Paragliding in Puli

This weekend, to celebrate our friend’s 30th birthday, we went on a camping and paragliding trip to Puli, a town (pop. 86,000) about an hour’s bus ride into the mountains from Taichung City. Boje and I met at my branch on Saturday afternoon after I’d finished teaching for the day, then took a cab to the Nantou Bus Company counter at Taichung City Station (台中干城站). It was the same bus company that took us to Sun Moon Lake, and it was only NT$125 per person (one way) out to Puli. We were dropped off at Nantou Bus’ Puli terminal and took a taxi up a winding mountain road to the campground where we’d be flying from the next day.

The campground was so lovely and located in a large clearing on the mountainside. There was a huge patio with a sort of outdoor kitchen/snack shack where our group of 10 was served an all-you-can-eat BBQ feast under the stars. We had chicken steak (ji pai), chicken wings, chicken butts (or the “Parson’s nose”, as Boje calls it), chicken skin, steamed vegetables with ginger, and a tofu/fish ball soup. Boje and I also had some skewered BBQ chicken hearts. The verdict: chewy, and tasting slightly of blood.

Some of the people we were with were camping in tents there for the night, but we paid an extra NT$200 per person to share a cute cabin with three other people about 20 minutes away. We all celebrated our friend’s birthday well into the night, and a little while after midnight the five of us staying in the cabin decided to call a cab. Turns out no local drivers drivers wanted to come up dark switchbacks in the middle of the night, so the lady running the kitchen drove three of us down the mountain while my friend and another girl followed behind us on a scooter. I reached the bottom with Boje and the birthday boy, but the girls had experienced some scooter engine trouble and were delayed getting down. Once the five of us had all met up at a beautiful park at the bottom of the road, we made our way to a 7/11 (Taiwan’s 24-hour cab stand) and called a taxi. The driver seemed to know where to go (based on gesturing, our yammering in English and his banter in Chinese, and lots of pointing at a map of the area) so we headed out. The taxi driver missed a turn and so we were flagged down by the girls. A Taiwanese man at a nearby gas station was consulted for a second opinion, and after much shouting (not in anger, but in the tired, confused way of people trying to overcome a severe language barrier) we were back on the road. There were several more false starts, but we finally made it to our destination at around 2 in the morning. In typical Taiwanese fashion, rather than be a jerk and charge us extra for the hassle, the cab driver halved our previously agreed fare AND gave us his card so we could call him in the morning, because I’m reasonably sure he thought no other taxi driver in Puli would know how to find us again. We collapsed into our tiny cabin and all passed out promptly to the sound of chirping crickets, croaking frogs, and snoring boyfriends.

In the morning we (slowly) got up and headed back up to the campsite to meet up with the rest of our party who’d stayed in tents. Around 11, an awesome South African paragliding pilot named Yuri as well as some Taiwanese pilots he knew showed up and we started flying!

Boje was the second in our group to go and I was so terrified/impressed the whole time he was up there. He entrusted me with the “big lens” so I was able to get some photos. Every time the pilot brought him down near us, the whole group on the ground could see Boje’s huge grin. I had a momentary panic attack at one point, though, when the pilot was trying to land the chute and we heard him yell “Shit!” as the parachute continued down the mountain. He'd just missed the landing, which seemed like a pretty normal situation all day as the winds picked up. All was well, and they landed gently on the following circle. My own trip was less successful. It wasn’t scary at all - you feel completely safe up there. The guy who organized the trip for us aptly described the experience as “like sitting in a big glove in the sky”. My only problem was the crippling motion sickness. I made one circle and was feeling okay, but about halfway around the next lap I exclaimed “Bu hao! Bu hao!” (No good!) and insisted with the few Chinese words I could muster that we needed to land. Once I was safely on the ground I still felt queasy for about an hour.

After everyone had flown, about half of us headed back to Taichung on the Nantou bus, and the other half took scooters. Those of us on the bus took a cab to an amazing restaurant in town called Uzo Bar and Grill. Wow. I hadn’t had a chicken gyro wrap like that in a long time. None of us had eaten since breakfast, and we all devoured our wraps, burgers, pizza, desserts, and cold drinks. It was the perfect ending to an awesome weekend. Boje absolutely loved paragliding, and is already thinking about when we’ll be able to go again. Sounds nice, dear - enjoy your flight. I’ll be the speck on the ground kneeling over a bucket.

For prospective paragliders:

If you'd like to try paragliding in Puli, contact Steve or Yuri from Step Out in Taiwan. They're on Facebook and offer a bunch of different scooter tours and packages on their website. They did all the bookings and arranged everything with the cooks at the campground as well as told us exactly where to go, so we had an awesome overnight stay and very safe paragliding experience for under NT$4000 per person (including meals and bus fares).

The cabin where we stayed the night

Waiting for take-off

Just after take-off

Puli in the background

Yuri having some fun

From below

Brett & Yuri

Failed landing attempt

Amanda waiting her turn

"What have I got myself into!?!?"

"I can do this... just don't barf!"

Amanda about to be hurled off the side of a mountain

Amanda after take-off

Amanda paragliding

Amanda paragliding

Back on the ground and thankful to be alive!

The launch area

Paragliding in Puli

Brett & Amanda

A Taiwanese BBQ!

This weekend, Boje and I went to our first ever Taiwanese barbeque! It was a staff party at my branch and I loved it. My branch has a “back yard” of sorts that leads to a small outbuilding occasionally used as a classroom. We arrived late due to some taxi problems (if you’re any good at hailing a cab in the dark on a busy road in Taichung, please tell me your secret) but were greeted immediately by happy people and the smoky smell of our dinner. We munched on pizza while we waited for my colleagues to expertly grill meat, wraps, and veggies on small portable units set up on the deck. We had a vegetarian grill as well as a pork-and-chicken grill going at the same time, and I must say both were very appealing! (Though after some night market scares I’ve learned my lesson about saying haphazard things like “I’ll eat anything if it’s slathered in BBQ sauce!”)

After we’d eaten our fill, they set up a table for Mahjong. Boje and I watched a few rounds and I’m really interested in learning to play! Before I do that, however, I’ve got to learn to read numbers in Mandarin. And learn how to keep a poker face. As it turns out, Mahjong is a lot like poker but with domino-like tiles instead. So interesting! I was tired from the cold that had been bugging me all week so we went home early, but I really enjoyed the whole experience!

The next day we went to Carrefour to find some sheets for our king size bed (which is smaller than a Western king size, but larger than a Western queen). If you’ve been following our blog, you’ll know all about the headache we’ve had trying to find sheets. Our first trip to Carrefour was a bust as we’d forgotten our notes about the mattress dimensions at home. The second trip was made solo by Brett so I could nurse my cold and migraine. He came home with a set of bedding but upon taking it out of the package we discovered the sheets inside were a size smaller than advertised! This time I went back with him and we triple-checked the bedding we exchanged before bringing it home! Success! And just in time for our first house guests! I think we’ll be pretty busy this week putting together an itinerary for our visit from Brett’s parents next weekend, but we’re both getting really excited to see loved ones from back home!

Today I was pretty sick and grouchy when I got to work but things really improved as the day went on! I made a pretty major breakthrough with the class who used to make fun of the way I talk. “Zach” and his posse have now learned that I will never understand what I’m doing wrong with his name and they just smirk instead of actually screaming and laughing. I even got a very sincere and sweet verbal apology from one particularly unruly student! On the flip side, another student smacked me right in the self-esteem with this little gem:

S: Teacher Amanda, today you look so terrible and so tired.
A: …
S: And why you breathe like that? Do you have asthma? Or are you tired from the stairs?
A: … I’m sick!

The kicker is that she's one of the kids who spent last week's class coughing and sneezing right in my face!