I am pretty surprised that you guys know much about Dulan. Cause lots of Taiwanese don’t know this place.
My first time visit Dulan was on weekdays 2 years ago. I loved the atomosphere there. I felt so regretted that I couldn’t have chance to listen to the live music from local musicians who play on weekends. However, it didn’t reduce my love to Dulan. The Dulan mountain is quiet, pretty and peaceful. The beach is clean. The people are friendly.
Last month, I went back to Dulan on weekends for the music. It was great. And we had nice local meal and found a yummy beef noodle stand.
If you go to Taitung city, you might want to visit 鐵花村 on weekends. It’s an art market with live music. Best time to vist there is evening.
We made a quick stop in Dulan last week weekday, specifically we stopped at the old sugar factory (which we drove by first as the signage was unclear). Not a whole lot going on, but there were people working on wood there, the sugar cafe bar was open with one customer/staff, the other workshops were deserted and at least half the shops were closed. The bar looked very cool and I’m sure you could have a good time there when they have more than one person in it! This is a phenomenon that happens all over Taiwan, and it doesn’t help in promoting tourism. People just open and close when they want, and they don’t do much on the weekdays, the cheek of them .
I looked into the ‘famous’ bakery there and they simply overcharge for their loaves, I just couldn’t bring myself to fork out 280 or 350 NT for a loaf of bread . Hippy heaven, more like manna from heaven!
Taidong city had more going on with some good markets and evening performances, but again fairly quiet. The busiest area was probably the bike path along the Taidong city coast. I couldn’t really get my head around how quiet Taidong is during the peak tourist season!
We also stayed in a new hot spring hotel/B&B in Jinglun town which was very enjoyable, the village itself was also pretty cool. I’ve stayed in Zhiben before and Jinglun is easy if you are heading South from Taidong (just of the main coast road).
We did visit Tiehua Village in Taitung a few weeks ago on a Friday. I liked it. They sometimes struggle to have a large audience for their live-music shows, which is a shame, cause it’s a nice setting with a warm atmosphere. We stopped at Dulan Factory once on a weekday. Not much going on. I actually like that there is not much going on in Taitung in general. That’s the beauty of the place, a great escape from Taipei and other cities.
We had an amazon trip through Taidong and Pingdong, it really was almost like visiting a different country. Some of the scenery in the Pingdong and Taidong mountains is breathtaking, and you’ve got coconut plantations and fruit farms all around, its really subtropical.
The drive along the coast is awesome for views too. Talking to the aboriginals and the sedate pace of life there, so relaxing. They do like their singing and karaoke. Rush hour there is like two cars a minute going by! Once again I felt like packing our stuff and heading out of dodge and to the promised land!
Driving the southern link expressway was extremely hair raising in the heavy rain last week though and I saw the aftermath of a possibly fatal accident just a few minutes ahead of my car.
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. Hippy heaven, more like manna from heaven!