Day trip to Yilan

Company that I work for is in its early years and couple of months ago someone realized we haven’t been out as a group hence it was decided we would head out on May 1st for an outing. Since it was Thurday and we had to work the next day, we opted out of Hiking and instead went for a leisurely late morning walk followed by a lunch late afternoon.

Our company is based in Jhubei, Hsinchu county and since most of the people live nearby we decided to head north instead and planned a day trip to Yilan.
First we visited “Luodong Sports Park” in Yilan township just as everybody else does. Its a huge park and I mean real huge.47 hectors to be specific. It is meant for people of all ages. Young legs can enjoy knocking tennis balls on couple of courts or sweat on basketball courts or have a relaxing time swimming in the pool. One can also rent bicycle and ride inside the park. There is a small artificial lake in the middle. Older people can enjoy a peaceful walk or else sit in the wooden posts nearby the lake or spend time feeding fish and/or ducks in the lake.

A fascinating building lurks behind the park

Only tennis court that was not occupied

Riding bicycle inside the park seems to be a favorite with visiting people

squirrel noshing on orange

Nice spot to spend quite hours

Park lake
Freaking hot weather made us take several breaks during our walk around the park. Just nearby the lake there is a small shop that sells drinks and cakes in addition to renting bicycles. Couple of people brought their families along with them. We spent couple of hours in the park as everybody seemed to enjoy the peaceful environment away from the daily grind. The park also houses an awesome star grazing dune. Since the park is huge and there ain’t many lights one should be able enjoy a beautiful starry night in late evening there.

Around 12:30 we left the park and headed out to Sanshing which is famous for Green Onions. We stopped by a small restaurant somewhere in Sanshing. Loads of people made a stop there to nosh on hot and tasty “Zhong yo bing” (Green Onion Pancakes) and something called “Po roh” or “Pu rho” (spare the romanization of Chinese words).

Green Onion Pancakes. Personally I prefer “Zhong zhua Bing” though,

“Po Ro” it looks pretty similar to favorite Indian snack known as Bhajiya or Pakoda. Big difference between them is of pork filing used in “Po Ro”

The restaurant seemed one of its kind and it was interesting to see so many people flocking the place, waiting 30 to 60 mins for the tables to clear up. We also did wait for 30 mins. I usually do not like to wait for food but there was plenty of photo ops nearby so I didn’t mind.

Green onion fields in Sanshing

Stuffed with food next I was looking forward to see pacific ocean but the food was too good I guess as it got better of the other people and they decided to opt out of any physical activity. This in fact turned out to be great decision as instead of sea shore we went to a wood clog museum .

When I first heard about it the first thought that came to my mind was “How in the world someone can walk using some freaking wood shoes?”. Naturally I was pretty curious to see it. The attentive staff at the museum walked us to the second floor where they showed us a video that talked about the long history of wood clogs and Baimi Community in Suao and it made me realize the significance of their tradition and the overall clogging industry. It was a fascinating experience to say the least. Today I dug in for more information and found these two amazing piece of work done to highlight wood clog museum. I will strongly suggest to go ahead and check both the articles in taipei times and my favorite magazine in Taiwan, taiwan review magzine for more information.

wood clog museum

hand painted wooden soles

Clogs on display

The museum also has some huge wooden clogs on display.

well you could either slip into your shoes or sleep on your shoes ;)

Apart from artwork clogs there are apparently a huge selection of clogs especially designed to massage ones feet

Wood clog museum is located at a gorgeous location only problem being the huge stone quarries behind the museum dumping fine sand on it on daily basis. Well there are regulations for that kind of things but it still has some noticeable effect on the surroundings.

On final note I would say it was an excellent outing considering it was long due and everyone seemed to have a great time visiting park and the museum not to forget the amazing lunch we had in Sanshing.
For more photos check out my Yilan Day Trip Flickr set

~ by ashlin on May 6, 2008.