For our first walk of 2025, we decided to deviate from our normal coastal route and walk inland in a Southernly direction from XiLuo to HuWei in YunLin county. The reason for this this is that the coastal section running from FangYuan (end of Day 25) to YunLin county lacks smaller roads and the only route is along the major Western Coastal Express Way, accompanied by very heavy traffic and from previous experiences further north, we are well aware of the perils of such roads.
The day began with Elaine, Rich and Martyn traveling on the HSR from Taipei south to Changhua and Tim traveling north from Tainan to join them. Having checked the weather forecast, we were expecting a somewhat chilly day for Taiwan (Max 16C), but on meeting Tim, one would have thought we were heading to Antarctica; Fang Ding had kitted him out with all kinds of winter gear and paraphernalia just in case it started to snow….
Us Northerners (From Taipei) obviously laughed at our Southern friend’s preparations but took it all back outside the station whilst waiting for our taxi, as it really was cold (only 12C) out of the sun and the wind was quite brisk. Fortunately, once inside the taxi, we warmed up, as did the conversation and our journey began.
Changhua county is known as the Garden of Taiwan and produces the most agricultural produce in all of the Island. As we drove, we saw numerous commercial nurseries and small orchards on either side of the road and swathes of rice paddies and vegetable fields in the background. Our first stop was Taiwan Rice Castle, located in Beitou, Changhua county. The museum was established by Lianmi Inc and offers an insight into all things nice – oops RICE! No pun intended hahaha, actually though, there were puns in both the English and Mandarin signage; Know rice, know life and No rice no life, as well as the Chinese character for castle. The usual character “gu” (古) in “gu bao” (古堡) for castle had been replaced by the character “gu” (穀), meaning grain, thereby changing the meaning to “grain fortress”.
Outside the main entrance, we were greeted by a friendly employee who enthusiastically introduced us to the museum and helped take photos. There was a large poster for the character “Mi” which means rice grain in Mandarin and Rich and Elaine became the human, inedible forms of the character. The tour was on the second floor consisting of various displays showcasing rice knowledge, as well as having floor to ceiling glass windows looking out onto the rice processing and packing facility on the ground floor.
Descending back to the first floor, we entered a vast retail space selling a myriad of rice products including rice bath milk, rice cosmetics, rice cakes, rice-related supplies and various other food items, including ice cream, peanut sugar and local snacks.
Obviously, we had to partake in some food tasting after which Tim and Rich bought a couple of packets of local biscuits for sustenance on our walk. Outside the building there was a stall selling glasses (typical for a rice factory??) and spotting another retail opportunity, Elaine and Tim bought 3 pairs of ‘old age specs’ each – the vendor was so appreciative of the great start to his day’s business that he gave a free pair to them both – only in Taiwan!
After a quick 10 minute taxi ride, we arrived at the Nine Dragons Banyan tree located on the embankment of the ZhuoShui river in Tiantou village, Zhutang township. This century old tree spans an area of more than 3,000 square meters and its numerous branches have become so intertwined, that locals say it looks like it can fly and so named it the “JiuLong” (Nine Dragons) Banyan Tree. The Nine Dragons being well known characters in Chinese mythology and supposedly possessing magical powers in the human world.
In times gone by, this wonderful Banyan acted as a beacon for local residents crossing the ZhuoShui river and overtime a number of small Buddhist shrines have been erected under its expansive branches, as well as an outdoor KTV area and local eateries serving traditional dishes such as oyster noodles and clam soup. It was too early for us to try these, but Tim did check out the ‘other’ facilities and reported an excess of 50 urinals in the male toilets. As we were the only tourists there, we were unsure as to whether these facilities were built for male mortals or perhaps the sons of the nine dragons and their mythological, flying friends?
Tim also came up with a little ditty about the Banyan tree, that he danced and sung in tribute to Dick Van Dyke’s rendition of “Me Ol’ Bamboo” in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
The Old Banyan, The Old Banyan,
You’d better never bother with me Old Banyan,
You can have my xi gua or my lu rou fan,
But you’d better never bother with my old Banyan
Erm………..let’s file that under the “Only Tim” category.
Our observant dear readers may have noticed by now that we have yet to start our walk – well done for those of you who have spotted our lack of human movement ! The reason for this is whilst planning this walk, we had a couple of discussions as to what would be the best route and in order to make the walk slightly more interesting and hopefully more enjoyable, we decided to start the day as ‘real tourists’ and take in some of the local points of interest. So, having seen a couple of Changhua’s finest tourist hotspots, it was back into the taxi and off to XiLuo via Taiwan’s largest spanning iron bridge.
This bright red iron bridge, spanning a length of 1,939.03 meters with 31 arches has an intriguing history; on March 24th, 1936, the locals set up a committee to construct a bridge over the Zhuoshui river, pledging the construction to the then Japanese Government and work began in October 1937. As of March 1940, 32 piers had been completed, however, construction was suspended after the outbreak of war against the United States on December 7th, 1941 and the Japanese government moved the materials for the bridge to Hainan island in China.
Following the retreat of the Chinese Nationalists to Taiwan, the Xiluo Bridge Reconstruction Committee was established in 1948. In January 1950, personnel from the Taiwan Provincial Government, legislators, engineers from the Economic Cooperation Administration and the Council for United States (US) Aids conducted a site survey to finalise the bridge and in 1951, the US Government spent US$1.3 million for the steel material and the Taiwan Provincial Government also provided NT$6 million for the project completion.
The Taiwan Machinery Manufacturing Corporation and the Mechanical Engineering Department of the Ministry of Economic affairs were in charge of the bridge erection and painting projects respectively. The construction of the bridge resumed in May 1952 and was completed on Christmas Day the same year, with the inauguration ceremony of the bridge being held on January 24th, 1953. So, in short, the bridge was devised by the Taiwanese, started by the Japanese and completed by the Americans and Chinese and is now used by the Taiwanese and the occasional British Nationals. Basically, it’s a long, old bridge in a small world…..
Arriving in XiLuo, we were immediately impressed by the old merchant houses and the magnificent Fusing Mazu Temple. The original temple dates back to 1717 and is referred to as the “TaiPing Ma” or Peace Ma (MaZu) Temple, for its role in offering sanctuary to the officers and soldiers involved in the Lin Shuangwen incident in 1786 and each October this temple hosts a huge ceremony, attracting hundreds of worshippers, to thank the Goddess Mazu for the year’s harvest and her continued protection of the Zhuoshui river.
XiLuo Old Street has some unusually well preserved shop houses and it was a nice start to our walk to pass through a segment of Taiwan’s former history. The local school was built by the Japanese at the beginning of the 20th century and prides itself in being the only elementary school to offer a course in “black beans” . It was also interesting to note that the tallest building in the area was the Farmers Association, owing to the importance of rice, black beans and fruit and vegetables cultivated in this area.
By now the sun was shining and in preparation for the journey ahead, we had a quick pit stop at a 7-11 and then headed towards a local soy sauce factory to see the famous black beans for ourselves.
We transversed the HSR line for one of the numerous times on this journey and on arriving at YuDingXing handmade soy sauce company we were somewhat surprised by the large number of bicycles and children outside the modest building which housed the soy sauce factory. It turned out that a group of school children on a five day cycle ride around central Taiwan had just finished their tour and lunch. Our entrance caused a flutter of excitement amongst the children, who all had to shout out “hello” and “how are you?” before we were approached by a young man asking if we wanted a tour. Of course, we said “yes” and were extremely impressed with our guide, Ozzie Hsieh. He is a third generation soy sauce producer and gave us an in depth tour of the facility.
It was fascinating to learn exactly how soy sauce is made using the traditional wood fired method and it was heartening to experience the enthusiasm and dedication applied by Ozzie and his brother to this ancient condiment.
with wheat and mould spores and the resulting mixture is referred to as “ koji “.
Leaving the aroma of the sauce behind, we came across a traditional Tofu skin maker, before continuing south, passing through what looked like a green mesh sea, made up from the netting used to protect the various vegetables and fruit. Water irrigation channels ran along the side of the roads and every now and then larger buildings appeared; a district branch of the Changhua Christian Hospital, a produce distribution facility, with two huge piles of onions and ginger outside and a petrol tank factory to name a few. These were somewhat incongruous dotted amongst old “san he yuan’ houses, temples and various abandoned lots.
It was time for another pitstop at the local HiLife. We sat outside in the sunshine and were entertained by the sight of an “everything truck”. These vans were once a common sight on the streets of Taiwan, but with the advent of ‘everything available online’, have seen a sharp demise. We waved and maybe as a result of seeing four non Taiwanese, the driver immediately started to loudly play the Bee Gees’ “How deep is your love?” through the van’s external speakers. It felt like being back in an 80’s disco and certainly put an extra spring in our steps!
Energised by our snacks and the musical outburst we proceeded towards HuWei, passing through tracts of fallow land with crops left to seed and various “chairs of Taiwan” lying elegantly on the roadsides.
Our walks tend not to be complete without “NFT” or ‘Normal for Taiwan’ moments, and not to disappoint today’s NFT was the little hamlet of BanZai, resplendent with wall murals depicting various scenes ranging from Harry Potter to African animals to farming, as well as a lantern shaped like an ox and some other cutesy works. This all proved a bit much for Tim and he was forced to indulge in the notorious Taiwan chewing gum, aka BinLang or Betel nut. The shop owner and the driver of an old farm vehicle were totally bemused by our presence and for them, it was definitely not an NFT moment.
We were now on the last leg of the walk and again passed under the HSR line heading for the YuanLin branch of National Taiwan University campus. According to the map, there was a route through the campus and on into HuWei. However, having crossed halfway through, we realised that the campus was still under construction and hitting an iron wall, had to back track to the main road. Checking Google, we were relieved to see there was an actual road running parallel to our previous path and under the setting sun, we marched forward. We did think it was rather strange that we were the only people on the road and reaching the end, we discovered why – the road had yet to be opened. It would have been too much of a detour to go back, so we ingeniously found our way out and back onto the open road.
Daylight was just fading as we arrived in HuWei and in contrast to the road less travelled through the unopened campus, the main thoroughfare was bustling with traffic and pedestrians. It was Friday night and the highlight of the week for many small towns in rural Taiwan, is the ubiquitous night market. We were tired and hungry so with one last temple to visit before dinner, we were once again entertained by Tim with his “Taming the Tiger” Hung Gar Kung Fu form.
Leaving the TianHou temple we tiredly wandered towards our chosen restaurant. We had done almost 24 kilometers and our feet were tired and we were all hungry and thirsty. After a little bit of confusion regarding where we were eating, we finally found the Hong Chang Wang restaurant and gladly sat down for our dinner. Another great day Walking Taiwan.
Total Distance Walked Today 23km.
Distance Walked in Total 513.2km.
End of Day 26. By Elaine Salt.
The above route shows our journey via taxi from the Rice Museum to the Banyan Tree and on to XiLuo Old Street.
The above route shows our journey on foot from Xiluo Old Street to Huwei.
The above map shows how far we’ve covered in total.