Yushan Part One

Rising 12,966 feet (3,952 meters) above sea level is Taiwan's highest peak: Yushan Mountain (Wikipedia). This was my goal for June 21st. Coincidentally this date is remarkable because it is the summer solstice and it is the one year anniversary of my arrival in Taiwan. I arrived just after sunrise on the 21st of June in 2009 and if everything went according to plan I would be on top of Yushan at sunrise this year.

Before I started the journey to Yushan I had to take care of some things back home. My apartment contract finished on June 19th, the same day that the hiking tour left Taipei. In the morning before the hike I packed up all my possessions and put them in a few bags that I left with Sam. After cleaning my apartment out Sam and I went to Shida to meet Ya Chu for lunch. We ate at Grandma Nitti's before we met up at the tour bus. Another apartment was available near my work in Banqiao, so I arranged it so that I could move in there after the hike.

Yushan is in the center of Taiwan. It is a long ways from Taipei. The nearest road is about 13 kilometers from the summit. On the first day of the three day tour our destination was a hostel near the trailhead for the summit. To get there we had to take a long, windy road up into the heart of Taiwan's mountains.

The road is still in poor shape from the last years Typhoon Morakot. The roads were built into extremely steep cliffs of a river basin. The drive along the mountain road lasted for several hours. Everywhere there were tell-tale signs of the destruction wreaked by previous typhoons. Cliff faces were naked of vegetation. Boulders were strewn across the river valleys. There were remnants of old roads and tunnels that had been abandoned after massive rock slides. Frequently we passed heavy duty construction machinery. Trucks full of rocks, tractors and cranes slowly plyed their way along the lonely roads. Often there were cliff faces covered with concrete to add some stability to the fragile walls of the mountains. Some of the mountains were so big that the structures to hold them up looked only like matchsticks.

We plied our way along the road higher and higher. Often there would be warning signs as the road up ahead was overflowing with the debris from a landslide. Construction crews were cleaning it up and the road would narrow to one lane. On one side of the road was the near vertical face of the mountain, on the other side there would be a steep drop of thousands of feet. It was a tense journey as we vied with intermittent construction traffic on the road up the mountain.

As we got higher and higher the temperature got cooler. We eventually became parallel to the clouds and later we could look down into the clouds and see the occasional mountain top in the sea of clouds. As the last light of dusk evaporated we reached the Tataka hostel where we'd lodge up for the night.

The accommodations here were dorm like. There were about 20 people in our group and we shared bunk beds in the hostel. In other wings of the hostel there were other groups that were also climbing the mountain. We were the only group that had any foreigners. Most of our group were Americans and Canadians. There was also a French family and a Norwegian family along with a Swiss, a Brit and a couple of Taiwanese. I played cards with Ya Chu and Josh for awhile before everyone went to bed.

Hiking

The next morning we woke up early. After packing up our gear and eating breakfast we made our way up to the trailhead. At the trailhead there was a small police station and a visitor's center. We watched a video in English that described the trail and gave basic safety advice. The official at the visitor center checked our passports then we began our hike. The trail was 8.5km and had a net gain of 900 meters in altitude. The trail was in good shape, but it was long and taxing. We officially started the trail around 8:30 am. For several hours we hiked along the slope of the mountains.

The scenery here is startlingly different than anywhere else in Taiwan. There are lush green forests. Abundantly filled with pine trees, the alpine landscape reminded me of hikes I have done in California and Oregon. The air was clean and fresh. As we went around each bend of the sinewy mountains we could take in the vista of mountains rolling into the distance. As the valleys thinned out there were clouds over the coastal plains. It was mostly a clear day and while the temperature was cool, the sun burned cruelly on any exposed skin.

We ate lunch at a shelter built about 5 kilometers up the trail. Our guides had some burners and boiled some water and made us some tea. We ate lunch box style rice with sausage and some vegetables. After a spell we packed up and got back on the trail. Higher and higher we went up the mountain. The trail snaked through forests and up steep switchbacks. Finally after several hours of patient and exhausting hiking we got to Paiyun cabin on the slopes of Yushan.

I was exhausted as I made the final steps up the stairs to the Paiyun. I headed straight for our designated dorm and dropped my pack off at the foot of my bunk bed. My head was splitting with a headache from the gain in altitude and all my limbs were sore. I felt every ounce in my pack.

Inside my backpack I carried a down coat, a bag with some snacks, warm clothes, rain gear, toiletries and a small backpack. It wasn't very much stuff but carrying along the trail was taxing enough.

We had dinner early at 5:00 pm. The plan was for us to get to bed early and wake up at 1:30 am to have breakfast and start the hike before sunrise. Every one was pretty subdued and exhausted from the day's hike. I think we were all in bed by 9 pm. Most of the evening I was wracked by my headache, so I kept mostly to myself and took more and more Tylenol until the pain went away.