Today we started our vacation with a trip to Taroko National Park, Taiwan. Here is link to Wiki about it. This gorge is one of the highlights of the east coast of Taiwan. This magnificent natural area was created by the Liwu river.
To begin with it's quite a drive through winding roads and mountain tunnels to get here. When you arrive, you are warned about the dangers of this national park. Lots of signs warning of falling rocks, dangerous wildlife, and high incidence of earthquakes. So exiting.
Parking is a major issue here. So we only had the opportunity to stop at places that had parking and then we walked in. So it added about an extra 20 minutes to our hiking, but it was worth it.
The picture above is the Shakadang trail or Mysterious Valley Trail. This is over 4 KM of hiking. Most of the trail is carved out of the cliff.
The picture above is of my wife and son. A lot of the cliff is marble, just not here.
Above is a picture of some brilliantly colored marble.
The waters are pristine and very clear. In the pictures above, you might notice there are no people enjoying the cool waters. The reason that I was told is that it is too dangerous. As mentioned above, this area is an earthquake zone and falling rocks is a hazard. The only way in or out is hiking. So any injuries are difficult to get out of the valley. The roads that they have are extremely narrow and often get jammed. The only road accessible here is a 100 meter climb up some narrow stairs. So visitors are warned to be careful. But the waters are so tempting. Especially when the temperature and humidity are so high.
Next we went to Shanyue bridge (pictures below). This suspension bridge is 400 meters above the river. The wind is extremely powerful and the bridge sways and occasionally bounces despite being a modern bridge.
After the bridge, we walked around and found some more colored marble, below.
By now, my son started to get tired. We easily walked over 4 KM and the ground elevation varies constantly. So we decided to wrap it up.
The last place we went was Yenzikou, Swallow Grotto Trail (燕子口). This area has a road that goes in and out of the cliff and through tunnels.
All in all a great day. Later we met up with some old friends and went out to dinner at "the Yankee Dude Ranch", which is a seafood restaurant. There was nothing yankee or dude about it. It was pretty much a very Taiwanese restaurant. That story is here.
Tomorrow we are heading to TaiDong, another east coast scenic paradise.
All images taken by me with my Iphone 14