Very Livable Taitung (Part One)

Taitung has aspirations of being a bigger city, yet it has very small town feel.  20 years ago, they relocated their train station 6km to the outskirts.  Today, the new station still seems like it's in the middle of nowhere.  While there are plenty of local trains to the north, there are not as many to the south.  Their night market started only 10 years ago, runs merely a long city block.  Yet, they have a enviable city park almost the size of Central Park, for a city of just over 100,000 people.

We cruised around on clunker loaner bikes, in the park, along the coast road, on the rail trail.  We had wanted to do hiking and bicycling in Taiwan.  We are already very satisfied with our East side half of the tour.  We are prepared that the second half on the more populated west side over Chinese New Year will be a different experience.

Not many other folks on the local train from Yuli to Taitung.


And some great views out the windows.


The owners of our guesthouse were very friendly and helpful (eg train station pickup and dropoff). Here's the view from our window.


The area around the old train station is a hub of activity as it's now the bus station, the visitor information center, a terminus of the rail trail, and a park for buskers and special events.
















We ate well in Taitung starting with these Cong You Bing (scallion pancakes) which we bought (there was a queue) and then ate on the seawall.








One day we borrowed the guest house loaner bikes and road north along the coast to Dulon and back. Great ride! About 55kms in total


The coastal road is busy but there is a bike/scooter lane and 7-Elevens every 10kms or so.


Our bikes: One is a 1-speed, the other has 2 or 3 speeds that work. ;-) However most of the hills - each headland means a hill - are gradual.


The bike parking at XiaoYeliu Park had these nice benches for cyclists with bike racks in between.


And very cool rock formations. We walked around and took a break.




The coastal road continually has perfect views.


Views that draw tourist buses.


Let's take another break.




We turned around at the old Dulan Sugar Factory, now a weekend nightclub and shops. And had ice creams and an iced coffee at Family Mart.




While walking around in Dulan a string of 50 or more cyclist on an organized tour rode by and turned into the Sugar Factory. There were leading and trailing SAG wagons.


Link here.

I managed to pull out my camera on this long downhill.




Link here.

Returning to Taitung we rode on the levee bike way and then rode straight to a veg resto (which has been in business for 50+ years) for a snack; 2 bowls of noodle soup. ;-)






And later for dinner we had an order of 20 vegetarian jiaozi (pot stickers).






Here's the GPS track of our route.