We are in Kenting for one major reason, to see the beaches in these area which are some of the most famous ones in Taiwan. And also some of the only ones were you can take a bath. The weather forecast again foretells rains but the morning sky is quite clear so we do a bit of birdwatching from our balcony with some surprising results. For example we see our first Grey Treepie, a nemesis bird for us that is quite common but eluded us for a week already.
The small patch of forest between us and the beach yields a few more interesting birds including a Black-naped Monarch, two lifers in a couple hours quite exciting!
While looking for birds we also eat breakfast from the goods bought at the night market the previous day. That means our breakfast is crepes and fresh fruit, quite a good mix actually.
And then it is time to exit to hotel and walk to the nearby beach through the patch of forest we have explored till now from afar. We pass also a small creek on the way, maybe that is one of the attractors for the many birds.
The Kenting Beach itself is easily accesible even though it has a long list of forbidden things to do including swimming and fishing.
It is also quite devoid of other people this early in the day. We enjoy exploring this seemingly wild beach walking alongside the sea towards one end of the beach and looking for interesting shells or crabs.
Somewhere on this stretch, disaster strikes. Our workhorse camera, a Sony RX10 IV decides to stop working. Well it is more complicated, it still works but we cannot see what we photograph as the viewfinder is suddenly dead.
But before it goes completely dead we can still take a few pictures of some beautiful birds including the fascinating Little Ringed Plover.
From there we walk to another nearby beach, Xiaowan Beach. While much smaller it is one of the rarer ones where you can swim and as such it is quite popular. And there are even people in the water. So we do the same, we enter the water for a short swim. As the water gets deep quickly we decide to be prudent and stay close to the shore and exit quickly when the waves seem to pick up.
And then it is time to return to the accomodation relying only on our phone cameras to take photos on the way back.
We walk through downtown Kenting which is quite different from the nighttime with all the food stalls gone. And all the people gone really, it looks like a deserted city.
We walk on the main street passing modern churches and hotels before returning to our hotel to pick up the car and explore the other major attraction here, Kenting National Forest Recreation Area.
