Yihuality : Monkeys & Snorkelling

Last weekend a friend of mine and me travelled from Taipei to Kaohsiung and to Kenting. Kaohsiung is one of the main cities in Taiwan and is located in the west of the island. Kenting is a small city near the coast located in the very south of Taiwan.

First we took a train from Taipei to Kaohsiung on Thursday directly after school. In Kaohsiung it was already 10.30pm as we arrived and we just went to our B&B. The B&B was cheap, nothing special but clean and a working AC.

Friday morning we didn’t hear our alarm and slept very long. It was a little bit sad, because we missed breakfast but we tried to still get the best out of the day. We didn’t have accommodation in Kenting when we started the trip on Thursday. Via talking to friends we found out that there is the possibility of camping at the beach and the very nice and friendly woman at the Information Center in Kaohsiung found a Camping area in Shadao with a free tent for us.

After buying lunch (and breakfast) and the bus tickets to get to Kenting on Saturday we started our initially planned trip: Monkey Mountain! After a short bus ride we arrived near the Zoo at the entrance of the hiking gate. We took random ways next to the actual way (many stairs and boring constructions to walk safer) and were very happy to explore the mountain ourselves. We found a little shrine in the middle of the forest and various paths that lead to places were some people arranged some sort of housing. This kind of housing can be compared to the housing homeless people in Europe arrange in the underground or other places that provide some protection against weather and cool temperatures.

A little bit disappointed, because we didn’t see monkeys so far, we took a rest and ate dragon fruit. Suddenly, a whole monkey family jumped out of the forest on the way. They were leaning comfortable in the trees on the right and left side of the way. Two monkeys were watching the surrounding, many of them cared about baby monkeys and some just lay lazy in a tree, cleaning their fur (in German: Lieblingsbeschäftigung der Affen: Faul im Baum rumhängen und den Pelz putzen!). It was great watching the baby monkeys play in the trees and the complete group working together, taking care of each other.

After this we were very happy that we saw the monkeys, went back to the city, had a stroll around, and explored our new environment.

Saturday morning we got up early enough to get breakfast in our B&B, took our bus to Kenting around 10.30am and directly moved into our tent in Shadao. The camping area was quite rural, very easy, but clean and cheap.

After undressing and lunch we went snorkelling with a guide and had a good view on many different fish, all very colourful swimming through the stunningly beautiful corals. Shadao is the beach with the highest content of shelf in the sand: 87%. But the strong tide and the sharp rocks didn’t allow for swimming without a wetsuit. Snorkelling was wonderful; after our lecture we still had time to explore the shelf alone. It was my first time snorkelling and it was definitely not the last!

Below some picture from this nice adventure!