More blogs? Surely you jest, Weg.

But I am not jesting! In fact, I have never jested! And since at work I said I never use the future perfect tense, even by tomorrow, I never will have jested!

So today I had planned to go to Nanshijiao, which one of my coworkers lives at. She said there was a monastery up on the hill, which sounded cool. But instead I saw the green line out to Xindian, and like a ADHD kid seeing a butterfly, I said "Now I want to go to there!"

I looked in my handy dandy Taipei guidebook, and found nothing on Xindian. Then I looked online, and found exciting information such as the population being roughly 300,000 people. The mayor is Wang Mei Yue. And it is home to Jinwen University. EXCITING STUFF GUYS.





So despite taking the time to get out there I didn't really have high expectations. After getting off the MRT, there was a sign to the Bitan Scenic Area. I figured someone went to all that trouble to put up a sign, so I might as well go look I guess? Anyway I was pleasantly surprised. Bitan is a giant suspension bridge over the river. And on the river, there are tons of paddleboats you can rent. And, not gonna lie, I really wanted to rent one. But I figured on the scale of sad things to see, "White dude alone in a boat shaped like a swan" ranks pretty high up there.

I found just on the other side an alley that had pictures of a mountain. They also had a table full of water bottles suggesting a donation and asking you to take some water. I walked through this alley, and there was a sign that said "Hemei Mountain Summit - 900m"

Hemei Summit

Did I just stumble onto another fucking mountain? Yes I did. God damnit. So now I'm hiking up this mountain. It's really not terribly high, but it is quite steep and is situated on the banks of the river - which makes it look even taller. It had a pretty steep grade for the most part, that I was getting seriously winded on the way up - much more than the mountain I had climbed Sunday. And towards the end, they must have run out of motivation and lumber, because the stairs were knee high. So despite the trail only being a kilometer or so, it was pretty much straight up. By the time I got to the top, I wanted to die.

Even the birds speak Chinese here!

One cool thing about this mountain though, is that nobody really knows about it. I mean sure, I know the locals do, and I'm sure some people in Taipei have heard of it, but Google doesn't turn up many results. Mostly blogs about other people that have done it, not other travel sites. And it certainly wasn't in the Lonely Planet book. And I was the only person at the top. And I heard complete silence for the first time in months. So now I can say I'm a resident, because I know something cool that you won't find in any travel guide. Suck it.

I decided since I am apparently climbing mountains now, I am forming the Taipei Everest club. That is, during the course of my time here, I want to climb mountains that cumulatively will equal Mount Everest in height. I've got a while to go, but there's no shortage of them around. And as senior member of the Taipei Everest club, I nominate Weg to be Executive Mountaineer. I accept, welcome aboard.

On the way back I stopped at Xiaobitan, which is a little offshoot station from the green line with no reason to be there. Why? Because it is my goal to visit every MRT station at some point, and I knew I'd probably never be down here again. Anyway the line it's on will apparently link up with another offshoot station to form the new light green line, but it's not done yet. The thing is though, Xiaobitan seems to be a rich area of the city that built this station just to say "Well, we're going to build our own MRT Station. With beer. And hookers. In fact, forget the station." But they didn't forget the station, they built this expansive, pretty place that more resembles the hanging gardens of Babylon. Except, there is nobody there. The place is Silent Hill creepy. And as you can see from the photo, everyone is hard at work. I went around the neighborhood, and it was full of expensive restaurants and deluxe apartments, but nothing of note.







I had an early start, so there were still a few hours of sunlight left. I had heard Gongguan mentioned in conversation before, so I thought I could stop off there. The only "attraction" of note was the Taipei Drinking Water Museum. Yes. That is what I meant to type. And I had seen plenty of adverts for this place around the city. But then again, I've also seen adverts for the Subway Evacuation Museum, the only "hands on" subway evacuation museum in the world. You mean there's another one that isn't even hands on?!

Water, you and I are going to get intimate

Anyway, the Gongguan station has the wrong exit marked. Knowing I was lost, I brought up Google Maps which, if you're in the area, might as well be called The Drinking Water Museum App. Seriously, it's huge and there's nothing else around it. It was like Larry and Sergei punched me in the face. It's actually located in a water park, but the water park was closed! Seriously Taipei. I don't care what the calendar says, it is not winter. It's like... 75 degrees out today. If not for public decency laws, I wouldn't wear pants. Take off the coats.


But on the way out I saw a dragon.

Retarded Dragonite, I choose you!