I'm in the Business Center of the Yaling Hotel in Magong, Penghu, Taiwan where we just spent two nights. We haven't gone far from the hotel today venturing only to new Pier 3 mall a block away to see a movie called "Oceans Nine" (nothing about oceans) and behind the hotel for a so-so seafood lunch as the rain poured down.
Our three day trip was spent dancing around the rain; boat rides to two of our main trip attractions were cancelled due to choppy seas. Furthermore, a great looking outdoor pool at the hotel and the pristine sand and blue water at Chili Beach were at your own risk; in fact some careless soul let his family down by being washed out to sea nearby. We were making the best of a rainy time. The hotel bed was comfortable; great to sleep in, anyway, though the room was cold. The hotel breakfast was mediocre, especially the western side, and the Taiwanese guests were typically noisy and inconsiderate; there were seven kids making a racket running around the echo-laden lobby unattended and undeterred as I wrote this. They were so noisy in fact that we chose to be picked up and brought to the airport at 2 pm for our 5:50 flight back to Taichung. Despite what my wife heard about the chaos at the airport due to travelers whose ship rides back to Taiwan were cancelled, anything was better than the hotel lobby.
Our three day trip was spent dancing around the rain; boat rides to two of our main trip attractions were cancelled due to choppy seas. Furthermore, a great looking outdoor pool at the hotel and the pristine sand and blue water at Chili Beach were at your own risk; in fact some careless soul let his family down by being washed out to sea nearby. We were making the best of a rainy time. The hotel bed was comfortable; great to sleep in, anyway, though the room was cold. The hotel breakfast was mediocre, especially the western side, and the Taiwanese guests were typically noisy and inconsiderate; there were seven kids making a racket running around the echo-laden lobby unattended and undeterred as I wrote this. They were so noisy in fact that we chose to be picked up and brought to the airport at 2 pm for our 5:50 flight back to Taichung. Despite what my wife heard about the chaos at the airport due to travelers whose ship rides back to Taiwan were cancelled, anything was better than the hotel lobby.
 |
Our flight out of Taichung was on a brand new ATR prop; the half hour ride almost as expensive as the half hour taxi from our home in Beitun. The tour package was inexpensive but the taxi ride was not. We will have to wait a few years before the just approved subway to the outer limits of Taiwan's largest air force base hosting a tiny airport is built; it takes a plane forever to taxi to the runway. Taichung is now the only international airport without an MRT hook-up. We must also remember to bring our own lunch to Taichung International Airport because there is one Taiwanese style restaurant outside check-in. Inside, there are two or three chintzy tourist traps and a few small duty free shops.
From our hotel room, we could see the harbor full of anchored fishing boats. The empty lots nearby were where proponents were hoping to build casinos; they lost by 80% on the second try. At least Penghu gets to keep its quaint small island feel, traffic-less streets, and local downtown Magong businesses, a fifteen minute walk from the harbor. The South Sea Visitor Center, where we were to get tickets for our island hopping, was a five minute walk near the berths and a shopping mall. It turned out to be a perfect configuration for what would turn out to be three days of intermittent rain and high winds. Forlorn, I looked out our window again down at two inviting outdoor pools over our lobby. It was where I had planned to do laps. This trip was a total washout for swimming.
By far, the most fun we had was taking a flat-bottomed boat with glass- windows below deck out of which one saw nothing in the murky water. The boats were attached to the privately owned Hai-Yang Mu-Chang oyster enterprise and their eating platform over the bed not far outside the harbor. We were brought there for an all-you-can-eat fresh oyster feast by a guide that wouldn't clam up for a moment. I had my fill of him and three trays of oysters that my wife baked over bamboo coal until they opened, some of them, anyway; some had been taken directly from Davy Jones locker. Once opened, I dipped the salty meat nuggets into a greenish wasabi paste in soy sauce and downed them with a bowl of thin rice gruel and cans of authentic Taiwan beer. The rain didn’t stop but we were high and dry on the slow boat in the replica of China to the platform in the harbor protected from the open seas. Rough seas in Penghu South ,Taiwan
The trips to Blue Cave (Tsau-lang) on Xijiyu Island and Qimei's Twin Hearts Stone Weir (surely you've seen the photos) were cancelled because of the 29 nautical mile rough seas. We did get our money back from EZ Travel, the agency that made all our plans; I highly recommend them. We didn’t go to Chimei but we did berth on the nearby Wang-an, both a safer 18 nautical miles from port. We took advantage of a lull in the rain and rode a scooter past the indoor Green Turtle Conservation Center to check out Huazhai Ancient
Residences; a few blocks of mostly un-reclaimed coral and shell mortar structures; the Erkan Ancient Residences on Xiyu island accessible by road on the main island that we visited a few years ago were more extensive and preserved
We looked everywhere and only saw a small pool behind glass with three turtles and a few fish swimming around. I had expected to see more than three small live turtles. The gift shop had pictures of turtles on hats and shirts but all generic; nothing to tell the world I had visited the sanctuary and these three orphans on this outpost in the Taiwan Strait. 
The worst part of our soggy excursion
was to neighboring Jiangjun-anyu, an alternative to the basalt island Hujingyu, closer to Magong but too dangerous to dock upon in rough seas. Instead, we spent time on an island with the
meaningless distinction of being the spot where tropical-and sub-tropical lines
divide the world; a spot designated by two obelisks wide enough to block the horizontal rain and wind on the barren hill where the obedient mini-bus driver dropped us
off, SOP, to pick up other soaking wet tourists before retrieving us on the
rebound. I should have refused to get off the mini-bus but my wife made me. On
the same island, mostly military base with a public school for six children of
the three hundred residents left from the original three thousand islanders. Stalls sold kaoliang liquor that had one long sea centipede inside each,
presumably deceased before being placed; you couldn’t even eat them like agave worms
in mescal; they were just there to gross you out.
On Monday evening, the
night of the summer solstice, the day of the Dragon Boat Festival, and Fathers’ Day in the
U.S.A., we thought it would be a fat chance of having the last fireworks show of
the season under Xi-ying Rainbow Bridge near Relativity Park (don’t ask me why
they don’t last through the summer) because of the wind and rain all day but,
amazingly, the rain stopped and the winds died down for the thousands who
congregated for the music show and all. We walked cross Magong island the
twenty minutes from our four-star hotel near the South Sea Visitor Center, had
some ices in one shop, a tea egg from the herb shop near Four-Eyed Well, and
made it over to Hyacinth Coffee Shop, a classic café so out of place with the
schmaltzy deep-fried dives around it, to have iced delights and fine company
for an hour with the lady barista there these sixteen years, and then we
strolled over to the 9:30 fireworks; the best in Taiwan.
We cooled our heels for an hour before the miraculous clearing of rain and wind for the fireworks display. When we are downtown in Magong, we never forget to bring home the brown sugar sponge cake and peanut candy; local specialties.
When we got back to Taichung, on time, the 400 NT taxi fare greeted us; There are a few lots across the street from the airport that charge 70-80 NT a day; we will look into it on our next flight out of Taichung. I felt badly for the stranded people, especially when I heard the authorities sweep them out in the evening. There were a lot of people, whole families, on stand-by. One family of nine paid 14,000 NT for plane tickets because no ships were sailing back to Taiwan, and the flight they got was to Taipei so they still had to detour their way back to Kaohsiung.
Thank Goodness for Pier 3; it sheltered us from the storm, had an American-style fast food restaurant with fried chicken and hamburgers, and a gourmet ice cream stand. My wife got a designer leather handbag and I got swimming goggles (just in case it stopped raining; it didn't), had duty free shops, a movie theater, and even a whiskey museum. Most important, it was dry and not crowded. For all the alternate plans we had to make because of the rain in Penghu, it was more fun than staying home in the rain in Taichung. If you don't play, it will be taken from you in other ways.
No comments:
Post a Comment