Cycling around Taiwan

Taipei → Daxi

I picked up my rental bike from MathewBike, the best cyclery in Taiwan. Escaping the city gridlock was a challenge and by 4pm I was still stuck in urban Taipei. I hadn't eaten since breakfast so I bought three dragonfruit at a fruit stand and watched the frantic happenings of the street. Trucks delivered bulk ingredients rice and oil. Aluminium balconies swayed off brick apartment blocks. A washing machine spat grey alley water. I needed to find Provincial Hwy 3 fast and get out to the mountains.

It was hours later and dark when I escaped the metropolis. Beyond New Taipei, I asked schools and landowners if I could camp on their grounds. No luck. The police in Sanxia recommended I ride on to Daxi to sleep in Zhongzheng Park. There I unrolled my camping mat in a wooden gazebo and ate dinner: another dragonfruit and two biscuits. I slept well, and was woken in the morning by the delightful jingle of the town’s garbage truck—a Taiwan specialty.

Daxi → Taichung

Continued south on Hwy 3, hell-bent on distance. I cycled all day, over Shitan’s formidable hills and through Dahu’s strawberry farms. I saw faded rural temples, weeping banana trees, a giant Buddha in Emei, and fishermen trying their luck in a lonely pond.

Again I rode into the night. As the sharp cresent moon lifted into a purple sky, a blessed downhill carried me into Taichung’s industrial heart. Found hostel, collapsed.

Taichung → Chiayi

Late start riding in the swampy morning heat. Brief stop at “Rainbow Village”—a neighbourhood painted by an ex-soldier to save it from demolition. The crowds and heat were too much, so I hit the road.

Chiayi-bound through quiet towns where minutes stretched to months. I reached the city around 8pm and asked at the local police station about nearby campgrounds. Officer Harry offered me the “space out the back” of the station, along with sweetbread, a shower, and 15 minutes of squad photos. I readily accepted.

I asked Harry about crime in Taiwan. “There’s not much, but not none”. That was good news for me, as I pictured more officers ahead waiting to guide me through this enormously unplanned journey. The station was next to a hospital. It was the loudest place but safest place I’ll ever sleep.

Chiayi → Kaohsiung

I beat the sun out of bed and hit Route 168 in darkness. It was going to be a huge mountain climb to start the morning: Route 172’s harsh sequence of switchbacks led me high to the Huoshan Biyun Temple—a stone castle staffed by a disinterested monk who was burning incense while watching an American sitcom on an iPad. The perfect juxtaposition for modern Taiwan.

Nearby was a fire-water cave (水火同源), where an eternal flame dances on spring water, thanks to a fault line in the river that seeps natural gas. Quite absurd. I took Route 175 south, where red coffee cherries burst from roadside trees. Homestyle timber cafes traced the winding undulations, intermittently revealing the stretching valley below, which rolled like the sea out to a bumpy green horizon.

Kaohsiung → Fangshan

The rain was torrential on the day I left Kaohsiung. I waited for it to pass. It never did. So I was riding soaked, with daylight fading fast. Two and a half hours in, I was cold and desperate to find a place to sleep. That is, until a middle-aged woman told me about the room on the roof of her shop. She led me up the external stairs to a strange brick cylinder on the roof. It had an intergalactic-themed interior. It was bizarre salvation in what felt like the middle of nowhere. It was perfect.

Fengshan → Kenting National Park

I had reached Taiwan's southernmost point—a rough halfway mark—and found a beautiful campground off the main road in Kenting National Park. The clerk at the Park’s information centre advised me against camping in the forest as there were “no 7/11s nearby”.

The number of convenience stores in Taiwan is baffling. Rest assured, during every gruelling climb through villageless wilderness, there will be a neon house of tea-eggs, chocolate milk, and instant noodles just around the corner.

Kenting National Park → Dawu

A brutal ride with over 1100m of vertical climb. Along the way I saw monkeys, an army base, a dog eating a ferret, and dragonfruit farms. Many seedlings of towns that have never quite sprouted. The coastal sections here felt familiar, similar to Australia’s rocky cliffs, yellow-white sand, and coastal scrub that hugs the road.

Dawu → Taitung

Absolutely howling headwinds. It was almost easier to walk the bike. That's all I recall.

Taitung → Dulan

My partner joined from this point on, which meant more leisurely riding and stops along the way. One detour was for an underwhelming tourist attraction called “water running upstream”. It clearly runs downstream, so I advise you give that one a miss.

Dulan is an excellent spot to spend a few days. The old sugar factory has been converted to a community space that hosts live music and open mics. Best of all, there is free camping at the police station in Dulan. Just bring earplugs as the neighbourhood dogs can be vocal.

Dulan → Chenggong

A flat and windy ride along a beautiful coastline in sunny weather. The east coast is far less industrial than the west, yet the roads are immaculate for cycling. This part of the country is truly pleasant. Sanxiantai Island was a worthy detour on this segment, with the cool Sanxiantai Arch Bridge giving you access to the island on foot.

Chenggong → Ruisui

A sneaky, slow-burning uphill that catches out the unprepared with its progressively steeper and steeper mountain pass. We underestimated it, and were miles off the nearest town by twilight. It looked like we might be stranded in the mountains overnight, until the vicious incline turned into an epic decline.

We bombed the final 10km in fifteen minutes to arrive in Ruisui at a reasonable hour. As usual, we asked the police for camping recommendations. The officer said the train station would be good, despite the “many feral dogs”. We found a hotel instead.

Ruisui → Hualien

There were two ways to tackle this segment: the flat and mild journey along Hwy 9, or the spicy mountainous way along Route 193. After yesterday’s debacle, and to give our bums some respite, we opted for the flatlands.

Hualien → Taroko National Park

Taroko National Park felt like Taiwan’s soul. Spectacular scenery, nature, hiking, natural hotsprings, and free camping at the Lushui Campground. My favourite part of the country.

Alannah ditched her bike in Hualien, so to get anywhere in the gorge we had to walk. We tried hitchhiking and got picked up instantly by two betel nut-chewing locals. We spent four nights in the gorge, and from that moment on, hitchhiking was how we got around. We hitched twelve rides in total.

Taroko National Park → Xincheng

An eye-watering descent out of Taroko Gorge and back to Xincheng Station, to then travel back to Taipei by train. Skipping this segment conveniently avoids the most dangerous cycling road in Taiwan: the *Su-Hua Highway*. I rode through Taipei’s riverside cycling paths back to Mathew Bike to return the rental all in one piece, with 1037km on the clock. Taiwan burned into my legs, lungs, and memory forever.