Day 5: Taroko National Park

6/4/2018
After doing some research, we decided that we wanted to do a tour for our visit to Taroko.  My parents didn't think it would be safe for us to drive through the park and we got a recommendation from a family member, so decided to do an all-day tour with a guide.  We went through Meet My Guide and they were just awesome.  Since we had so many people (11 total) we had 2 cars for our trip.

Our guide was Alan and he was pretty great!  He spoke English and gave us a lot of background info about the area and about Taroko.  Eulee and Eli really enjoyed their time with Alan and bonded with this guy.  Eli already made plans to come back to Taiwan when he's 18 to see him.  Ha!!  This guy was definitely Eli's BFF during the entire trip.

Our first stop was Qing Shui Cliff. Walking over to the cliff, I felt like I was back in Hawai'i.  The green mountains and valleys...the humid air.  It's so lush and beautiful. 

Then we saw this--

Look at that blue, blue ocean.  I knew it was going to be a good day!

Then we headed into the park to hike Shakadang Trail.  This trail is high above the Shakadang stream valley.  It's beautiful with the marble rocks and the turquoise water. 

There are still Truku aboriginals who live in the park and we passed by some of their stands.  Alan recommended that we try their famous homemade sausages and they were delicious!  You're supposed to eat the sausage with the fern (in B's left hand), but B wasn't particularly fond of it. 

The guides could tell that our kids were itching to get into the water, so they let them get in and the kids were in heaven.  The water was so clear and there were little fish everywhere.  Apparently, they like the sausages, too!  It was such a perfect resting spot for everyone!

After we hiked back, we headed to get some lunch at a visitor's center.  Then we went to Swallow Grotto.  This has to be my favorite place.  Because of frequent falling rocks, we all had to don helmets--

Lookin' good....

Then we just hiked along the path way up high, along the river.  It's so high up and right on the edge of the cliffs that it's hard to look straight down sometimes.  Ama couldn't look down at all. 

Across the river, there are large "potholes" where swallows dart in and out.  Evie's favorite animal is a swallow, so she loved seeing the potholes. 

Then we even saw monkeys hanging out on the cliffs!  It was such a neat place to visit! 

Then we went to the Eternal Spring Shrine.  This place looks like it's straight out of an Asian painting....a shrine, with a waterfall, along the side of a green, lush mountain.  Wow. 

This was just a simple walk through some tunnels to the shrine itself.  There is another hike up to the Bell Tower, but it was closed when we visited.  Boo. 

After that, the guides took us back to Hualien to catch our train back to Taipei.  I was sad we had to leave.  There is so much to explore in Taroko and we'll definitely be back the next time we visit Taiwan!