It’s a really full day tour from Taipei to the natural beauty of Taroko Gorge, one of the Seven Natural Wonders of Asia!
(ภาษาไทย) Toroko Gorge is in the city of Hualian, this city is about 100 miles away from Taipei. It was pretty hard to find a day-trip tour from Taipei to Taroko Gorge, but I finally found this trip on Viator at 150USD per person, included round-trip train tickets, lunch, local guide and all entrance tickets.
It was great trip but you have to get ready for a long day travelling, all you need is comfortable shoes!
We also packed rain coats, hat, sun glasses, and some snacks. Briefly, the tour group picked us up at the hotel, then we took a train for 3 hrs to Hualian, after that we jumped on a coach for about 45 mins to the Taroko Gorge. The coach took us around the Toroko Gorge, and we jumped off for attraction spots and jumped back on the coach. After the day, we were taken to the train station and back to hotel. It’s total 13hrs!
We planned to have an easy day the day before (Taiwan Day 2 Yehliu Geopark and Jiufen, the old market street), just to get ready for the tight schedule!
The driver came to pick we up on time (5am), but we were the first couple that he picked up so we went to several hotels to pick up the other tourist. Well, I just wished that we would not be the last couple dropped off after the long day trip!
The driver dropped all of us in front of Taipei Railway Station where the 1st tour guide was waiting for us, and he lead us into the Railway station.
This tour guide distributed the train tickets for our group and advised us to go to the restroom or get somethings at 7-11 the convenient shop inside the train station. Yeah! I got a chance to stock up my snacks. There’s only coffee, tea and instant noodles for sale on the train.
I think Taiwan is great for kids, female and elderly for any public transportations. They have safe waiting zones for females in the train station, very impressive.
When the train arrived, the tour guide made sure that we got in the right seat, he also waved for us! That’s cute!
Now, it’s your choice on what you want to do on the train because it’s a 3 hour ride, I ate everything that I bought from 7-11!!!
It took 3 hours to get to Hualian, we arrived here about 9 in the morning.
The local tour guide(2nd) was waiting for us at the train station, I’m so sorry I can’t remember her name but she was great!
Before another ride on the provided coach, we stopped to use the restroom in train station.
The coach is nice and clean, we took another nap because it takes about 45 mins to get to Taroko Gorge.
Here we are!!! When we arrived the tour guide let off the bus to take picture at the first stop (the entrance).
Ops! We found Taiwanese sausage (again), and we needed at least 2!!!
Then we needed to get back to the coach, our tour guide started telling us what we were going to do and see. First, we needed to stop to get our hard hats.
Our tour guide was a bit concerned about our hygiene, so she provided napkins for us to put on our head and under our chin.
This is very thoughtful because the hard hats have been used by many tourist.
And for your safety, you have to wear this hard hat at all the times in the Taroko Gorge.
There are so many tunnels, sometimes we got thru by our coach and sometime we had to walk…
Start exploring its sheer marble cliffs, now I understood why I had to wear the hard hat!
I was wishing to see the blue water (just like I saw from the magazine) but we should come here during the winter time. Water is not that blue during April…
This is a famous stop for pictures, can you spot the elephant head.
The last stop is at a temple waterfall, this is what I saw from the Taiwan tour website and made me feel like I gotta come to see this!!!
But this is actually a shrine called Eternal Spring Shrine, a landmark and a memorial shrine complex in Taroko Gorge. It was built to honor those Taiwanese veterans who lost their lives in the construction of the tunnels (1956—1960)
It has been rebuilt at least twice, after being destroyed by landslides. The most recent shrine was built in 1989.
The Shrine is located right above the waterfall streams. Our tour guide let us walk around and I thought we can walk to the Shrine.
Actually, we can walk to the cave to get closer the Shrine.
That’s all we can, it’s all about your safety, as the Shrine is right on the cliff, and the landslide could happen anytime.
The Shrines looks very stunning even farther off in the distance. They didn’t plan to build this for the tourist, but so delightful to visit!
In all, the coach trip will travel through 38 separate tunnels, ending up at the Tianxian Bridge in front of the Xiangde Temple.
It’s about time for lunch, I wasn’t expecting such a nice lunch when it’s included with the trip or complementary.
The lunch presentation was very nice and the food itself was so great!
I can’t believe I ate all of them, it’s just so good like I can’t stop eating!
Next on the tour is to stop the marble factory – the standard overpriced factory tour with pushy sales people. We are not allowed to take picture inside, but the tour guide said we had to stop by the government rule.
And next…Chi-Hsing Beach, it’s different than Thailand beaches because nobody was swimming.
In fact, this beach is quite dangerous if you are planning to go in the water. However, it has a great scenic area where you can observe the beautiful mountainous coastline of Hualien.
่The sea, the stone, the sky, everything about this place is so beautiful. You can hear the loud noise of the sea hitting the stone, it’s extremely soothing…
That’s about a day trip in Hualian, the local guide completed her duty when she took us back to the train station, and it would be another tour guide (in the morning) in Taipei. It’s another 3 hours ridding the train back to Taipei.
Wow, I think they have really good team work, great time management, and at a reasonable price – We strongly recommend you to try this trip!!!
