The Alishan Forest Railway

Hello there,

yesterday we went back to Taipei using multiple transports.
First we had to get from Alishan to Fenqihu using a public bus. Because the staff at our hotel had told us that it was best to go to the bus station in Alishan at 8 am due to the tickets being sold out quickly (although the tickets would be sold from 8.30 am and the bus would leave at 9.10 am) we did just that.
But it turned out that she meant the bus to Chiayi. For the bus to Fenqihu there was almost nobody waiting in line and the tickets could only be bought directly in the bus. So we waited an hour for our bus and then went to Fenqihu.

I am glad I had the pills against motion sickness for the bus ride

 

 
Our tickets for the Alishan Forest Railway were for the train at 2 pm, so we had four hours to explore Fenqihu.
And we spent a good three hours of that time eating ;). Fenqihu itself is not that big, and most of it consists of food stands, restaurants and shops, where they mainly sell food. I read that around Fenqihu are also many trails for hiking, but after the past days of hiking we just couldn't do any more of it.
So we stored our luggage at one of the locker stations that are available at almost every station and are very easy to use (3 hours cost 50 NTD) and went to explore Fenqihu's food and the town itself.

old locomotives on display

 

JJ tried a century egg for the first time and he liked it. They taste like a boiled egg with a jelly texture and a slightly acidic and bitter aftertaste. (I've tried them before. They are not bad, although not my favorite food)

the eggs are preserved in a mixture of clay, ash, salt, quicklime and rice hulls for weeks or moths

our first snack in Fenqihu; it was like a doughnut shaped croissant

eating the famous Fenqihu lunch box (bento) with chicken and chicken and pork

Fenqihu Station

 

 

Trying tree tomato juice. Its pretty good. A little sour and sweet

Dessert/Snack: some kind of ice cream burrito, with vanilla ice cream, shaved peanut brittle and cilantro all rolled up in a paper thin crepe; it's called huāshēng juǎn bīngqílín according to the Internet

 

 

One of the trains at the station

 

our luggage

while we were in Fenqihu two trains arrived at the station that were not our train to Chiayi

Here comes our train!

At 2 pm it was time for our train ride to Chiayi. And I loved it! The track itself is amazing. Sometimes there are quite steep gradients (apparently max. 6.26 % according to Wikipedia) and the scenery changes from cedar forest to bamboo forest to palm trees and finally fields and city. The track has many twists and turns, sometimes there are steep slopes on one side of the train. There are also multiple very narrow tunnels and several bridges with great views. It's simply amazing! And the train is gorgeous. Maybe not so much from the inside, but that's okay. A thing you will notice right away is that the train swings quite a bit from side to side as it goes. At first I was a bit concerned I might get motion sickness, but it turns out to be somewhat soothing.
After a while another Chinese tourist we met earlier on the bus ride from Alishan to Fenqihu showed us some gorgeous pictures he took because he found out where the openable windows were. So we, and some Japanese tourists spent a lot of time risking our cameras and phones by taking pictures by sticking them outside the window.

here you can see a little bit how narrow the tunnel were

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

there was some kind of celebration going on on the streets of a city we passed

 

The ride takes about 2 and a half hours in total and you arrive at Chiayi TRA station.
Since we had ticket for the high speed rail to Taipei and the HSR station is quite some time away from the TRA station (which is located in Chiayi city) we took the free shuttle bus to get there. The high speed rail also is quite cool. It runs on elevated tracks and the 260 km journey between Chiayi and Taipei only lasts 1 hour and 40 min.

A snack that we bought in Fenqihu but ate later: some kind of very flaky pasty with taro filling

Another snack bought in Fenqihu: Boar meat chips

HSR station in Chiayi

Evening sky at the HSR station

High speed train

view from the train

After our arrival in Taipei (being totally exhausted from the journey) we decided to take a taxi to the hotel although it isn't too far form Taipei Main Station. We showed the driver the address and he also entered it into his navigation system and started to drive. So far so good. However, somehow at some point he took a false turn and we ended up somewhere else, so we started giving him directions from the back seat using google maps, which wasn't all that easy since he didn't speak English... And he also seemed to get a little angry. So after an additional 10 min or so we finally ended up at the right place, although, as it turns out, when he took the wrong turn we were some 100 m away from the hotel after all...
Then we arrived at our hotel. It turned out to have a self check in. At the door there was a phone and instructions to call the hotel staff with the phone and follow their instructions to get the password for the door and check in details. So we did that, with some difficulties since the speaker quality of the phone was pretty bad. They told us the code for the door and our room number and said the door to our room would be open. So far so good. But when we arrived at the room the door was closed. And we thought we could hear people inside the room...
So JJ went back down to talk to the staff via phone to tell them that there was already someone in that room.
At the same time, another young couple checked into their room which was right beside ours. For them everything seemed to have worked. Their room was open. JJ quickly came to tell me that the staff had told him something about that the staff would call the guests and tell them to return the key and that we should wait...
So he went back down, in case the staff would arrive and I stayed beside the rooms door to guard our luggage and wait if someone would come out.
At that time the newly checked in couple got busy inside their room... The walls are apparently paper thin, so standing outside waiting got a bit awkward.
After a few minutes the door to our room opened and two women came out and just left. When I told JJ about it he went back to the phone again to tell the staff. The staff just told us to wait, someone was already on their way.
After 20 min finally said staff member arrived and told us we would get another room and proceeded to request the payment. Since I was not convinced the new room would be clean, or even open, I went ahead and went to the new room to check if it was any good while JJ payed.
And as I opened the door a strong smell of cigarettes hit me. We are not smokers, and I can't stand the smell of cigarettes. Also I was quite sure that upon booking we requested a non-smoking room.
So I went back, told JJ about it, and when he entered the room he agreed with me that we couldn't stay there. So back to the phone we went...
At that point I thought all of this was like a bad sitcom.
Luckily the staff member was still somewhere in the building and he came right back and told us he would give us another room.
And finally, this room seemed nice! Clean, no cigarette smell or anything! So we left our luggage and went to get some food at the nearest convenience store, since it already was 11 pm.
After arriving back at the hotel just wanting to eat quickly and sleep we tried to open our door.
And it didn't work! We couldn't enter our room.
The staff member was doing something in the storage room next to our room and noticed our trouble and came to help us using the general key. He tried to fix the door a few minutes but nothing worked. The door seemed to be broken.
So. You probably guessed it. Another room!
...
The one right next door.
And hey, until now we stayed in that room. I will keep you updated.
The room itself seems nice enough (new, very clean, only thing is that there is no window, but that is quite normal in cheaper Taiwanese hotels) and the area is very good (right next to Ximen Station).

So as you can imagine, after eating we went right to bed.
At least we got a bit of a story to tell now.

Hope you enjoyed reading!

Pia