Lukang

November 23, 2014

Matsu Festival!

We began the morning with a brief, shallow penetration of a nearby street market. The narrow street was amazingly congested, jammed with shoppers passing through on foot, on bicycle, on smoke-belching scooter, everyone oozing through at about a quarter mile per hour. We got a couple hundred feet in, purchased some fruit for the day (fresh cut pineapple) and worked our way back out again.

The ride to Lukang was flat, flat, flat - we logged a cumulative elevation gain of under 300', an average of about 5 feet per mile. Those few feet all came from the occasional small rise of a highway overpass. It was all pretty uninspiring - mostly on minor highways with very little traffic, but the landscape wasn't much to look at - not at all like yesterday's beautiful experience. Maybe it's just too flat, too close to the sea, and too built up.

Or maybe it was just too dirty. Even though it was Sunday morning and traffic was light, the air was quite hazy and grey; and by midday it started seeming downright unhealthy when we passed through a region where the dry stubble of the latest rice crop was shouldering. After a few too many miles of this I was wishing we had kept to my original plan and headed east into the hills around Sun Moon Lake.

The Siluo bridge over the Juoshuei River just looks endless because the other end disappears into the smog. Actually, it's only 2 kilometers long.

We came this direction to see Lukang, based on our Lonely Planet recommendation. It was once an important port city and the second city in the south until the bay silted up. Now the town is a few miles inland, dried up, and empty except for some of the best temples in the country and a well preserved old street. We hoped all this would inspire us enough to justify the dreary ride in. By evening's end though, after a wild and chaotic evening, we agreed we had just experienced one of the most magical evenings of our traveling careers.

I'm not really sure what we were witnessing, but it was remarkable. I believe it was a ritual celebration of some sort honoring the sea goddess Matsu, and was focused around the great Matsu temple here. We first came into contact when we entered the central district and happened upon a group of folks assembling and preparing for the coming festivities - testing out their instruments, marching positions and movements. We were immediately adopted by a friendly group that wanted their photos taken with us. After trading shots, one of them got a grin on his face, grabbed me, and raced down the street to catch up with a group of palanquin bearers so that he could swap me in as a bearer for another shot.

In Lukang, preparing for the Matsu festival. Rather a dour sentiment for such a bright face.

This was such a great little experience that we thought it made the whole day's ride worth it - and we hadn't even seen any sights yet. After with some difficulty and help from some folks in a 7-11 we finally found our B&B, we set out for a few hours of sight-seeing. As soon as we entered the old town though we were quickly swallowed up in a huge parade jamming the streets. We were trying to make sense of the scene and work our way into a decent spot for photography when a woman grabbed my arm and gestured for us to follow her down the alley. Off we went, following her as she ran-walked about three blocks, ending up at the entrance to Tianhua Temple, perhaps the most important Matsu temple in Taiwan. She ushered us to what would be an ideal spot to watch the festivities, smiled at us, and faded back into the crowd.

What a show! For the next hour we witnessed an amazing pagentry as one group after another reached the steps of the temple and staged some sort of ritual performance that typically included prancing around menacingly, repeatedly charging at the temple, backing off, and then either finally dashing in or retreating in apparent defeat. The cast of characters was phenomenal - demons, warriors, palanquin bearers, musicians, drummers, and amusingly even a pair of scantily dressed go go dancers with USA emblazoned across their fronts.

The sounds were amazing as well - ranks of trumpeters blaring loudly and repeatedly at the temple, drummers, and the constant explosion of huge quantities of firecrackers. It's a wonder we weren't all deafened by the end.

Blaring horns add to the incredible din at the Matsu festival, Lukang

Go-go dancer at the Matsu festival, Lukang; an interesting addition to the more traditional demons, warriors and other menaces.

Finally the procession completed and was wrapped up by a last, immense round of firecrackers, and then it all dissolved as people went inside the temple to look over the finery from the pageant and then moved on to the night market.

The street market was mobbed with revelers

But wait - there's more! About a half hour later things started up again with more pageantry, an even larger barrage of firecracker explosions, and finally a spectacular display of real fireworks, set off in the middle of the crowd about 30 feet from us. A truly unbelievable night.

Firecracker mayhem lights up the night at the Matsu festival, Lukang

At the end, it seemed as if the temple itself was ablaze

The next morning over breakfast we got a bit of background. My vague assumption that this was some sort of Matsu ritual was confirmed. We learned also that large events like this happen only a few times each year, and this one was especially large in celebration of the upcoming national elections. Pure blind luck on our part to have gotten to witness it. This alone justified the whole tour.

Today's ride: 50 miles (80 km)
Total: 741 miles (1,193 km)

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