johansvennung(臺灣)

I ate some food in yilan, since people said there are not that many stores up in the mountains...

We were suppose to walk for 3-4 days...so we needed to buy alot of food...

The we went on a local bus taking us up to wuling...

It was rainy weather, and we couldnt really see that much...but the road went up hill, I like the mountains in taiwan...

They had a lot of farms and plantage along the road...

Dont know if the bus driver was payed to do it, but we always made a stop at a local store in a small village in the mountains...

I bought some local egg...and steam bun...

Then we came to the park entrance, and we had to pay 100nt per person to enter..

We met a professional guy who made us change our route...

We had to take a car another 5km from where the bus dropped us of...and our new friends helped us arrange a driver and car...

I also saw some signs telling which snakes that were common in the park...

And a map over the park...next time I will walk to hsinchu from here...

We had a chat with our friends, who were waiting for some other friends. initially we were suppose to wait here in wuling until tomorrow and start our hike, since our permit started from tomorrow morning, but our friends, told us to wait until 17, when the ranger station close, then we just leave our persmit in a postbox and enter, some day before...

He alo gave us some cherries...while inspiriing us to join him...

Vlad thought that the berries were a little to bitter...

We started to walk for a while, since the friends that we were waiting for were delayed...

it was raining a little, but i didnt want to put on any rainsuit, i would just sweat to death...

We were offered a car to take us further up the hill to the ranger station...

It was small, and we were 7 people, so our taiwanese freinds squeezed in the trunk...

It was steep and many busses went on this crappy road...we met some of them...it was creepy how narrow road it was...

We dumped some papers that our friends recommended us to dump in the post box...(we left to many papers, we found out later...)

The path had stairs, it was a 40 mins walk to the destination of the day...so interesting, the taiwanese ppl always say atleast 2 or 3 times longer that it acctually is...

We decided to sleep in this cabin, called Qika hut...

they had electricity but it was turned of at 21.30, and alot of mice running around...

We initiallly never planned to stayin this hut, however there were spaces left here (one reason ppl need ta permit is that they need to prebook beds in the hut, and only ppl who can prove that they can walk on a mountain may use tent...its kind of silly, but it is how it works...)

Here are my team mates...the first rainy night...on the first hut (there are totally 2 cabins on the way to the top)...

We were suppose to start at 3 am the day after...I was bored at this hut, since it went faster than expected, so i opened my rum from Bhutan to end up my miseries...

Each hut has some rangers watching it...this guy, whowas super drunk was the host of this cabin...(it turned out that this guy ws not a ranger, he was just a portier, who pretended, offering us sleeping bag for 200nt, and he took my tent)

He pretended to kill a mouse with my water bottle, but later on he said "its my friend" and let the mouse walk away in the room were were sleeping in...

He was telling stories and treating us rice wine...

The cup we drank from was a little broken, so we had to hurry up to finish it...

He gave us more and more...(when calling the park administration, they told us that they dont know this guy, ifi return to this place...I will b far more suspicios about local rangers...and ask for ID from every one of them)

After a while our taiwanese friends friends arrived, they took car from Taizhong...and they told us they were going the same route we originally planned. however, by some reason we changed it so just go to the top and back...I also planned to swim in the lake, that was taiwanes highest..

I was recommended to leave my tent here since we would not need it if we were suppose to go back the day after...(u know the story)

They ranger put it in his room and said it was safe...I never saw my tent after that...they stole it... :(

I also treated our friends friends some Bhutan rum...they were really nice...

They boiled some water here in the kitchen of the hut...I guess if we were making a longer route, we would also bring equipment to boil water...even though I think its drinkable on the creeks uphill as well...

From this moment, my camera broke...so some times I borrowed my friends camera...

We were served noodles from your friends...

We left form the Qika hut super early, like 3-4 in the morning...and reached the next hut "369" about 2 hours later...where people were still sleeping...

They had a sign of common animals...I felt likehome...where I often encounter deers and elks...

They had a kitchen where the rangers and visitors were cooking food, I think they got free gas from the high tech toilet that generated gas from the shit...

I was filling up some water...from the aluminium bottles...it tasted a little aluminium aswell...

It was super foggy this day...however, people said that it was an awesome view from here on normal days...

Our friend was talking to some kids, who didnt want to walk further, they were waiting for their classmates to come back from the peak...

We could see some blue sky...but just some small fragments...

My friend Vlad reached the top around 10, I was some minute after...

Walking in the fogg, it was interesting, they had alot of information signs...on the path up...

I felt like Frodo, walking in mordor...

Finally I reached the peak...faster than expected...thats why I wanna go back, walkingall the way to or from Hsinchu...

We coniued to walk further, in order to find taiwans higest lake...since I was walking in my swimming outfit...I wanted to take a swim up there...

We walked on on a steep path...taking us downhill...some where...

I had alot of swimming equipment in my tennis bag...

I wsa maybe not "100%" fitted by the book, but I was still wearing a "fältmässig" outfit, for a civilian...

We found a path back to the cabin "369" but didnt know if it was the same as where we came from..so we walked back to the top, finind the real path, but then it was raining heavily, soi we decided to walk back...

I was hesitating and joined some other people back up on the top a third time, but realized that its safer not to walk to the lake alotm since it was slippery and steep...

I went back to the hut where I met my friend, and suggested to continue downhill...however after some discussion we stayed in this hut...

When we came to the hut, our old taiwanese friend were taking a nap...

We knew we had to wait here until tomorrow...and it was about 1-2 pm...

We started to walk back early the day after as well...

We planned to see the sunraise at the east peak, it is on the way back to wuling where we started...

It was a very clear day...we kind of picked the worng day to climb...even if, by rumors, it was uppose to be bad weather today aswell...

We could now see many other peaks...

We could now also see the "369" cabin and the peak of Xueshan...

Here is the team "hunter", every application needed a name...and our group was named "hunter"...

When you are on a 3000+ mountain in Taiwan, you can often see most of the other high peaks...

I saw Hehuanshan, the mountain that I climbed 2 years go with the NCTU mountain climbing club...

I also saw the cool village I saw from Hehuan shan...that I wanted to visit...where it might be snow eery winter...thus the houses looks like home...or something...

After this peak visit, we coninued downhill...

We went down to Gika hut to pick up my tent...this is the guy who slept in the rangers room...dont know f he is a ranger...since the regulation here is chaotic...random guys sleeps everywhere apparently...

...and FUCK!!! my tent is gone, the tai guy who acted like a ranger stole it! If i come back here, I might empty the palce on sleeping bags and equipment for the same value as I evaluate my tent!

Just some 30 minutes later, e came back to the park entrance...where they had a pool...

We needed a car from here, like last time...and our old friend made a phone call to one of the other taiwanese friends, who rushed down to us to give us a lift to the bus, that we thought might leave in some hour...

Even from here it was a great view.

And on the way to the bus stop, we passed alot of tea plantage...

And from the bus we went to Yilan, then taipei and back to Hsinchu...some day earlier than planned...

It was fun and I want to go back to the mountains, its a big contrast compare to the citites...

However, I got disapointed with the taiwanese national park authorities...since I can easily climb the highest mountain "yushan" in one day, its said to be easier that xueshan...however they still force you to apply for some permit, even if i wont use a hut...

due to the limited space in tha cabins that i apparently never will use...they always treat people like kids in this country... :S

But neverthe less...