See what I did there?! Jiufen was the first place in Taiwan I’ve visited that has felt absolutely swamped with local and mainland tourists. Everyone seemed to be visiting with organised tours on big coaches whereas I decided to get the public bus. Quite straightforward, headed to the Adventist Hospital and waited around 20 mins. Bus goes to Jiufen Old Street, it was air conditioned and we could use the public transportation cards which made things nice and easy!

The bus journey was about one hour, including a change of driver at a bus depot somewhere in the arse end of Ruifeng, aka the land that public transport innovations forgot. Once the driver had started it up again, the bus wound its way up through the hills, the clouds disguising the peaks of the mountains, making you feel like you are climbing into oblivion, into another world. Finally the bus dodged the tourists and dropped us off in Jiufen. We made it!

The old street was lined both sides with lots of vendors and hundreds and hundreds of tourists, as well as the occasional scooter driver who decided to drive directly through what I could only presume was a pedestrianised zone…? Main foods on offer were sweetened sausage on skewers, fish balls in soup (seriously SO MANY FISH BALLS like everywhere sold them and after eating them accidentally in Taipei believing them to be tofu balls when I ordered them, I’m no longer the biggest fan), but one stall did sell something so delicious: vanilla icecream in a salty crepe, sprinkled with crushed peanuts and optional coriander – amazing!

After that brief nourishment, we went walking around the town away from the touristy old street, braving the occasional downpours and otherwise extreme heat bearing down on us (around 32C) and getting to see some beautiful sights scattered throughout this town hidden in the clouds.

We then decided to follow the road down and out of Hualien to find the temple we had previously seen from the road on our approach to Jiufen, nestled in the forests in the mountains. Eventually we reached it and it was absolutely massive! Loud drumming was coming from somewhere although as the building was so big, could be coming from anywhere.

 

We had exhausted all the main sites in Jiufen and so braved the queues for the buses and headed back on the bus into Taipei, where we went for some excellent beef noodles immediately after arriving.

I also discovered that the previous evening, I had been eaten alive by mosquitoes – one bite had swollen to around 9cm across with a wonderful white circle surrounding it! Thank God for antihistamine cream!