January 22, 2022
January 22nd
Changhua with g
I know it's winter, but it's been a cool and wet here recently and as Chinese New Year is fast approaching, most of my time has been spent at home plotting a quiet route that meanders around the less visited counties of Changhua and Yunlin. It'll be good to escape for a few days before the holiday rush begins at the very end of January and my Canadian friend g is taking a few days off too and coming along for the ride, while Debbie sadly will still be at work.
An express train departs at just gone 9 o'clock and it only takes two hours to get south to Changhua City. It's a new one that allows bikes onboard and the fare with the bike is a pretty reasonable NT$500 - roughly US$15.
The problem is the weather.
It's been raining consistently for a couple of days now and the weekend forecast predicts more of the same. During the night it was so heavy it woke me up, so before setting off for the train station, I don some Nike nylon jogging bottoms that I bought roughly 20 years ago, but have seldom worn. My shoes get enclosed in zip-up spats that are over 30 years old - they don't owe me a penny - and an orange cape will hopefully seal the deal on the roughly 15-minute ride. The rear panniers also get rain covers fitted. I'll just grin and bear it.
It's a relatively short but damp experience and hopefully things improve, as cycling for a few days in the rain is not my idea of fun.
The bike carriage is the very last one of 12 and g is already onboard when it pulls in - he lives near the station just north of mine. He's relieved to see me wheel my bike into the carriage, what with the rain obviously making our tour doubtful.
There are about half a dozen bikes hanging up on a rack and a two are expensive road machines whose owners are decked out in sleek Rapha gear. My bike gets strapped securely in place opposite g's and we soon decide to swap our single seats for an empty pair so we can chat more easily.
He gets to see screen shots saved onto a 7" tablet and we discuss where to go sightseeing in the city before riding about 20 km west to the historic town of Lukang. There are a few places not too far from the station and as the train speeds its way south, the rain eases off and our optimism for better weather increases. This is to be expected, because although Taiwan is quite small, the central and southern parts are generally warmer and drier.
A young women boards after an hour and she gestures that one of us is in her seat and it only occurs to me to get her to swap for mine once we're sat down again.
My spats come off and it's disappointing to see they didn't work at all well at keeping my shoes dry on the short ride to the station. Maybe they'll get binned.
Omicron arrived recently and the government has re-imposed restrictions that state masks have to be worn on buses and trains, and nobody is allowed to eat or drink while on board. Two hours is manageable, but coffee is needed once we arrive at Changhua.
There's a Cama coffee shop just a block away and that's where we ride and spend 20-odd minutes chilling out. It's still only just gone 11 o'clock and we're in no rush. There's plenty of time before the sun goes at six.
It feels warm now and my merino top comes off and on goes an orange short-sleeved one.
There are various old temples in the city and the first up - Kaihua Temple - is only a minute away and a women in her sixties is sat near the entrance selling small, fragrant flowers that are said to bring luck. She's happy to have her photo taken. Inside there's a shrine dedicated to a mysterious couple (Lord and Lady Pox) who are said to have developed a cure for smallpox, but we skip that and ride east along busy Route 19 for a couple more minutes.
The local Temple of Confucius is much bigger, but what's visible from the road is deceptive, with most of the complex hidden behind imposing doors. As we get there the sun comes out in miraculous fashion and we pose for a self-timed photo.
While the temple dates back to the 1720s, the large wooden front doors are not an original part of the complex and to get to that means riding around to a side entrance. There are only a couple of other visitors walking around.
Route 19 soon takes us under a square arch and a sign then points left to 'Great Buddha Scenic Area'. It's a steep road and we spin away in our lowest gears for a few minutes, working up a sweat.
The sun has gone behind clouds and the sky is overcast, but humidity is high.
We make it up to a huge statue of a cross-legged Buddha that looks out over the city from an elevated spot. The city looks endless - literally - from a semi-circular viewing platform and riding out of town doesn't seem like a particularly nice thing to do. Hopefully it's not as bad as it appears.
After dropping back down the bendy hill to Route 19, we call at a Japanese building and wander around the back. A man comes out of an adjacent wooden villa and tells me it's a restaurant and it certainly looks more interesting than the Subway we passed earlier, so g and I opt to give it a try. They serve chicken curry and we have that along with two pots of green tea.
Retracing our tracks along the 19 takes us back past the train station and we then search for a nearby roundhouse. Built by the Japanese in the 1920s, it's the only one left in Taiwan. There used to be five.
My screenshot confuses me and it's not until g consults Google Maps on his phone that we realize the place is actually on the other side of the rail tracks.
After riding through an underpass, we leave our bikes just inside the entrance area as instructed by a security guy and walk around to reach the core of the roundhouse. It's a surprise to find quite a few tourists milling around. It is Saturday.
Some old steam engines are parked up along with a few orange and yellow diesel ones. The big, circular turntable is where trains would have been rotated and a curved building borders about a quarter of the central area and houses a few more locomotives.
It's a shame the sun has gone as my snaps look a bit flat and 10 minutes is enough.
We consult a few screenshots as we make our way west down a nearby street that's lined with light industry.
My planning comes unstuck when a screenshot leads us to a dead-end, so we ride to a main road and follow that and try to get back on track, but fail. After 10 minutes of aggravation, we find our location on g's phone, then make our way to my planned route west to Lukang.
Progress is quite slow but OK and we weave left and right at regular intervals, passing occasional workshops and warehouses. There's the noise of what sound like heavy machines stamping sheets of metal followed by the tickling of pieces falling into drums. Who knows what obscure parts these places are making. There are no people around. It all reminds me of Detroit.
About half way to Lukang we get to a junction with Route 135 and there's an 85°C coffee shop close by and we decide to call in for a short break. I think I order small lattes, but the guy makes two big ones and my chocolate cake appears to be a character from some recent movie. It has one eye.
When we glance out the large window people are holding umbrellas and drops are splashing into puddles, so g looks at a radar image on his phone and it shows rain will be falling for a while. This is not what we want.
It's about 4:30 and our rain gear gets pulled out and I find a couple of plastic bags to slip on my feet, under the old spats, and after riding down a side street, we make a rural beeline towards Lukang.
When I edited the screenshots my imagination conjured up an image of us cruising into the historic quarter of town, with time to spare on a sunny afternoon to pick a nice place to sleep. How wrong that was.
The rain is persistent and the wind becomes strong, blowing from the right, and my cape isn't much use with my side getting soaked. It feels cold and it's getting dark and these rainy 10 km into Lukang are unpleasant.
There's a decent hotel near a Starbucks and we try to locate it, but miss the junction and end up riding in a convoluted loop, wasting about 10 minutes and getting extra wet and increasingly frustrated.
Eventually we get there looking like a couple of drowned rats. It's a bit swanky and the rate is not cheap - NT$3,200 - but we're not riding any more today and our bikes get wheeled into the foyer to dry out.
We just hope tomorrow's weather is better, otherwise this will be a short tour.
Today's ride: 20 km (12 miles)
Total: 1,206 km (749 miles)
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