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| Hehuanshan Forest Recreation Area (合歡山) |
I joined a group from
Hsinchu on a one-day trip to
Hehuanshan Forest Recreation Area (合歡山). It was a paid event with our own drivers. The itinerary suggested it would take three hours to get from Hsinchu to Hehuanshan. Before joining the event, I did confirm with Google Maps which suggested just over three hours. Since I was coming from Taipei, I had an extra 1.5-hour commute by the time I got myself to the High Speed Rail Station, took the high speed train for the 45-minute ride to Hsinchu and then finally a tiny shuttle train that would've taken me over to the Hsinchu train station. I ended up missing the small shuttle train and had to take a taxi to meet the group as we had a 7:30am departure time. Please note that I left the house with NT$1,200 in my pocket and no bank card. In my experience, one doesn't need much money when hiking for the day. I had everything I would need for the day according to the itinerary I was given. There is a story here which will follow later in a future post.
Hehuanshan has been on my list of places to see for a very long time. It's not easily accessible no matter which part of the island you are coming from as these mountains are in central Taiwan and are 3,000m above sea leavel. Accommodation up here can be hard to come by and expensive. Also, after climbing Jade Mountain (3,952m) and not feeling well for the final ascent and then attempting Mt. Fuji (3,776m) and not getting further than my hut at 3,100m because of more severe altitude sickness, I was hesitant to spend a night in the high mountains. A day trip sounded perfect! And it was amazing, BUT, there were a number of bumps along the way.
The first bump was that it took us over five hours to get to the
Hehuanshan Main Peak (合歡山主峰) trailhead. It didn't help that the driver suggested we stop for "famous" tea in
Puli. We had a group of thirteen and only four or five people ended up buying tea. This added almost 45 minutes onto our trip and was not great planning on the organizer's part. According to the itinerary we were given, we were supposed to be at the Main Peak trailhead at 10:30 yet we were in Puli at this time waiting in line at a busy tea shop so that less than half of the group could buy tea. Sigh. We made it to the trailhead just before 1:00pm. Unfortuntely, the moment I stepped out of the car I started experiencing altitude sickness. Dizziness. Puke-y. This was the second tiny bump. As much as I love the mountains, high altitude doesn't seem to agree with me. Thankfully these feelings passed fairly quickly and I was able to enjoy the day!
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| The climb up to Hehuan Main Peak (3,417m) is fairly easy and took no time at all |
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