Hualien

Okay, I know I've been lazy about posting pics from Hualien and Taroko gorge like I said I was going to. I'm sorry. I get all wrapped up in wanting to tell the story about what happened where and then I get overwhelmed and don't do it at all. So I'm going to try the breaking it into chunks method.

We took a train to get to Hualien. From Taipei this takes about three hours. We went on a holiday weekend so the trains are oversold and our tickets are standing room only. When we first started out the aisles were so packed it was hard to move. Fortunately not everyone had the same final destination and the crowd thinned out a bit as we went along.
We were so happy to finally arrive. Here is a picture of the visitor center in Hualien.

This is a view of the mountain behind the train station. There are some spectacular views of the mountains and coastline as you take the train. Once we got to Hualien we were all hungry so we decided to check into the hotel and get some lunch. Then we would go and rent some scooters for the weekend. The pic below is the view of the park across the street from our hotel. Notice the cornea searing orange color of the tour bus company on the right. It was intensely bright in the sunlight.

Well it turns out that waiting until after lunch to rent scooters on a holiday weekend was not a good decision on our part. Everyone was out by the time we got around to them. Well this sucks. Now what? Most of us have been up since 5 am so we retire to our rooms and nap for a bit. The plan is to rest and be refreshed and ready to explore. I will let you know how that went tomorrow.