March 16, 2009
Taipei, Taiwan A trip to Yangmingshan National Park
(to see all the full size photos of Yangmingshan Park trip click here to go to my Flickr set)
I describe Taiwan to American friends as a place the size of New Jersey, with the population of Canada, divided into a about a dozen ethnic groups (depends on who's counting), speaking about the same number of languages (or more). Did I mention about 80% of the island is uninhabitable because of steep mountains and jungle?
Yangminshan National Park is more like the majority of Taiwan's terrain than the crowded cities along the western coastal plain. The forest cloaked mountains rising above the city to the north, was once the cool, scenic preserve of the elite. Now, with the island's political and economic development, the park is open to the public. City buses (the #260) run to it and, in fact, the National Park is part of the city.
But you would never know it.
The park is actually larger in land area than Taipei proper. Like American national parks, roads and small towns dot the interior. Camp grounds, nature study sites, trails laid out to see butterflys (best hiked in May and June) and trails to see the cherry blossoms and azaleas (best hiked now), areas of interest to geologists, and areas of interest to people just going out for the views, areas of interest for artists, and for those just looking to relax in some of the many hot springs doting the old volcanos.
A friend attending a business meeting at the park offices in Yangmingshan took me along several hours before the meeting to a local restaurant with a fantastic view of one of the valleys and, incidentally, one of Generalissimo Chang Kai Shek's villas.
