in a pinch the outer deck area of the sleeping area is covered, so you could sleep there if you dont have a tent, chilly up there though.
This is Pingdong though, not Taipei. its not complicated. Go let the cop photocopy your ARC and you are basically done. the only real reason for you to bother at the police station is in case of an emergency you wont need to pay for evacuation, if you go without stopping in i think you are liable for anything that happens. Someone correct me if im wrong.
I have been going down to Kenting a lot lately so thought i should take a pic of the turn off road 185. This is the turn to BeidaWu coming form Sandimen (from north going south). Dont quote me but the turn is around KM 40-42 i think. turn left here, the cop shop is about 5 mins later, then another 30 mins to the “new trail head”.
These pics are just right after the military base. The turn is a few hundred meters south of the base.
Meczko, if you are stuck getting up there, i am 95% sure i am in the mountains around here all this weekend, so if you need a lift pm me and i will give you my cell # and i can give you a ride up if you are going friday night/saturday morning.
the thing around here is it can be sunny and looking good down here at the base of the hills, and it can be intense rain up there. I remember a few weeks ago i went up there late at night. it was totally clear, stars, no moos so real crisp. once we got close it started raining and we turned back as it was like a typhoon power downpour. winter is often good, but this year is just not normal, it POURED yesterday here when i was gardening on my roof…
It is. It’s getting to be a bit of a problem. Taroko National Park, Yangmingshan National Park, and the now National Polices Agency’s mountain entry permit site all don’t recognise ARC numbers.
I’ve emailed Taroko about it numerous times and just get ridiculous answers back saying that foreigners need to have a Taiwanese leader in order to get permits. But then they say if I ask them to apply for me they might be able to give a me a permit without a Taiwanese leader.
it is only an issue when computer automation is used. things like beidawushan they just photo copy your arc and there is really nothing more. you show up and get it done, get there before midnight and i dont see why prior registration is even needed…
its not just hiking that this works with. business operation, export licenses/inspections etc all have this bull shit to deal with, but its all just on the computers. if you show up in the flesh and get the people to use their own fingers, magical things happen and after a bunch of confusing hours wasted, it all works out. Taiwanese web development is sadly very poor, that is the root of the problem i feel.
i’d say that’s true for the police stations (I’ve even been told just to forget about it for some routes, and go off and hike, when I know you’re meant to have a mtn permit).
But Taroko Park HQ do seem to get flustered by the swerveball of Big Noses turning up and wanting park permits.
You just need to apply online before hand if you want to reserve a space in the cabin. Otherwise you’ll need to carry a tent up in case there’s no space when you get there. Only really applies to weekends too.
I suspect that with most of the sites it’s because they haven’t thought that foreigners may want to use the site. But with Taroko it’s definitely because they don’t really want foreigners going off the beaten path on their own.
It’s fall out from the Fred Frontier MIA case and previous to that the Swiss guy who got stuck on the Jhuilu Trail (before it was renovated) and had to be rescued. The park authorities have been paranoid ever since especially considering how accessible it is.
certainly you can do that on beidawu. no one checks, and its all good. but i read somewhere if you need rescue and you dont have permit (beidawu you dont get a permit, they just copy your records) then you are stuck with a bill…is that true?
i dont go on that trail without a permit, but I am all through the mountains here and there is no one but aboriginal hunters around most of the time. no one here really cares save the rescue dudes. in the last few months i have seen them going up to beidawu 3 times…each time a few full vehicles going fast and asking us if they saw XXX people with worried/angry expressions lol.
seen as it takes really 5 mins and you dont even need ot really speak to the cops for this mountain, you may as well.
the sleeping area has a great campsite. running water, toilets (squat) and wooden platforms for tents…we tented there and it was like a hilton in the hills as far as im concerned. when i first came to taiwan i kind of laughed a bit as they have these extravagant buildings out in the harsh mountains…now i kind of enjoy having them :discodance: beats teh hell out of spending a few hours in search of water or sleeping on roots!
really? they have not once ever given me anything but a xie xie and a bye bye. I give them my arc they copy it and that has been it, everytime. they have given me permission, but never actually handed me any sort of permit.
many thanks for all your advice. Finally, we did not attempt Bei Da Wu, as weather forecast was quite bad for those days. In result we spent an enjoyable day walking and monkey-watching around Shoushan in Kaohsiung and the bad weather came one day later than predicted.
Anyway, after our experiences in this super-friendly country we are very eager to visit Taiwan again, so maybe we will have another chance for Bei Da Wu another time? I’ll keep information from this thread just in case.
As an aside, I believe the reason is that Taiwanese ID numbers have a checksum digit on the end, whereas ARC numbers either don’t or use a different algorithm. So there’s some bit of PHP code floating around that everyone just uses (I have a copy of it somewhere), and it rejects ARCs.
I might be up for it depending if its a weekend and if i have to work. The mountains here are raining now, despite being cloudy/sunny/hazy in the flats. the last 3 weekends i have been in the mountains near there and it has always at least drizzled a little. last weekend it just downright POURED.
