Day 7 - From Shihmen Reservoir To Guanxi Old Town And Onwards To Hengshan, The Long Walk South In Taiwan

 

Day 7 - From Shihmen Reservoir To Guanxi Old Town And Onwards To Hengshan, The Long Walk South In Taiwan

Last night I must have slept for at least ten hours.

I am still adjusting to walking in the heat with a heavy backpack.  At the end of the day, I am so happy to shower and get into a clean bed.

I don’t even have any appetite for dinner, although yesterday evening I forced myself to eat some of the snacks that we were carrying, just to reduce the weight of our backpacks. 

We ate the roasted sweet potatoes we’d bought at the Sankeng old street, the bananas that a cafe owner gifted us, and some peanut brittle that we’d bought in the old town of Sanxia.

Our hotel was offering a reasonably priced buffet, but the idea of a full dinner didn’t appeal to either of us.

This morning, we enjoyed a nice breakfast.  Jules ate some toasted French bread with peanut butter, and I ate a variety of wild mushrooms with a savory rice porridge and fruit.

From the reservoir, we had to walk along the main road, which was full of fast moving trucks and cars.

We had to climb up and up and we had no sidewalks, just a bicycle lane on the side of the main road, but it was fine.  

The sky was covered with clouds, but it didn’t rain.

We were surrounded by mountains and jungle and thick bushes intertwined with vines along the walk.

When we did enter residential areas, the main road was lined with utilitarian shops, garages, repair shops, small manufacturing plants, and many closed corrugated shops.

There were no cafes nor interesting shops to look at.

Finally we arrived at the town of Guanxi.

It had a lively market and a sleepy old town.

The old town was just one street of brick buildings, some converted to used bookstores and cafes, but most not open.

It seemed like only on weekends is the area thriving.

But we did find a very cool modern cafe, that had comfortable sofas for us to relax and best of all, they had matcha latte with oat milk.

We spent more than an hour in the cafe, mostly because tonight we will be staying in a humble guesthouse mid-way on the road, where there are no restaurants and nothing to do nor see.

We didn’t want to arrive at the guesthouse too early, or we would have too many hours to spend in the room.

On the other hand, the weather forecast called for heavy rains starting in the late afternoon, so we aimed to get to the guesthouse at around 4:00 PM, in order to get in out of the rain.

In the town of Guanxi, we bought some food to eat for dinner, roasted baby sweet potatoes and Onigiri rice balls, making a delicious and simple meal which we could easily eat in our room.

Then we walked out of town, in the heavy heat. 

We stopped at a bus stop to drink our tea.

It was not easy to find a clean bus stop bench.

It seems that almost nobody is taking buses, and the bus stops are dirty with layers of dust and sand or stray dog excrement.

Finally we found a bus stop with a bench that I cleaned with my wet-wipes, and we sat to rest and have some tea.

The sky was getting darker and we packed up and continued walking.

The heavy heat and the rain meant that there were many more mosquitoes around and I had multiple bites that were itching.

But the hardest thing to do is to walk on the side of the road, which is covered in green moss, and when it is wet, it becomes very slippery to walk on.

We got to the guesthouse and rang the intercom bell, but nobody answered.

Across the street was a vegetable and fruit stall with a sleepy lady who was waiting for customers.

We went over to her and asked her if she knew where the owners were, and she offered to call them.

Finally they picked up the phone and she told them that we were waiting in front of their gate.

They spoke no English but were very friendly.

They showed us into a big well-lit and airy room, and where the laundry machine was located.

I made us some tea, showered and climbed up to do our laundry, as it is always so much more pleasant to start the day with clean hiking clothes.

The rain started, and quickly became a heavy downpour.

We felt grateful that we had finished today’s walk before the rain.

We ate the rice balls and sweet potatoes that we brought with us for dinner.

It was good and more than enough for us.

My shoulders were sore from carrying my backpack, and my hips hurt from strapping my backpack to my hips, in order to distribute the weight away from my shoulders.

My feet were throbbing a bit too, but I rubbed everything with some tiger balm and decided to ignore the pain.

I was thinking how wonderful it would have been if we had a hot spring to soak in like we do when walking around Japan…

But I quickly removed any thoughts of self pity from my mind.

It is not helpful to feel sad when walking a long pilgrimage.

We got to the guesthouse before the rain, and we had a clean airy room with clean well ironed sheets.

We were able to do our laundry, we had refreshing hot showers and we were safe and well fed.

So many of our brothers and sisters in the Middle East or in the Ukraine, cannot feel safe and comfortable….

The bed was big, but as hard as a rock.

In some places in Asia they believe that hard beds are good for the spine.

The room was a family room, so it had an extra bed for a child.

That bed had a softer mattress and both Jules and I squeezed in to sleep in a single bed.

But even with the air conditioner on high, I was too hot, so I moved at night to the hard bed and actually slept well.

 

In the morning, all the pain was gone.

Both Jules and I seem to bounce back quickly, sometimes in one night, which is a great thing.

With love,

Tali

Today’s Stats:

Steps - 25,965

Daily Distance -  18 km.  

Total Distance To Date - 99 km