Visit to Mt. Bagua Scenic Area in Changhua

Last weekend I went to Changhua, a modest town in south of Taiwan. Changhua is home to a huge statue of Buddha situated at the top of a hill known as Mt. Bagua. One can probably see Bagaushan from anywhere in Changhua.

I took an afternoon train to Chnaghua from Jhongli. It takes around 2 hours to get there.

Changhua Train Station. Changhua seems to be a major station with a maintenance train waiting on the other track, ready to go.

There it was. Guide to Mt. Bagua Scenic Area and other major attractions in and around Changhua.

At Exit door saw this board. “Fan Shape Garage” ? Got to see this next time I come here. It better be something else rather than a big circular structure lol.

[UPDATE: Craig recently made a visit to Fan-shape garage and posted some spectacular shots. Thanks for showing what I missed Craig.]

Before heading to Mt. Bagua I decided to go around Changhua city. Not that I haven’t seen it before but I didn’t have any pictures of visiting Changhua.

Thats Changhua Train Station on the outside. Taken from my taxi ride hence the scrappy image. It was rather pleasant there contrary to the temperature scale on display at station.

Nicely lined up houses. Couldn’t find many taller buildings in Chnaghua.

This one was rather interesting.

Cute house with smallest possible entrance.

It was time to head for Mt. Bagua.

Ride to the Baguashan top was smooth. Although it was Sunday, I didn’t see many people flocking there. Lot of bicycle enthusiastic having a good time though.

Entrance to the place where Buddha statue is and the temple.

Right across to the entrance gate I could see a commercial complex where handful of vendors have setup their shops and “Pakuashan Buddha Scenery Travel Service Center” office. I was wondering what “Travel Service Center” could possibly be.

Below is a video showing a 360 degree view that I took while standing right in front of the gate.

Walkway to the Buddha statue is lined with trees and small statues of characters from Chinese mythology. Each statue is exquisitely carved and unique.

Statues are also well lit up once the light fades in the evening.

At the end of walkway you can see stairs to the Buddha statue on the right side flanked by coconut trees.

To the left there is a circular observation deck built for visitors to enjoy Changhua city view from Baguashan mountaintop and also look over the great Buddha statue. There is also a musical water fountain at the center. Plenty of photography opportunities.

Love those wooden walkway.

Plenty of flowers to beautify the place.

Information display board describing important landmarks in Changhua city as seen from the observation deck. The weather was rather gloomy otherwise it certainly would have made a great view.

I took another 360 degree view video from there. Check it out. It starts first showing the statue of Buddha then Changhua city view and finally the water fountain and observation deck itself.

Finally I present you great view of huge statue of Buddha. One can see the enormity of statue by comparing it with the height of those trees.

A closer view of the statue.

and even more closer … Just incredible. One can just stand their in awe of this enormous statue and still be at peace with the surrounding.

There are two of these on either side of the Buddha statue almost like guarding it.

There are two of these again on either side. One hosts a huge bell and other one hosts a huge drum. Somebody scared the hell out of me when he rang that bell while I was concentrating on taking a picture. That thing is not just huge but also makes a ear shattering noise … gosh.

To my surprise I found out that the statue is actually hollow and it hosts 3 floors inside. On the first floor [btw we call it ground floor but here it is known as first floor] there is a temple and other two floors have various depictions of stories of Buddha and his teachings.

There is one more temple right behind the statue. This picture was actually taken from a small window on 3rd floor at the back of Buddha statue. One can see the small Buddha statue on the third floor of temple in the picture.

Apparently there is enough space up there to unwind yourself and enjoy some peaceful time.

After spending most of my evening I wanted to check out other places in the surrounding. Plenty of walkways along the mountain.

I saw a C-119 Flying Boxcar stationed and snapped some pictures of it. More of these C-119s can be seen at PingTung and Jiji town also.

This young pilot was trying to fly out of Changhua using this ride by pulling every available lever on the inside of cockpit only to find out later that it was fixed to the ground.

Finally it was time to get back home. Changhua looked quite spectacular at night from Baguashan. check out my Flickr Set for more pictures from the trip.

Last but not least my thoughts on the pictures taken. I feel the images are quite scrappy given that my camera is a Casio point and shoot type. I guess its high time to upgrade it to one with exposure control functions, optical stabilization and other functions that comes with DSLR. Only thing I don’t want to do is to carry a huge DSLR around each time I want to travel. I really don’t want to loose my freedom to move around easily with a decent camera which I can keep in my pocket. How does a Canon Powershot G9 sound?

~ by ashlin on December 26, 2007.