Last night's accommodation. Shepherd's B&B
The dinner last night was an expensive disappointment.
A water filled bowl of chopped up pieces of chicken (bones, skin, sinews, etc and some very rubbery mushrooms. Expensive too at A$16.50.
This morning I was the first up (apart from the cook) and wandered out onto the balcony to see what the weather for the day might be like.
Cloudy and dry…. Looks promising!
By 8.00AM I was on my way. This was going to be one of my longest days cycling.
A 25km ride to the summit of Wuling Pass which means a climb of 1400 metres. Then an 88km ride down to the coast through Taroko Gorge. An estimated 7 hours in the saddle!
Three hours predicted to reach the summit. An hour gone and I stopped to admire the view and check the weather.
A Taiwanese tourist offer to take my photo when I reached the entrance to the National Park. Another 3.6km to the summit from here.
The summit in just under three hours.
Down there is where the National Park entrance is located
Can you see my bike in the carpark?
Last part of the road to the summit
Tourists queue and jostle to get their photo taken beside the altitude marker.
Others are warmly wrapped, carrying day packs and hiking sticks as they head off to explore the surrounding hills.
I take off my thin orange polypropene hiviz top and add a thermal base layer. The orange top goes back on followed by a thin fleece. The hard physical riding is over for the day. Now I will mostly be coasting into the wind.
A kilometre below the summit on the eastern side is the only hotel in the area. Apparently it's expensive!
From this point onwards it was mostly steep switchbacks as I slowly descended towards the eastern side of the island.
Those clouds down in the gorge may be an issue!
A group of motorbikes passed me. I was rather impressed with their camera setup. A 360deg camera on a pole mounted to the bike. The lead bike had his out in front. The one in the middle had his vertical and the one at the rear had his trailing behind. It would probably be an interesting video.
Numerous tunnels
The bottom 10km of the gorge is heavily tourist orientated and quite busy. Not what I wanted after 6.5 hours of cycling.
A small parliament of Taiwanese red faced (and red bum) monkeys wandered across the road immediately in front of me.
More tourist scenes
By now it was starting to get dark and I don't have a headlight. I needed to get moving and reach my accommodation.
1 comment :
That was quite some ride, up and over the mountain.
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