickier

Once on the road again, we had a hard time figuring out our way and often stopped, getting more and more upset as night was falling. During an umpteenth stop along the road, a lady in her fifties got out of her house trying to help us with our pinyin map and quickly involved her daughter but they didn’t look too sure about the way. Despite all their kindness and will to help, I was pissed as I knew it would take ages to leave them and we were running out of time. Louis knew it too but was more open so I reluctantly played low profile as I had made us lose time on the morning, trying to find by myself the way towards the MaoLanShan trail. Do not get it wrong, I love Taiwanese people but they always try to help even though they have no clue. The ladies eventually achieved to have us enter their house and offered us a cup of ice tea while the now-involved husband (who was sitting in a wheelchair for he fell from his house roof years ago, if we understood well) was screen-shooting Google maps, drawing arrows on Paint to show us the way and printing out the sheets. Meanwhile, we probably broke all rules of Taiwanese hosting with our dirty clothes, soaked shoes and gross manners… Oh, the irony of this anthological situation!

We drove about 100 kms on day 12

We left them 30mins later and decided to try our luck but even with the help of their maps, we couldn’t find our way. So we changed our itinerary and headed towards TaiZhong (台中市). At first magical with the stunning expanding sunset, the drive then became tricky with bits of rain, nighttime dark sky, fast cars and crazy stray dogs crossing the road. We strenuously made it to TaiZhong and were lucky to quickly find a cheap hostel. Heading out for a McDonald’s, we opted for a Subway, a lighter (?) option. Both mentally and physically tired, we collapsed in our beds as we wanted to get up early on the next morning in order to benefit from the most of daylight hours and avoid similar troubles. Well there would be troubles, although not similar… Stay tuned!