Taiwan - Taroko National Park

Part II - The Interior
After an hour at the beach, we headed inland to the interior of the park.  Jennifer explained that the Taiwanese Gov't. brought in the Americans for advice on building the road we were driving on inside the park.  The response - cannot be done - too dangerous for heavy equipment.  So what did the Taiwanese do?  They built it by hand, one foot at a time.  This includes digging out the tunnels that you see in this photo.  The view was spectacular.  The river, on the other had, spent eons carving out a valley amongst the granite peaks.

The rope bridge was not open to the public - you needed a special permit to cross it and hike the mountains beyond.  I was secretly happy about that.

There were walkways every so often that allowed you to peer over the cliffs and down to the river below.

Some of the walkways even took you through sections of mountain.

It's hard to believe that these mountains were once seabeds.  Just imagine the power it takes to push them up thousands of feet and tilt them on their sides.  I asked Jennifer about earthquakes in Taiwan.  "Oh yes, we have them all the time!" she said, though I didn't feel any while I was there.

Due to recent rockfalls, we were required to don helmets in certain sections.  I thought it was overkill until.....

I saw some of the recent evidence

Unlike the beach, we weren't alone in the park.  There were a few busloads of tourists and we saw many cyclists.

We parked at the one hotel that was allowed to be built inside the park and made our way across a bridge towards a monastery.  We bought a snack once we got there.

Some of the trees were in bloom.

And there were a few birds resting on the branches.

This was a truly beautiful place - I'm glad the Taiwanese had the sense to turn it into a national park.