I'm in Love!

With Taiwan!
I love this plant!

What an adventurous day! This morning Karyn, Kailey and I biked to the train station and waited for the train to Ershui (Land of the Monkeys). Last time we were in Ershui, we got a brochure for a city called Jhushan. It looked awesome and so we decided to try and go there today!

We didn't exactly know how to get there besides that we needed to get a bus in Ershui. We had no idea how many times a day the bus ran or if it even ran at all on Saturdays. We couldn't find any information about it online. Thankfully the man at the visitor center in Ershui spoke some English and was able to help us!

The next bus didn't come for another 1-1/2 hours, so we decided to wander around Ershui a bit. The first two pictures of this post are in Ershui!


I loved the red pavilion and the yellow sunflower and the brown tree stump with the green plant growing out of it all together!

We finally got on the bus and the bus ride alone was worth it! This is from the bus! Look how green and tall and straight the mountain is! I didn't take many pictures from the bus but the views were amazing!

We made it to Jhushan! This statue was near the visitor center there! It's made of bamboo and I just thought it was funny!

It took us awhile to make it to the visitor center, because once we got to Jhushan we realized how bad our map was and that no one spoke English. Thankfully, though, the map we had had the names of the places we wanted to go in English and Chinese. After asking four people by pointing at the map and body language, we found our way to the visitor center :) The people were super nice!

When we got to the visitor center the ladies there did not speak any English either, but once again, thanks to the map and body language and the super nice people, we knew where we needed to go :)

We found this beautiful Daoist Temple on the way to our destination! It's beautiful, new, huge and detailed!

The temple! I don't know what it's called, but we all really loved it!

Look at all of that relief carving on the wall and pillar!

The yin and yang symbol!

I loved the detail! Look how intricately carved this pillar is!

Money burning! They symbolically burn money! I can't remember why they do it, but it's fascinating to watch. (It's not real money, just in case you were wondering :)

This is the tower that they burn the money in!

Look at that detail!

We ended up walking a ton today! We didn't realize how far apart things were there! But we got to see a lot of awesome things on our journey!
I really wanted to see one of these tea fields while we were in Jhushan and we definitely got to see one! I love this one on the hill!

I just wanted to put the picture of this butterfly up!

Another tea field! It's huge! It's funny because we couldn't see the end, meaning it looks like there's a drop-off or something at the end, but we don't know! I loved this field! I don't know why, but it just mesmerized me!

A small cemetery on a hill!

Look how gorgeous this is! I loved it!

A lady fishing in the river with her hat and goulashes on!

And we made it to our destination! This was the main reason we came to Jhushan and everything else was just an added bonus! It's a suspension bridge! A real, live suspension bridge that shakes when you walk on it!

Karyn, Kailey and I on the suspension bridge! It wasn't scary or anything. But it's just awesome to go on a suspension bridge in the jungle of Taiwan! I really felt like we were in the jungle on certain parts of our walk today :)

Contemplating the meaning of life on the bridge ;)

Color accent on the bridge!

After the wonderful suspension bridge we went briefly to some botanical gardens! It was breathtakingly beautiful! This picture is in the gardens!

See that white ball in between the dragons?! I know you do, well that is the sun! The sun looked really cool today! It didn't really look real to me. It just looked like a white ball in the sky.

Jhushan was amazing! We are already planning on going back! There are some more suspension bridges and waterfalls and museums and parks that we haven't seen. The funny thing about Jhushan is that it is not in any of the tourist books of Taiwan, but it has so many things to see and do! It's kind of nice that it's not so touristy! I really am in love!

Welcome to Lugang!

Be prepared for tons of pictures on this post! Enjoy!

Lugang is about a 30-minute bus ride from Changhua. Karyn, Kailey, Liz, and I hopped on a bus this morning and made our way to Lugang! These two cats were at the bus station welcoming us to Lugang :)

Our first stop was Longshan Temple! It's one of the oldest Buddhist temples in Taiwan. It's beautiful and it's huge! It's a national monument in Taiwan! This is the very front of the temple.

This is inside the first courtyard!

Longshan Temple! I like this shot!

I saw this poor little dog and had to take a picture! At first I didn't know if it was alive, but it definitely was alive. This is in Longshan temple!

I love this light!

The big, black thing has incense sticks in it (if you look closely you can see them). Buddhists burn them as a form of worship and for use in prayer!

Longshan Temple! The people in the background are holding the incense sticks and praying.

I like the elephant! Look at the details around it!

I love these statues! I like the way they were lined up!

Our next stop was the Lugang Folk Arts Museum! (You can see the museum in the picture with the round towers). It cost about $4 to get in and it was well worth it! We saw some traditional articles of clothing from the 1700s. We saw some intricate Buddhist statues. We saw some beautiful rooms set up as it typically would have been in the 1700s. There was so much stuff there and it was awesome!

This is the courtyard of the Lugang Folk Arts Museum! Isn't it beautiful!? We loved it!

Look at the details of this dress! I believe this was from the 1700s and the embroidery was all done by hand! The whole dress was this detailed! It was amazing!

They had swings in the courtyard of the museum! I loved it!

Me trying to stay on the sticks. I could get on for a second but I could not take a step on them. It was hard, but fun! This is also in the courtyard of the museum!

This is up close of the museum! We loved just sitting in the courtyard looking at the building!

This is the House of Reminiscing! There's a story that a husband and wife lived at this house and one day the husband left (I don't know the details, like if he went off to war or something). And everyday the wife watched out the circle window (behind the tree) waiting for her husband to come home. He never came back. It's such a sad but beautiful story.

I love how this wall was there with windows and all, but there was just empty space on the other side! I assume there once was a home there but it got torn or knocked down except for this wall!

Nine Turns Lane! This is a narrow road that they built small and curvy to protect the residents from the entry of bandits and the wind! Most of the buildings on this lane are super old!

Liz, Kailey, Karyn and I on Nine Turns Lane!

We got these crazy cold, condensed, corn syrupy suckers! I don't really know how to describe them, but that's the best I could come up with.

Kailey and I with our suckers! They were definitely interesting! They weren't bad, but different.
We are at the old market in Lugang in this picture! We loved it! This is where we'll be going for our Christmas shopping before we come home :)

There is so much history in Lugang! It used to be one of the biggest cities in Taiwan. The river silted and something else happened that caused it to be less popular.
This little well I'm standing by was separated by a wall, half was inside, half was outside. The inside one was used by the wealthy owners and the outside one was used by passersby and less fortunate neighbors! The owners were generous in letting others use their well and it strengthened relations within the neighborhood!

This is back in Changhua! This is from the roof of our building! I heart the sky!

Another picture from the roof!

Lugang is awesome! It is definitely more touristy there than here in Changhua, but I still loved it! It is still authentically Taiwan!

Taichung Park!

This beautiful and rather large park is in the middle of Taichung (where we have church)! Taichung is the third largest city in Taiwan!

I had to use the color emphasis on this awesome red bridge in the park :)

Look at this beautiful flower! I have no idea what kind of flower it is, but I like it!

I liked this shot!

My roommates and I on top of a mini Buddhist shrine in the middle of the park!

We bought matching pollution masks :) People wear these here when they're riding their scooters or they're outside a lot. It's supposed to help filter out at least some of the toxins in the air. It's kind of hard to breathe in them, though, which is a bit of an issue.

The back of the big goat statue!

Look at me!

I like scooters! I'm trying to show you how many scooters they have here and if you look closely some of them are wearing the pollution masks :)

I liked the scooters all lined up and the buildings in the background!

This is in Changhua (where we live). I liked the scooters and the motorized wheelchair thing that drives on the road with all of the other cars and scooters and bikes!

Do you recognize the characters on the billboard?! Look at the picture closely! It's pretty awesome :) It's an advertisement for water.