Taiwan Expedition Log

August 9-29, 2008
September 5, 2008 update

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Tuesday August 19, 2008

The Bilyu Tree was an impressive, but unhealthy old specimen of Picea morrisonicola. As we were heading into the restaurant to eat lunch, we were taken by both the blaring speakers playing The Righteous Brothers, 'Unchained Melody,' and by the path that curved around behind the restaurant. We opted to check out the path first ... a decision we would not regret. Thank goodness we got to the path before the destructive roadside weedtrimmer crews who we passed repeatedly along the mountain roads, mowing off all kinds of cool plants with reckless abandon. Thanks to our good timing, we finally found spores on a high elevation form of the vigorous tropical fern, Dicranopteris. Despite seeing lots of Trochodendron aralioides throughout our trip, we had never seen any with as glossy deep green leaves as we found here. Growing among the trochodendron was Schefflera taiwaniana, Ardisia crenata, and an array of great ferns including one of our highest elevation sightings of the ubiquitous, but stunning tropical ferns, dicranopteris.

After a good hour of botanizing, we trekked back up the hill to enjoy a delightful lunch on the veranda of this quaint restaurant along with more of our favorite oldies music. Returning back down the mountain, we made only one more stop to see a very cut-leaf Fatsia polycarpa and a very divided Tetrapanax papyrifera. From Tianshiang, we figured it would take at least 2-3 hours to make it to our next hotel in Hualien ... this despite two people at the Grand Formosa Hotel telling us we could make it in an hour. Throughout the mountain roads, it was often difficult to manage much more than 15 miles per hour. We headed east on Highway 8 from Tianshiang, through Taroko Gorge, stopping only long enough for the requisite gorge photo moment (they were gorgeous), then south on Highway 9 into the port city of Hualien ... all in 50 minutes. Geez ... what a difference a straight, non-washed out road makes.

We became a bit concerned as we passed several business park entrance signs, all surrounded with razor wire ... hmmm... Our first stop was at a Post Office to mail back our first packet of fern spores, then a Grocery store, where we finally found needed supplies including hard to come by paper towels.

Hualien is a large town and we knew finding our hotel would be tough, but Mark spotted a sign that said Tourist Information Office. We pulled over and thanks to the helpful folks in the office, we discovered we were only a few blocks away. We arrived at the Lige Hotel not knowing what to expect, but always up for a pleasant surprise. The upscale hotel also had glass shower doors, although the shower controls were a bit overwhelming, and in-room Internet service, although they lacked a dinner restaurant. Walking down the city street that evening, we discovered a Chinese hot pot restaurant that looked quite interesting, so in we went. We were able to choose our food from a huge buffet, then cook it to our liking at our table. If you find yourself there, important safety tip ... the medium-hot cooking sauce is really hot ... and the icee-like fruit drinks worked great to cool down smouldering lips.