7/2: Free day - Taipei Zoo

 Today was our last free day and our last day before going to Vietnam. I didn't do much, mostly just packing, throwing things away (I had to toss a ton of stuff to get my suitcase below the weight limit for the plane), and working on our lesson plans. Since the trip is through the Fulbright-Hays program, we have to turn in lesson plans that we can use and share with other teachers based on our experiences. I'm working with another AP Human Geo teacher and we're going to create one lesson for each unit in the course, so teachers will be able to add to their existing curriculum easily. Today we essentially brainstormed what each lesson would be and how they fit into the course. For dinner, Nicole went to Din Tai Fung (which, if you have one of these in your area you NEED to go. It's so good!) and brought be back some bao and a chocolate bao! The chocolate one was just over the top good. We have to meet at 4:00 for the bus to the airport so it was a great night to stay in and go to bed early. We all got a bunch of laundry done too so we'd have fresh clothes for Vietnam. 

The zoo was amazing. Hot, of course, but the animals were super cute. We took an Uber over to save time and energy for the day, then hit up McDonald's for breakfast. They didn't actually have breakfast still on since we took our time in a slow morning, so I got a big mac meal for $145 NTD, which is about $4.50 US. Even McDonald's is cheaper here!

The main animals we wanted to see were the pandas and the penguins. We managed to see both even though they're on opposite sides of the zoo, so that was pretty good! This post will basically just be animal photos. :)

The panda house was air conditioned but they were still feeling pretty sleepy. My favorite shot is the one of the panda just flat on it's back airing their belly out. 

Various orangutans were hanging out talking to each other. They were so loud!

And this one was hanging out in the shade just unable to deal with all the screaming!

Black swans.

Malayan Tapir

Sun Bear - look at those claws!

I love elephants, especially their eyes. They just look so cute and loving. The first two are Asian and the last one is the African Bush elephant. 

King Penguins! I love penguins, and every time I see them I flash back to a book on animals of the Arctic I had growing up. I swear I read that thing about 150 times and I can still see the pages in my mind. 

The brown bear was was too hot to move and was sleeping in the corner where they could hardly be seen. Same, bear, same. 

The red panda was adorable and they fed it just as we came up, so we saw it running around and snacking. The photo with it's tongue out might be about my favorite animal photo I've taken ever. 

7/1: Park of Lover's Lake, Yehliu Geo Park, Damsui Fisherman's Wharf and Old Street

 Today is our last day with our tour guide Michelle and our minder Jane. It's been an amazing time with them, Michelle is incredibly knowledgeable of Taiwanese history and Jane is just an amazing person. Jane is a student at a different university who has been traveling with us, taking care of logistics, and making sure we take lots of group photos with our banner. She has so many photos of me taking photos of things, I am waiting to get access to her stuff so I can share some of it!

The Park of Lover's Lake is this tiny little park at the top of a mountain outside of Keelung City. It was really hot and humid as usual, but I make it around the lake and up to the top of the lookout tower you can see at back of this photo. It was really pretty and looks all the way down to the ocean on the other side. 

This is the view from the tower back to the lake. 

The park is full of lizards, dragonflies, and turtles. I also managed to find a couple of cats, of course!

On the far side of the lake there was this really cool suspension bridge. You can tell how hot I was here!

After yet another Chinese table food meal we headed over to the Yehliu Geo Park. I really enjoy the Chinese table food, but it's been a lot having it every single day and sometimes twice a day. 

The Geo Park is this amazing geological site with multiple layers of rock in different strength, so it's all carved out in different shapes. There's mushroom rocks and caves and rock that looks like sponges, it's all really cool. 

The line here that continues across the water is a fault line. It goes in a dead straight line right through the whole area. 

This is the Queen's Rock, said to look like Nefertiti from a certain angle. There was a very long line to see it from that angle, so here's my best shot and a link to see it from the right angle. 

There's a ton of fossils in the area as well, this is a sand dollar fossil. 

There's warning signs at the start of the park telling people that if someone falls in, you should not try to go get them. There are workers who will activate safety procedures if someone does go in. Because of the waves and rock formations, it's very dangerous to go in. This statue is of a man who went in to try to save some tourists who went in and lost his own life too. He left behind a wife and kids, so the local government set up a fund for their education and housing and stuff. The oldest son came back to the area and volunteers in the park still. 

About halfway through the park I found the little snack shop and got a mango smoothie. What else would you get in the middle of mango season when it's stupid hot? 

We went to a couple of other spots but I didn't take many great photos. The wharf was just a wharf, and not a nice one. It was just kind of a working wharf with a fancy bridge. But the last stop was the Damsui Old Street, which is a tourist zone and shopping area. I got a lot more souvenirs and gifts for people since this was my last real shopping day in Taiwan. 

For dinner we went out with Professor Ying who gave us our lecture on Taiwan's economic situation. He was a fascinating man to have a meal with and gave us so much information about his childhood, his mandatory military service, and Taiwan's current place in the world. It was the fanciest food of the trip with a huge fried fish and abalone, among many other dishes. I may have stolen one of the abalone shells to bring home (what, it was beautiful!). 

6/30: Taroko National Park, Daka Ecological and Recycle Park, Yilanbing Pastry Shop

 Today was a hiking kind of day and it was beautiful. We came up around the northeast part of Taiwan and ended up back in Taipei at NTNU for a couple of nights before heading to Vietnam. Hotel breakfast yesterday was absolutely horrible, so we tried to go to a nearby McDonald's to grab some food. For some reason it didn't open until 10:00, so we ended up at the good old staple 7-eleven and got tons of good food.I got onigari again plus some chips and water for the road. 

This is the view from the visitor center which was <prepare to be totally surprised> under renovation. It was really pretty though. 

This bridge is the Lion Bridge, it's covered in these carved lions. Each one is slightly different from the rest and it was fun to look over them to try to find the differences. It might be something as small as the direction the eyes were looking or as big as the shape of the mane. Just a cool touch. 

Walking along the bridge you can see the covered path to get up into the valley. It's down on the lower right on this photo, you're essentially walking through an underhang of a clif. It was a good time to be short, I didn't even have to duck. 

The water through here was so beautiful. The color reminded me a little of some of the streams in New Zealand. I want to take the photos to a paint matching place and have them make a custom paint for my house, it just made me so happy. 

Here's the photo under the overhang, it was all wet and dripping underneath. 

The rock layers in this area are stunning. You can see all the folds from being along a fault lines. 

The area is still very important for the Taroko Tribe, so they sometimes bring goods up and down the path. It was fun to see this 4 wheeler come whizzing by towing a cart and with a kid hanging on the back. 

I asked Nicole to take a photo of me sitting on this rock which led to an incredibly sequence of me running up and posing in multiple ways. I pulled my favorite two to post. 

We all because a little obsessed with snails on the trip but none more than my roommate. I took this photo of this iridescent one on the trail to send to her. It seriously was glowing. 

On our way out, it started to rain but we still stopped at this little memorial site. It's a site for the people who died digging the tunnels through the park area. 

Our second walking spot was the DaKa Ecological and Recycle Park, another spot through a valley. It had much more water running through so there were a lot of rapids down below. This was a gold mining site going way back through recorded Taiwanese history. 

Walking through the overhang areas, these birds were dive bombing everyone who walked through. When I was taking the photo I realized it was because their babies were in a nest up here and they were trying to protect them! We also saw a big snake slithering around. 

Our rest stop on the way back to Taipei was at Yilanbing Pastry Shop, a super famous spot. I got some amazing flaky cookie/biscuit things and wandered through their little history area. These are some of the original cake pans used by the company. 

6/29: Morisaka (Lin Tien San) forest area, Guangfu sugar factory, Liyutan Carp Lake, Ci Sing Tan Scenic Spot

Today we visited some absolutely beautiful areas. First up was a cypress forest area that was logged heavily by the Japanese in their occupation era and then by the Chinese. It's mostly old-growth cypress which has the most amazing smell I think I've ever smelled. I bought so much stuff here, I think I blacked out in the stores and just went crazy. I ended up spending about $2,000 New Taiwanese Dollars, which is about $65 US. To put that in context, that's what I spent on everything I bought for an entire week in Taipei, and I probably spent $5,000 NTD in the entire two weeks I was there. I'm not showing a lot of it because there's a lot of gifts in there! I got so many fun ideas for Adroit as well, there were so many cute projects that I think we can recreate with the kids. ​

This is the entry to the forest area, like many things it was under repair so we didn't get to go in here. 

This adorable puppy came to say hi to us all in the bathroom area and didn't want to leave us alone. He was wet because his caretaker was giving him baths to keep him cool, but he was just so fluffy! He almost came on our walk with us because I couldn't find his caretaker to give him back, but she finally got him back so we could keep going. I swear, I almost stuffed him in my suitcase to bring home with me. 

This is the coolest industrial art I've seen in a long time. It's large equipment turned into a dragonfly!

Some cypress rounds on the wall of the little museum. You can see all the rings, the trees are old and huge!

The official gift shop had these amazing sculptures. I wish I'd been able to afford one, they were just stunning. 

When the Japanese started logging here, they built lots of homes and shops for the Japanese workers coming to stay. It's interesting seeing the contrast between Japanese style buildings (mostly here in this eastern region of Taiwan) and the Chinese styles that are most other places. 

This is the Guangfu sugar factory, further along our journey. I got ice cream that is made on site with sugar produced here and ran into some friends from the hotel. At breakfast, I was making faces with this family of little kids who were sitting in the space, and I ran into them here! They were so excited to see me and their mom helped me translate some conversations about where I am from and why I was there. They were super cute and it was fun to interact with them. 

Disney and Frozen is universal, we did a little singing and they loved it! Blurred the kids because, well, kids.

There was a pond with tons of fish that you can buy food for and feed. This photo in no way shows how many fish were there, it was just masses of them attacking the food. 

This is the Liyutan Carp Lake area, it's the little lake tucked right in amongst the mountain range that has become a little recreation area. We went out on the paddle boats (and I remembered how much I hate paddle boats), saw some giant fish (carp, I assume), and saw a practice dragon boat race. We got rained on a little but had a cover on our boat, so it was all good. 

These guys FLEW past on in our paddle boat, it was impressive. 

It's really hard to see, but there are two dark spots in the middle of this photo that were the giant fish. They had to be 4 feet each at least. 

I took this out the bus window so I'm not sure where it is, but it reminded me so much of some of the scenery in the Narnia movies. All the rivers have this type of riverbed here, it's a very rocky region. I love it with the low clouds and then brilliant greens. 

Our last spot was the Ci Sing Tan scenic spot, it's right by the local airport so that was interesting. While we were there a military plane of some sort landed, I have a video of it if anyone is interested but I can't get it to load on this blog. 

The upper part of the beach was rocky, then sandy, then rocky again right at the shoreline. The rocks by the shore were like little river rocks that weren't super comfortable, but I still sat there for as long as possible just watching the water. 

One of the guys from our group was walking along behind me and snapped this photo of me chilling on the log I found to sit on. It's one of my favorite photos I've ever had taken of me!