City Riding

Every Monday and Friday I get the afternoon off work and have a nice window of free time between 12:30 and 5:00pm. The best time for city riding in Kaohsiung is from 1:30 - 4pm on weekdays when the streets are pretty quiet. Did one of my favorite KHH city rides yesterday:
Love River to the North Gate and back.

Started out from Zoying where the bike path crosses Boai road and follows the Love River. The rains from the day before had washed away the smoggy air and a nice breeze was keeping temperatures around 24 degrees.

The bike path along the river is quite narrow, so I usually just stay on the road as it's nice and wide and not very busy.

An octagonal smokstack of the Jhongdu Tangrong Brick Kiln next to the river.
Closed in 1992, it once produced 3 million brick tiles a month.

Nice to be on the bicycle bridge away from this traffic snarl on Wufu road.

The ferry over to Fisherman's Warf on Chijin island was busy.

The Takao Railway Museum has some old steam locomotives and is now a popular spot for flying kites on the weekends.

Just before you get to the British Consolate's parking lot, a little lane on the left takes you up through the old North Gate to a newly built observation platform. I usually stop and get a drink across the street to enjoy while I sit and watch the boats come in and out of the harbour.

The best rest spot in the city.

A harbour pilot hard at work.

I tried to imagine Ang Lee sitting here after reading this in the Taipei Times the other day:

            "During my mandatory two-year military service for Taiwan's armed forces,
             I was stationed in Kaohsiung's harbor area. Looking at the sea every day,
             it gave me free reign to dream my dreams and develop a limitless imagination,
             so it feels good to be back here." Ang Lee

The late afternoon light always makes for great photos at the harbour.

Route Map
Distance: 21km

Good Reviews

More and more people seem to be discovering what those of us lucky enough to live and cycle here already knew; Taiwan is a great place to tour by bicycle.

The National:
Top 10: See the world on two wheels with the best cycling holidays
"Taiwan remains an unsung cycling destination"

WorldBiking:
Why Taiwan Deserves a Spot on Lonely Planet's Top 10

The Hungry Cyclist:
The Hungry Cyclist in Taiwan

Amazing Photo Collection

Torrential rain all weekend in Kaohsiung - time to get busy in the workshop if I'm gonna make it to work on Monday.

 This photo is from Bangkok during the floods last year.

To see the rest of the amazing 48 photos in this collection go to Boston.com

Orchard Alley

Did something really foolish yesterday - turned my phone to vibrate while in the bookstore and never changed it back so it could wake me up for my ride this morning. But, with all the missed rides recently due to rain, I wasn't about to cancel a ride just because of a late start. So, in the blazing 9am sun, I set off for a ride down Orchard Alley.

Things were pretty busy when I got off at Ciaotou Sugar Refinery MRT Station with a second hand market going on.

There was also an unusually large number of cyclists on my route today. Seems there was some sort of big group ride going on that had started in downtown KHH and was going to circle the reservoir and then back again.

They went left and I went right in search of a quieter road with a little more shade. Country road #40 was the answer.

This took me down to major highway 22. Then went east on the 22 for a couple of km to the KUAS campus, which is where you turn south again and enter Orchard Alley. The ridge in the background was shielding me from the chaos that is Fo Guan Shan Temple on a Sunday.

As you can see by the shadows on the road, the sun was all but directly overhead by 10:30 a.m. and it was getting rather hot. This quiet road is wonderful riding though, despite the heat.

Being of seafairing stock, my knowlege of farming is limited to say the least. So, when I saw this cactus being grown in rows, I wasn't sure what to make of it. A quick search with Google revealed it to be a Pitaya cactus or Dragonfruit tree. It should start to bear fruit next month I think.

Then came across this odd structure. An abandoned amusement park from days gone by?

A little further along, my quiet lane came to an end and I was thrust out in front of E-Da World. When will this monstrosity get abandoned? I would normally turn left here and drift down the hill to the Goaping river and enter the city via the back side of Niaosong, but the heat was getting to me. Therefore, took a shortcut down to highway 10 and got out of the sun under the elevated highway.

Over the hill to Meinong

I reached an important marker in my training this week: 600km of base miles.

As explained at Cycling Base Miles 101:
Base miles aim to gently increase cycling specific muscle/tendon/ligament strength, build capillaries, get your butt used to saddle time and improve your cardio vascular conditioning.

At 43 years old and 125kg (now 120kg) I was a bit worried about injuring myself if I hit the hills too soon, so I made a rough plan:

a) After 600km: Begin to challenge hills under 300m
b) 1,200km: Challenge hills under 500m
c)  2,000km: Knock yourself out.

So, with 600km under my belt, I set off for my first real climb of the year:
A 240m hill en route to Meinong.

All week, when I had no time to ride, the weather was great and I started to grumble about it being another weekend of rain, lightning and thunder. But as the saying goes: "Be careful what you wish for!"

At 6:30am when I left the house it was already pretty warm. At 7:30am when I stopped for a drink in Yanchiao it was a getting a bit hot. I passed a farm woman riding a bike with her body covered from head to toe and thought to myself:  "Lady, do you know something I don't?"
To which she of course answered in her best Benicio Del Toro as Freddy Four Fingers accent:
"Andy, I probably know a lot you don't."

At the 3-way hub in central Yanchiao where I like to stop at the Family Mart for a drink. With a temple on one corner, fruit and vegetable market on another and a convenience store it's quite a busy spot.

Before you actually get to the real climb though, there are about 6 short but steep hills that give you a taste of what's to come so that you can chicken out and take the easier route modify your route if need be. The first of these climbs takes you right in front of Cock’s Comb Mountain.

Though not a very long climb ( about 2.5km ) the grades were very steep. I just couldn't find a gear low enough to prevent myself from getting winded. I know Rule#69: It is strictly prohibited that under any circumstances a cyclist should walk up a steep incline. Luckily, my will to live is stronger than my pride, so I hoofed it up a few of the nastier sections. Luckier still, was that no fellow cyclists came along and caught me in my moments of shame.

I was ever so glad to reach the top of this climb, but really should have studied the topographic a little more carefully - I then would have known that this camel had two humps. There's a small temple at the top of the second peak with a nice rest area. Met a group of 4 oldtimers taking a break there, who had brought along with them a full sized tea kettle and campstove and proceeded to whip up some lao ren cha; one of those very pleasant little surprises that make riding in Taiwan so enjoyable.

A quick descent brought me down to highway 21 where I proceeded north for 10 minutes to the bridge at highway 28 and turned right.

By the time I finished grabbing something to eat in Meinong it was already 10:30am and I couldn't stop visualizing the mountains on the north end of town as being the lip on a giant frying pan. Decided to leave exploring Meinong to another day and caught the bus back into KHH.

Ocean View

Finally made it down to my local bike shop today and got the broken spoke on my Kona fixed. Didn't have a lot of time left after the repair, so headed out to JungShan University.

The road along the ocean on the back side of Monkey Mt. is one of my favorite KHH city rides. It's a narrow, winding road with no shoulder, that sees a lot of traffic on the weekend. But at 3pm on Friday afternoon, it's great!

The weather forcast said there was a 60% chance of rain today, but the skies were nice and blue all afternoon. I always stop to enjoy the view from the top of the climb looking back at the university and the entrance to KHH harbour.

Looking north from the same point you can see the red umbrellas at Escape 41 down by the water.

I Need a New Bike

I think I need a new bike. Well maybe not need, but would like a new bike. No, I need a new bike.
I have three bikes now and each has its purpose:

1) road bike     2) mountain bike     3) touring bike (modified Kona MTB)

The problem is, that all of these bikes are too nice to safely leave locked anywhere. I need a city bike to run errands with that I can leave parked out of sight for hours at a time, without having to worry about it.

Ideally, I would like something like this:

I suspect this bike is still too nice for my needs; it's nice though.
Looks far to similar to the bike stolen in this news story from Chiayi: stolen bike

Back in Victoria, a good friend of mine swore by his trusty Road King girl's 5-speed as his downtown bike of choice.

Can you believe the cheek?  Selling this bike for $150CDN ($4,500NT) SOLD! Unbelievable.

I don't know which would be hurt more by this bike - my ego or my wallet? I don't have near as many tatoos as my friend does.

Amah, ni de jiǎo tà chē - duōshǎo qián?

Will have to make a trip down to the 2nd hand bike shop on Friday and see what they've got for me.

Island Getaway

The temperature really shot up this week, so I decided to combine a bike ride with some snorkling. The closest decent beaches to KHH are on Hsiao Liu Chiu (Xiao Liuqiu) island, so I hopped on the MRT early Saturday morning and travelled east to the last station: Daliao.

The convenient elevator at KHH Arena station near my house.

Ready for a day at the beach with flippers in tow.

Not many people ride to the end of the line.

Exiting Daliao station and turning left, you travel south for about 300m and turn left again at a T-intersection and follow this road all the way east to the Gaoping River. Then cross Highway 21 and get up on top of the dyke and ride the bikepath along the river all the way south to Lingyuan.

Riding south on the dyke.

One of the few bits of shade to stop for a drink on this ride.

The new bridge across the Gaoping river on highway 17 has a lot more room for cyclists now.

Arrived at Donggang harbour at 10:45am and quickly boarded a boat leaving at 11:00. $380 for a return ticket + $50 extra for the bike each way.

Didn't realize there are 2 different harbours on Hsiao Liu Chiu and this boat didn't go to the main Baishawei Tourist Harbour. As I circled the island counter-clockwise, I couldn't figure out why it was taking me so long to get to the beach where I wanted to swim. The island also had a lot more hills than I remembered from when I last visited 8 years ago; I'm getting old.

Looking back toward Dafu Fishing Harbour from a viewpoint at the top of the first climb.

The famous crystal-clear waters of the island's beaches.

Houshi Skirt Reef beach had great snorkling.

The lack of cars on the island made for very good riding, with the odd tour bus to look out for on corners like this.

Arrived back in Donggang at 3:45 to be greeted by a brutal headwind for the 20km trip back to KHH. Can't say I enjoyed this portion of the ride very much and took no photos.

RIDE SUMMARY:
1) Daliao MRT - Donggang : 26km totally flat
2) Island Loop : 12km of short steep climbs (+8km when I got lost)
3) Donggang - Siogang MRT : 20km totally flat

To see this ride on Bikemap:
To Dongang and back
Island Loop