Ultimate Backpacking : All That and Sleeping at McDonalds (Day 2)

Where were we? Puli, 8 of us packed in a room supposedly for 4 people at Jin Shan hotel. In case you missed how we arrived there, you may read the whole story here.

When we finally got a place to sleep at 1 a.m., we all said that we wanted to sleep until 10 a.m. No one’s allowed to put on their alarm clocks. Well, all those sayings turned out to be just talk, because around 7 a.m. I could already hear the sound of some of my friends awake and talking and deciding to take a shower.

We left our hotel at 11, just on time for check-out. The plan for the day was to find some interesting tourism spots near Puli or at Taichung, and get back to Zhongli by train or bus at night. We decided to eat first near Puli bus station, and in the meantime search through the internet for information on tourist destinations around Puli.

Ultimate Backpacking : Snow, Hitchhiking, and All That (Day 1)

I’ve been ranting a lot about how irritating winter is in Northern Taiwan. Taiwan’s humidity makes cold weather difficult to bear, and it doesn’t even snow. Except in some of its high mountains, such as Hehuan mountain and Guanshan. Since winter’s almost ending, me and my friends decided to take a trip to Hehuan mountain last Wednesday and unexpectedly our trip turned into something more than just the pleasure of playing with snow.

None of us really knew the exact way to go to Hehuan Mt. by public transportation. It turned out that we had to take a bus from Taichung city to Puli town of Nantou, and from there take another bus to Hehuan Mt. Since the bus didn’t go all the way to the top, we had to find a car from our last stop. We finally got a car rental (which was pretty expensive – I think we were tricked by the driver >.< ). We didn’t really go all the way to the peak of the mountain, but pretty close to the top, I think. The total time we spent going from Taichung to the mountain top was around 7 hours. So long I know, but it was due to the long queue of cars also eager to get to the top.