{"id":4331,"date":"2010-11-02T20:28:20","date_gmt":"2010-11-03T00:28:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/?p=4331"},"modified":"2010-11-03T10:26:35","modified_gmt":"2010-11-03T14:26:35","slug":"taiwan-cycling-festival-taipei-to-taitung","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/2010\/11\/02\/taiwan-cycling-festival-taipei-to-taitung\/","title":{"rendered":"Taiwan Cycling Festival: Taipei to Taitung"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of my favorite quotes involving travel comes from William Gibson’s Pattern Recognition<\/a>, describing a character who has just arrived in London, after a transatlantic flight:<\/p>\n

“Her mortal soul is leagues behind her, being reeled in on some ghostly umbilical down the vanished wake of the plane that brought her here. \u00c2\u00a0Souls can’t move that quickly, and are left behind, and must be awaited, upon arrival, like lost luggage.”<\/div>\n

For me, this is the perfect way to to describe that empty and displaced feeling I get when I’ve just made a long flight, feeling very much out of my own time and space. \u00c2\u00a0Usually alone, often at night, and frequently in a city new to me, I just go for a walk. \u00c2\u00a0There’s never a particular plan to it. \u00c2\u00a0Just a wander around, trying to absorb the general sense of a place.<\/p>\n

So that’s what I did when, having arrived late at night in Taipei and checked into the Howard<\/a>, I found myself with the energy to move. \u00c2\u00a0I did this despite the fact that I’d not slept a bit on the plane, and – in a first for me – found I’d have some company on this walk. \u00c2\u00a0Niamh and Mark, also in Taiwan for the Cycling Festival, found themselves a bit restless, too. \u00c2\u00a0So off we went. \u00c2\u00a0And this is what we found:<\/p>\n

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It would be foolish, indeed, to think you know a city through a single late night walk. \u00c2\u00a0But it does start to sketch a map of sorts. \u00c2\u00a0Not just ordinal, but of expectations. \u00c2\u00a0 Some things you get wrong – I’d soon learn that all those wide bike lanes were going to be filled with buzzing scooters in the morning, with barely a bike to be seen. \u00c2\u00a0But others turn out quite right – I felt incredibly safe, and there was an easiness to the people around me. \u00c2\u00a0That’s a theme that – while not particularly related to the purpose of my trip – certainly helped me focus on that purpose. \u00c2\u00a0Taiwan, despite the challenges of language (and weather), turned out to be a rather easy place.<\/p>\n

What is rarely easy, in any place 12 time zones away from your own, is getting yourself keyed into the local rhythms. \u00c2\u00a0So it was with no small amount of effort that I hauled myself out of bed early the next morning for a second look at Taipei, this time in daylight:<\/p>\n

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Click here<\/a> for same slideshow, but bigger and with captions.<\/p>\n

After a lovely breakfast, it was off for a bit of quick sight-seeing before heading to the airport for a flight to Taitung (TTT<\/a>). \u00c2\u00a0This included a stop at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall (\u00e5\u203a\u00bd\u00e7\u00ab\u2039\u00e4\u00b8\u00ad\u00e6\u00ad\u00a3\u00e7\u00ba\u00aa\u00e5\u00bf\u00b5\u00e5\u00a0\u201a):<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I suppose that now is as good a time as any to introduce the cast. \u00c2\u00a0From left to right: Niamh (of Adventures Abroad<\/a>), John (our guide\/magician\/miracle worker), Kate (of GlobalSoulAdventures)<\/a>, Mark (of Bikehugger.com<\/a>), and Beverly (of Beverly Garrity Design<\/a>). \u00c2\u00a0You’ll be seeing more of them later. \u00c2\u00a0For now, this is their best side.<\/p>\n

Other reasons to check out the CKS Memorial:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

and<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

and<\/p>\n

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It’s an interesting memorial, and undoubtedly could have been the kick-off of many an interesting political discussion (I find Taiwan’s political landscape fascinating, despite possessing just a glancing understanding of it), but this was not to be that kind of trip. \u00c2\u00a0Rather, it would be the kind of trip where we found things like this hilarious:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Yes, that’s a robot construction flag waver, and for the remainder of the trip, it never failed to excite and make us laugh. \u00c2\u00a0What can I say? \u00c2\u00a0We’re a simple people.<\/p>\n

On the way to the airport, we saw an advertisement for one of the most useful pieces of Taiwan’s new push for improved cycletouring infrastructure – bike cars on trains:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

To get to Taitung (TTT), however, we flew on Uni Air<\/a>. \u00c2\u00a0We departed from Taipei’s domestic airport, Songshan (TSA<\/a>). \u00c2\u00a0For domestic travel, this is far more convenient to downtown Taipei than TPE. \u00c2\u00a0The flight was short and uneventful, taking us from this:<\/p>\n

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to this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Well, except for one thing. \u00c2\u00a0This fellow sat directly behind us:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I found it hilarious, though my seatmate was less sanguine. \u00c2\u00a0Alas, we all got along just fine, and now I’m sitting comfortably at home. \u00c2\u00a0And that fellow probably isn’t. \u00c2\u00a0And we were off!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Taitung County (the county\/state\/province surrounding Taitung, the city) was completely different than Taipei. \u00c2\u00a0Green, spacious, green, gorgeous, and green, we’d clearly arrived in a very different part of Taiwan, despite the sub-60 minute flight. \u00c2\u00a0From there, we headed north for another bit of tourism – an aboriginal demonstration site that offered traditional rafting. \u00c2\u00a0A picture of tranquility, I think:<\/p>\n

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And it looks simple enough:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

So off we went, anticipating a bit of lazy time on the water:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Just look that. \u00c2\u00a0Beautiful, no?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Well. \u00c2\u00a0Just to the right of this photo? \u00c2\u00a0Is the rock I decided to land on, and make an ironic colonial claim. \u00c2\u00a0Joke was on me, though, as the rock tossed me off, camera in pocket, for a swim in the water. \u00c2\u00a0Which was really quite pleasant, until I’d been treading water for a minute or so and realized that the camera was, in fact, in pocket. \u00c2\u00a0So I’m a little short of photos for this day, after this. \u00c2\u00a0We ended up at the Hotel Royal Chihpen<\/a>, where I obtained a magic bag of rice that made much of what follows possible . . .<\/p>\n

Tomorrow: <\/strong>The 2010 Taiwan Cycling Festival kicks off! \u00c2\u00a0Also: Taitung International Triathlon, with a guest appearance from the Taiwan Air Force.<\/p>\n

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One of my favorite quotes involving travel comes from William Gibson’s Pattern Recognition, describing a character who has just arrived in London, after a transatlantic flight: “Her mortal soul is leagues behind her, being reeled in on some ghostly umbilical down the vanished wake of the plane that brought her here. \u00c2\u00a0Souls can’t move that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10,468,5],"tags":[501,477,476,510,469,478,479,475,480],"class_list":["post-4331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cycling","category-taiwan","category-travel","tag-cycling","tag-taipei","tag-taitung","tag-taiwan","tag-taiwan-cycling-festival","tag-tsa","tag-ttt","tag-uni-air","tag-480"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4331"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4363,"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4331\/revisions\/4363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blacknell.net\/dynamic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}