Day 13 - A Hot Day Of Walking From Gongguan To Sanyi, The Long Walk South In Taiwan
Day 13 - A Hot Day Of Walking From Gongguan To Sanyi, The Long Walk South In Taiwan
Today was a very hot day, with the actual temperature reaching 95 degrees, and the effective temperature being 99 degrees, in the sun with the heat index.
We wanted to eat breakfast early and get an early start on our walk, but our guesthouse didn’t start serving breakfast until 9 am.
Our room came with breakfast, and I wanted us to start the day with a breakfast, because we have to go down a mountain and then walk through a long stretch of rice fields, before we reach any shops or are able to buy any water or food.
Breakfast was a delicious salad topped with roasted purple sweet potatoes and wild mushrooms, served with farm bread.
After thanking our hosts, we started walking down the mountain, surrounded by a concert of birds, singing from the forest around us.
It was so much easier walking down than climbing up the same mountain yesterday afternoon.
But I knew that today was not a day of walking downhill.
In fact, it was yet another day of climbing, in extreme heat.
The maps showed that we will be ascending today about nine hundred to a thousand feet to get to Sanyi, our destination for tonight.
It was a very sunny day, with almost no shade by the side of the road.
I was so grateful for every single bit of shade, even from a tall bush or an electric pole that shaded our path for a brief moment.
During our days of walking, my hair is always wet from sweating under my hat and both of us walk in wet clothes, from sweating in the heat.
We are both aware that most of these days would feel totally different, and much easier, if the weather were cooler.
We talked about the fact that we have never walked anywhere in 99 degree weather, and that normally we would stay indoors in this kind of extreme heat, even when we travel.
But here we are, walking, waddling, putting one foot in front of the other, covering many kilometers and actually managing the walk and the weather.…
We had to climb a steep, twisting road before we arrived in the town of Tongluo, where we stopped in a convenience store to drink some cold coconut water and to rest our feet.
Taking the backpacks off our shoulders felt divine.
The city has many convenience stores and in all of them people were resting from the heat in the air conditioned section, sprawling around the tables and chairs.
But we always found some chairs to rest in.
It was a steady uphill climb from there.
We tried to stop and rest in the shade, but outside the city there were no longer any convenience stores or even any place to buy water.
We stopped in a temple with chairs, but the area was crawling with red ants, which I know to be biting ants, so we continued on.
When we’d started the day, aware of the climb and the hundred degree weather, we decided that if things were to get too difficult, we could always take the train or the local bus to Sanyi.
We walked by the train station, and I turned to Jules and asked how he was doing, and did he think that it would be best to take the train.
He said that he doesn’t want to be the one making the decision to quit, so we kept on walking.
The bus stops along the way were the only places we could find shelter and rest for our feet.
We contemplated taking the bus, but every time we continued walking instead of quitting.
We walked by a soap and aromatherapy store and a farmers market by the roadside, and stopped in to buy passion fruit ice cream bars, which we ate sitting on a bench in their garden.
They offered for us to wash our faces with their fragrant handmade soaps, which I was happy to do, despite the fact that I was removing my sunscreen.
I figured that not much sunscreen was left on my face anyway, from wiping up the sweat with my cooling towel all day long.
At a fruit stand, we bought two apples and two dragon fruits to eat for dinner, along with some roasted sweet potatoes.
We had no appetite for lunch, because of the heat, although we did drink a few coconut waters each and had the passion fruit ice cream.
We arrived in Sanyi and went straight to a cafe to get some iced drinks.
We felt a sense of accomplishment when we completed the ascending walk on the hot sunny day.
But we still had a very steep climb to get to our resort hotel for the night.
The owner of the resort welcomed us warmly.
He gave us a large family room, showed us where the washing machine was located and gave us a laundry drying rack with hangers to put in our room, because he had no dryer.
He also gave us slices of fresh pomelo that he had meticulously peeled, which we ate and found delicious.
At night, both Jules and I experienced some leg muscle cramping.
We decided that we should eat a banana every day to replenish our potassium levels.
We must be losing more minerals because of the excessive sweating.
In other parts of Taiwan, the temperatures are cooler, and heavy rains are falling in the south, where a typhoon is raging.
I hope that soon we will walk out of this area experiencing heavy heat.
Most people understand that we are experiencing increased temperatures because of global warming.
As greenhouse gas emissions blanket the Earth, they trap the sun’s heat. This leads to global warming and climate change. The world is now warming faster than at any point in recorded history.
But one day the people of the earth will finally understand that global warming is not only caused because we cut too many trees and use fossil fuels.
It is happening because we kill and fight one another.
Human beings generate tremendous amounts of subtle energy, and all our hate, wars, alienation, killings, harming, deadly wars and sorrow generated, are shaking the earth to its core and affecting all living creatures on the planet.
With love, light and kindness,
Tali
Today’s Stats:
Steps - 28,323
Daily Distance - 20 km.
Total Distance To Date - 199 km
