A fun day out.
Yesterday I went by myself into the mountains of Taipei.
From my house, you can take the metro to xindian in the south of Taipei, take a bus which costs 30TWD (about 60p) to a coutnry town in the mountains called pinglin, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinglin_District) and then take a free bus up a stream to a beautiful area, where you can go river tracing and semi-swimming in the crystal clear streams there.
Today, dressed in my swimming costume, a skirt and a seathrough top, I set out to catch the 9.30 bus, but I got to my metro station and couldn't find my walet. I went back, searched the house, re-searched my bag and found it in there - dozy idiot heather :P! So, I headed straight out and since I had to wait for the next bus I ambled along the prominade and watch some dragon boats practicing in the river.* Then I went to take the bus. There are two busses, a slow pretty one and a fast motorway one. I lined up for the slow one, but realised the line was so long I'd end up standing up, and what's the point of going the scenic route if I'm stood up, so I changed for the fast one. While waiting for the bus I also practiced my contact juggling. I'm glad I changed busses, because when we got to pinglin we got a direct transfer to the free bus and headed right out. Only problem was, I had no food and had planned to buy something in Pinglin.
I arrived at an area I'd found before. http://goo.gl/maps/rwB5W on the map, you can see a striped area. That's a tea plantation. I head along the road to a tiny hut (which I presume has tea-growing tools inside) then down along the side of the tea plantation to the river. just south of the bridge there's a tiny stream which you can only just make out - with a bit of imagination - on that map. I walked along that first, as it was very sunny, the hight of the day, so wanted to stay shaded. I'd been along there before. To get there, I have to cross the river at a quite deep point - so careful not to fall in, as my bag is not waterproof, I crossed. I put my bag down next to this stream, so I can fall in/swim etc as much as I like. . lots of twists and turns later, I got to the point where I'd turned back last time. There was a tree-fern sticking out over the water, so I knew it. Not long after this point, I came accross a man carrying a small fishing net full of fish. I greeted him, and asked him not to move my stuff at the stream-mouth. He responded telling me to be careful, because further in there was a "pupu" (pronounced like poopoo) Although I've subsequently looked in my dictionary, I can't work out what a pupu is. However, I then started to worry a little about my stuff - what if someone takes it, there are some important things in there, I should have hidden it better. So I decided to head back. I got back and hid my bag a little better, and then carried on down the stream. I continued until just before the river goes under the bridge - you can see it clearly on the map, further down from the tea plantation. There I found another stream - much smaller and starting with a small cascade of waterfalls which I had to climb up. This was rather interesting too. Then I went back to catch the bus.
I've got rather used to walking along streams. I usually find I keep low, move my feet around until they find a firm place. If I want to step on a slippery stone, I can keep my gravity centred straight down my leg so I don't slip. I use my hands lots to keep 2-3 points of contact on the more difficult areas, and if I do slip, (which did happen when I was in a bit of a rush to catch the bus) I can just sit down into the water and use the buoyancy of the water to soften the blow. I did hurt myself once - my foot slipped a little and my ankle bone, which sticks out more than most peoples hit another rock - ouch. the pain was gone within a few minutes though.
Here's what I discovered on my trip.
Along the first small stream I knew from last time you can find crabs, hanging ferns, lots of little green spiders with webs crossing the path, rocks that look manmade because they're layered straight down, and then intimitant cracks at rightangles to the main layers, so they make shelves which look like walls. with brick shaped stones. Today there were lots of large spiders, kinda looking like huntsmen spiders and sitting on rocks - some of them with a legspan as big as a childs hand. Each leg had a tiny white tip, and when I disturbed one it could walk over the water. The water was higher up this time, and for some reason there were less crabs and less small green spiders with webs. there werer lots of long legged flying things - looking like giant mosquitoes - hiding/flying around very shaded areas.There were little flat scorpion (but harmless) looking things, one of which found its way onto my hand. At one point there was a massive vine coming down from a tree, and it had tendrils coming from it into the water. Where it hit the water, the The tendrils fanned out into a big heavy root ball. Last time there was another tendril which was almost in the water. This time it was all the way in, with a few roots grown. I also found a few tree ferns who's dead and rotten branches had come down taking them with it. Sitting in the water though, they had stayed alive. Although last time I'd found an old bag with coal inside, this time I found no human made things along that river.
Coming out of the small streams is pleasant, because the bigger stream is warmer. It feels a little like you've put the hot tap on in a cold bath. This time, as I came out the small stream I spotted lots of fish jumping out of the water. I came closer, and sat on a submurged rock to watch them flip out right next to me - they were funny to watch. There were thousands of large gnats flying around laying their eggs in the water, and these fish must have been catching them. There were a few other fish on the rocks - eating algae, and further up the river some of the fish came and tried to eat my swimming costume - silly fish. There were a few large wing-spanned wading birds who always flew upstream as I approached. Apart from those, I could hear a few birds, but didn't see any. There were a few damsel flies mating, posturing and chasing eachother on a few rocks. A couple of mating ones tried to land on me as I watched them. As I headed down the stream, I was aware of a bad smell. I thought there must be human waste or something upstream. However, a little while later I found a large dead snake caught on a rock, head and tail waggling in the water, who's rotting carcas was making the bad smell. At first I wasn't sure if he was a snake - his body actually looked like a corrigated pipe, - and strangely there was a real corrigated pipe about the same thickness lying next to him behind the rock. Looking closer though I could see his face - so snake-like I was a little terrified to come close, but I knew it was dead. I did find other animal remains - this time in the form of droppings. They were dark, 2cm diameter ones, and picking one apart I found bamboo inside, however this was definately a carnivores poop - the bamboo was entirely undigested, all folded up, and I also found a worm - yuck. I wonder what animal left that dropping. I found a lot of debris - plastic coated sheeting, bits of rope, fabric and piping in the big river. On the way back, I found a very posh looking mans shoe. Although there was mud and debris inside, when I cleaned it out the shoe still looked almost new.
Up the even tinier stream I found two long pipes, which I followed along to find it was just one pipe folded over.and stapled to a rock. I deduced that the pipe had once been connected up but had come off, the free end floating down the river so as to make a double pipe. I carried on further up and found a man made ledge, with a large pipe-end coming out of it. I wonder what that was for, but it's obviously not in use anymore.
I'm sure there are a few more things I forgot to mention, but... it was a packed day!
When I got back, I explored pinglin village a little, and then in Xindian I also did a night hike. If I feel up for it, and especially if anyone requests it, I'll post about that in similar detail later.
* It reminded me of the dragon boat racing I planned to take part in this year, but due to poor communication with the team I'd ended up going to the wrong practice place and now I'd missed too many practices to compete. I'll probably go to one practice just to see what it's like - maybe tomorrow :)
From my house, you can take the metro to xindian in the south of Taipei, take a bus which costs 30TWD (about 60p) to a coutnry town in the mountains called pinglin, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinglin_District) and then take a free bus up a stream to a beautiful area, where you can go river tracing and semi-swimming in the crystal clear streams there.
Today, dressed in my swimming costume, a skirt and a seathrough top, I set out to catch the 9.30 bus, but I got to my metro station and couldn't find my walet. I went back, searched the house, re-searched my bag and found it in there - dozy idiot heather :P! So, I headed straight out and since I had to wait for the next bus I ambled along the prominade and watch some dragon boats practicing in the river.* Then I went to take the bus. There are two busses, a slow pretty one and a fast motorway one. I lined up for the slow one, but realised the line was so long I'd end up standing up, and what's the point of going the scenic route if I'm stood up, so I changed for the fast one. While waiting for the bus I also practiced my contact juggling. I'm glad I changed busses, because when we got to pinglin we got a direct transfer to the free bus and headed right out. Only problem was, I had no food and had planned to buy something in Pinglin.
I arrived at an area I'd found before. http://goo.gl/maps/rwB5W on the map, you can see a striped area. That's a tea plantation. I head along the road to a tiny hut (which I presume has tea-growing tools inside) then down along the side of the tea plantation to the river. just south of the bridge there's a tiny stream which you can only just make out - with a bit of imagination - on that map. I walked along that first, as it was very sunny, the hight of the day, so wanted to stay shaded. I'd been along there before. To get there, I have to cross the river at a quite deep point - so careful not to fall in, as my bag is not waterproof, I crossed. I put my bag down next to this stream, so I can fall in/swim etc as much as I like. . lots of twists and turns later, I got to the point where I'd turned back last time. There was a tree-fern sticking out over the water, so I knew it. Not long after this point, I came accross a man carrying a small fishing net full of fish. I greeted him, and asked him not to move my stuff at the stream-mouth. He responded telling me to be careful, because further in there was a "pupu" (pronounced like poopoo) Although I've subsequently looked in my dictionary, I can't work out what a pupu is. However, I then started to worry a little about my stuff - what if someone takes it, there are some important things in there, I should have hidden it better. So I decided to head back. I got back and hid my bag a little better, and then carried on down the stream. I continued until just before the river goes under the bridge - you can see it clearly on the map, further down from the tea plantation. There I found another stream - much smaller and starting with a small cascade of waterfalls which I had to climb up. This was rather interesting too. Then I went back to catch the bus.
I've got rather used to walking along streams. I usually find I keep low, move my feet around until they find a firm place. If I want to step on a slippery stone, I can keep my gravity centred straight down my leg so I don't slip. I use my hands lots to keep 2-3 points of contact on the more difficult areas, and if I do slip, (which did happen when I was in a bit of a rush to catch the bus) I can just sit down into the water and use the buoyancy of the water to soften the blow. I did hurt myself once - my foot slipped a little and my ankle bone, which sticks out more than most peoples hit another rock - ouch. the pain was gone within a few minutes though.
Here's what I discovered on my trip.
Along the first small stream I knew from last time you can find crabs, hanging ferns, lots of little green spiders with webs crossing the path, rocks that look manmade because they're layered straight down, and then intimitant cracks at rightangles to the main layers, so they make shelves which look like walls. with brick shaped stones. Today there were lots of large spiders, kinda looking like huntsmen spiders and sitting on rocks - some of them with a legspan as big as a childs hand. Each leg had a tiny white tip, and when I disturbed one it could walk over the water. The water was higher up this time, and for some reason there were less crabs and less small green spiders with webs. there werer lots of long legged flying things - looking like giant mosquitoes - hiding/flying around very shaded areas.There were little flat scorpion (but harmless) looking things, one of which found its way onto my hand. At one point there was a massive vine coming down from a tree, and it had tendrils coming from it into the water. Where it hit the water, the The tendrils fanned out into a big heavy root ball. Last time there was another tendril which was almost in the water. This time it was all the way in, with a few roots grown. I also found a few tree ferns who's dead and rotten branches had come down taking them with it. Sitting in the water though, they had stayed alive. Although last time I'd found an old bag with coal inside, this time I found no human made things along that river.
Coming out of the small streams is pleasant, because the bigger stream is warmer. It feels a little like you've put the hot tap on in a cold bath. This time, as I came out the small stream I spotted lots of fish jumping out of the water. I came closer, and sat on a submurged rock to watch them flip out right next to me - they were funny to watch. There were thousands of large gnats flying around laying their eggs in the water, and these fish must have been catching them. There were a few other fish on the rocks - eating algae, and further up the river some of the fish came and tried to eat my swimming costume - silly fish. There were a few large wing-spanned wading birds who always flew upstream as I approached. Apart from those, I could hear a few birds, but didn't see any. There were a few damsel flies mating, posturing and chasing eachother on a few rocks. A couple of mating ones tried to land on me as I watched them. As I headed down the stream, I was aware of a bad smell. I thought there must be human waste or something upstream. However, a little while later I found a large dead snake caught on a rock, head and tail waggling in the water, who's rotting carcas was making the bad smell. At first I wasn't sure if he was a snake - his body actually looked like a corrigated pipe, - and strangely there was a real corrigated pipe about the same thickness lying next to him behind the rock. Looking closer though I could see his face - so snake-like I was a little terrified to come close, but I knew it was dead. I did find other animal remains - this time in the form of droppings. They were dark, 2cm diameter ones, and picking one apart I found bamboo inside, however this was definately a carnivores poop - the bamboo was entirely undigested, all folded up, and I also found a worm - yuck. I wonder what animal left that dropping. I found a lot of debris - plastic coated sheeting, bits of rope, fabric and piping in the big river. On the way back, I found a very posh looking mans shoe. Although there was mud and debris inside, when I cleaned it out the shoe still looked almost new.
Up the even tinier stream I found two long pipes, which I followed along to find it was just one pipe folded over.and stapled to a rock. I deduced that the pipe had once been connected up but had come off, the free end floating down the river so as to make a double pipe. I carried on further up and found a man made ledge, with a large pipe-end coming out of it. I wonder what that was for, but it's obviously not in use anymore.
I'm sure there are a few more things I forgot to mention, but... it was a packed day!
When I got back, I explored pinglin village a little, and then in Xindian I also did a night hike. If I feel up for it, and especially if anyone requests it, I'll post about that in similar detail later.
* It reminded me of the dragon boat racing I planned to take part in this year, but due to poor communication with the team I'd ended up going to the wrong practice place and now I'd missed too many practices to compete. I'll probably go to one practice just to see what it's like - maybe tomorrow :)