We got up relatively early and went hunting for some fruit. We found a stall with ladies selling mangos. Christine tried to buy one mango, but the ladies insisted that it was 3 mangos for 100NT, then they gave her two extra for free, so we ended up with a truck load of enormous delicious mangos. Most of the shops were still closed, so we bought some milk from from the 7 – 11 and then went back to the accomodation to have breakfast. 

The heavens opened up with a torrential down pour while we were eating breakfast. We waited out the rain by writing in our journals and doing our Duolingo. Once the rain abated I doubled Scotty down to the bike shop to collect his scooter. Again this was a simple process, the lady copied his international licence, took the money and issued Scotty with a motorbike. 

With our new found freedom we headed for the surf break at Jialeshui beach where we had surfed yesterday. When we arrived we found that the rain over the past 12 hours had made the water muddy and uninviting. This combined with the teeming rain made the thought of going for a surf a little unpalatable. We decided to try for a path through the mountains and back to Hengchun. We hadn’t gone very far when we came across a gate where they wanted 60NT to gain access to a national park. We decided that this probably wasn’t the path that we were looking for so we tried going through the village full of white houses that overlooks Jialeshui beach. This ended up being another dead end. We decided to go on another route that would take us out to the light house and around to where the Kenting night markets were held.

This was a winner, we met some great people and saw some spectacular scenery on our journey we flew the drone out at a few points so that we could capture some of the incredible scenery. We slowly worked our way around the coast road stopping to take in some fantastic sights along the way. We eventually ended up back where the Kenting night markets were held and had lunch at the Thai place at the top of the hill. The restaurant had some Latin beats pumping that we were able to dace salsa to. The food actually wasn’t that great and gave us nightmares indicating that they may have used MSG in some of the dishes. 

We rode back to the accomodation and chilled out for the afternoon. A bit later Christine and I went to get some food for dinner and some fruit for breakfast. We bought Dragon fruit, bananas, some potato, broccoli, carrots, onion and some pork meat. 

We went with Scotty to drop the bikes off to our bike lady. I had a go at explaining our day to her in Chinese, I think I was able to convey a fair bit of it. I was only lacking the words for dirty water and light house but otherwise I think I was able to get the chain of events across. 

Scotty headed off to a nearby restaurant while we went back to cook our dinner. The kitchen at the accomodation was very basic. The cutting board looked like it may have belonged to one of the workers who built the accomodation back in the day. The dish cloths may have been the original ones from the time the accomodation still operated as a hotel. There was a nice big gas cook top, but there wasn’t any gas. We used the electric cook top that was sitting on top of the microwave, to use it we needed to unplug the microwave, I think it had two settings, off and flat out. There were two pans, some oil and a few basic implements, a spatula was not one of them. I boiled the vegetables and then fried off the garlic with the chilli. I cooked the pork, drained the vegetables and then fried off everything together. Christine made up a bowl of fruit for us to enjoy while we were cooking dinner. The fruit was juicy, sweet and delicious. Dinner was delicious, I ended up brazing the pan and using this as a sauce to go over the food, this also made cleaning the pot a lot easier. 

Taiwan Day 10 Kaohsiung

We got up relatively early, showered and cooked breakfast in preparation for the day. We had a bit of time until the drive arrived to take us to Kaohsiung, so I used the time to jot down some notes for our blog posts. When the driver arrived he was surprised to see five passengers. We had ordered a vehicle for 5 people, however it would turn out that this included the driver, so of course  this bloke wanted more money. 

When we had a look back over the records we found that we had paid just over half of the fee that it had cost to come to Kenting, as such the driver was requesting the extra fee for a large van, it was just lucky that he had turned up with a large van. 

Having just dealt with the first driver, and then the owner of the accomodation I was becoming a little short with people who were asking for extra money after the deal had been done. As such I was a little short with the driver, but never the less I paid his extra money so we could get rolling while Christine did some checking to see what was going on and unearthed the fact that we had indeed hired a small vehicle for the return trip. I calmed down once I realised that even with the extra charge we had paid the same fee as the one we had paid to come to Kenting. 

The trip back to Kaohsiung was smooth and this time the windows were not as tinted so we were able to check out the views a little better. A tropical storm was brewing up and this was stirring up the ocean on the west coast of the island, so we were looking at rideable waves in the sections where we could see the ocean. 

The driver dropped us to the hotel, which wasn’t that far from Fermosa Blvd where we had stayed previously. We left our bags at reception and set off to check out Cijin Island, a short ferry ride from the harbour. Cassian and Nicole hopped on the high speed rail and headed up to one of the cities that we had skipped on the way down. The high speed rail makes all of the west coast really accessible. Christine, Scott and I hopped on the subway and went out to a station near the harbour, we collected bikes and rode to the ferry terminal.

We caught the 12:00 pm ferry and about 5 minutes later we were on Cijin Island. We stepped off the ferry and into a bustling market that was taking place along the dock. We wandered through the market and found a beach side bar restaurant called Cijin Sunset Bar where we could have some lunch. Christine and I ordered a couple of burgers with chips and salad. The bloke working at the bar had lived in Australia, in Browns plains of all places, back in 2020 when the COVID pandemic caused him to cut his adventures short and more back to Taiwan. Thanks to his stay in Australia and his subsequent work with foreign tourists, his English was really good. 

After lunch we wandered up to check out Qihou Fort, that had been built to keep an eye on the Japanese who had been causing some mischief and was just a bit further along the beach. The beach had been roped off due to the tropical storm that was rapidly developing into a typhoon. This is probably why we were so easily able to get a table at the Cijin Sunset Bar. I imagine that if the conditions had been good the bar would have been standing room only. Another interesting thing is that on a good day you can surf at the Cijin Beach, there were rental boards everywhere. 

From the top of the fort we were looking at a super colourful village that would not have looked out of place in one of the Latin American countries like Puerto Rico. We took some photos and videos before making our way back to the ferry terminal. It had started raining a little by the time we arrived back at the harbour. 

Shortly after the rain abated a bit and we were able to ride back to the hotel. The ride was flat and due to the cloud cover and occasional misty rain it was quite comfortable. Our track took us through a district that had a stack of street art and painted buildings. Back at the hotel we were able to check in and do some washing. 

In the evening Christine and I took our hire bikes and rode back to the Loco Mexican restaurant for dinner. The food was delicious and inexpensive and the lady manning the counter was interested, or at least did a great job of acting interested, in hearing of our adventures in Kenting. After dinner we rode back to the hotel through the bustling Kaohsiung streets.