Ha, you got the questions in just before I did!
But what are you doing up and online so early in the morning?
And how about your epic trek across Taiwan? Did you return unchiggered and otherwise unscathed, and when will you be regaling us with the tales of the trail?[/quote]
So early? I have been getting up at 5.30am on average for the last week so this is rather late I must say. Though I am loathe to admit it, I did get up one morning at 4am and then proceed to walk for 11 hours (21km) over very rough trail that concluded with a km of landslides to negotiate. My hiking partners deserve even more praise for getting up at 3am one day and hiking 13 hours to the top of Yushan and back (much of it in snow!). I declined as I did not realize then I was made of sterner stuff.
I’ll post on my blog (and here) later in the week. I’m waiitng for my pics to be sent on dvd from Tainan (Richard borrowed everyone’s cf card to get all the pics on 1 or 2 dvds).
In short, it was a week that has forever made a mountain hiker out of me as much as a jungle trekker. Other than the one long section of rough trail, the old Batongguan route is in great shape with long wide sections that were cut directly into the sides of the mountains still intact. Where the old traversing route no longer exists, new trails have been established. The forestry department did a knockout job reparing this. Though long, anyone could follow the route and if you are prepared for one long day on the middle, it is possible to stay in cabins (most of which are nice A-frame type structures, with solar lights and water supplies) the whole way. It is also possible to extend the hike up to 3 weeks by heading down to Jiaming Lake near the end and then looping back up and across to the Mabolashi Trail. Richard and I talked about possibly doing all three trails together (the Batongguan, South Section II - now known as S2 - and the Mabolashi), hiring Bunun porters to drop off food every 5 days or so.
In any case, the changing landscape on the Batongguan was one of the joys of the trip. We started in thick sub-tropical forest, where broad leaves littered the trail, proceeded up into coniferous forest where needles softened the ground, and up to alpine meadows of low Yushan cane where sambar deer grunted in the distance. We then descended through a thick leech-infested rainforest, back through coniferous forest, and finally into a setting much like the Red River Valley trail in Wulai, but with a more open forest and wider views over the river valley and surrounding mountains. As a special bonus the end of the trail on the last day was lit with hundreds of fireflies as darkness fell.
Most of the Japanese stations along the trail have been reduced to old stone walls, but some of these have an Indian Jones look about them. I hope some of the pics I took of them in the thick atmospheric fog turn out. Interestingly, most of the stations are littered with old beer bottles, most of which are actually from the Japanese era. I brought back a small indigo bottle. Next time I will bring back a Jap-era beer bottle.
Speaking of litter, I was so please to discover that the trail system is immaculately clean. There is a bit of trash around the cabins, as you would expect (thought most everyone is great about removing their garbage and the Bunun porters insist that their groups do so). But the trail itself is wonderfully free of bottles and silver paper and old bags.
It was also remarkably free of other hikers. We didn’t see anyone on the trail for 3 days near the end, though we did share the cabin with another group who were hiking in the opposite direction. At Dafen cabin we shared the facilities with graduate students from Pingdong Uni who were doing research on mammals in the area. Dafen is well known as a bear reserve, and numbers are said to be easily in the hundreds. No one hunts here.
One night, as I was lying in my sleeping bag, I wondered what I would do when I got back to Taiwan. Then I realized I was in Taiwan, but that being on this trail was like stepping away from it all.
There were five of us in the group. Two were geophysicists from England who now live in Saigon. It was great to have such learned people along who, without irony, could look at a huge mushroom growing on a tree and say “Now that is a brachis fungi to beat all brachis fungi.” Or, “As we came around the bend in the trail we saw that the rock had changed from loose shale to quartz mica schists so we knew there weren’t going to be any landslides in this section.”
The couple were in their late 50s and have been all over the world trekking (including Antarctica). They enjoyed hiking in Taiwan tremendously (and were fascinated by the geology here) and plan to come back in the fall for more. I think any notion that Taiwan’s mountains just aren’t up to world standards can be laid to rest.
Carrying 7-8 days worth of food was not as bad as I expected, though my pack was far too heavy for the first day, which involved 8 hours of uphill climb. I would try to reduce the weight by 4-5 kilos next time. I will probably also need a bigger pack for this kind of long trek. But overall, it is possible to carry plenty of food and eat a balanced diet wtih a proper ratio of fats, carbs and proteins. I actually came back 2k heavier.
Well, I’ve written too much. More to come on the blog.
