Before leaving Fenqihu we want to hike at least once and explore the area around the city. And we have just the trail picked, trail #1 leaving close to our accomodation and then going to a giant tree, Shinto ruins and some overlooks. And who knows we might be able to even see some interesting birds in this underbirded area.
We pass carefully the train tracks before arriving at the trailhead which is marked with a clearly visible arrow pointing, where else, up some stairs.
Quite a few stairs in fact, we are used to this by this point however so on we go up and up listening to birds. And it is very good that we do so as in quick succession we find two more lifers for us, a very skulky Dusky Fulvetta and a very not skulky White-tailed Robin.
The first overlook is a great place to catch our breath and we manage to fully occupy it so another couple decides to actually skip it, great for us! The views are also quite beautiful and we spend some time looking at the village from above and also searching for birds.
There aren’t any new birds here but we catch our best photo of a Liocichla, a normally very skulky bird, right from this overlook.
The trail then passes over the major road through the village and then continues, now through a bamboo forest.
Here we find one more lifer, a Rufous-faced Warbler, this trail has already been an unexpected bonanza of birds that we weren’t able to see previously in Taiwan, quite neat.
And then we arrive at the first major attraction on the trail, the ruins of a Shinto Shrine from the Japanese times. In fact the train line to Alishan was built by the Japanese for logging purposes so they had a strong presence in this area.
From here the next stretch is flat and is quite enjoyable through a forest of mature trees. We really enjoy this part but we cannot find any interesting birds on this stretch unfortunately.
However on this stretch is the Luding Giant Tree, a huge tree that is significantly larger than any of the other trees in the area and quite difficult to even capture in a photo.
And then we see a commotion in the trees with birds calling loudly. Initially we assume they are just white-eared sibia but then we see it a mix of them and jays and the calls are actually alarm calls. So we take a closer look and then we see it, a huge Brown Wood Owl, the source of all the agitation. Then we look closer and there are actually two of them. This is a very unexpected and happy sighting for us as we didn’t think we will be able to see it at all. And there they sit just looking at us but mostly being annoyed at the birds mobbing them. A very felicitous sighting indeed!
Really satisfied with our birdwatching success we now follow the trail as it slowly descends towards the other trailhead. The trail continues to be beautiful, almost Alishan level, but there are more people here suddenly.
And then we arrive at the bottom and we see the reason for the increase in foot traffic, there is a large parking here and it is completely full. We are so happy that we still have our parking spot at the accomodation otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to do this hike as there is no easily available parking.
From here we continue on another trail for a short distance passing the small but relatively famous Earth God Temple.
And then it is time to cross again the train track and return to the village. It is now very lively compared to the previous time we explored it. All shops are open so we decide to buy something for lunch from the first one that we see that doesn’t have a long queue.
There are some famous stands and those are quite popular with visitors but we do not have time for them so we choose ones that are just a bit less popular and can actually be accessed in an normal time frame..
The whole village center is now crazy busy and everything is open so as we make our way back to our accomodation we decide to take a look in the stores while avoiding the crowds as best as we can.
Most stores are either food or souvenir related, unfortunately the souvenirs are quite expensive so even though we take a look through them we don’t find anything to buy. And food we already have enough, we have only two more full days in Taiwan so we have to start finishing our provisions.
We then continue on through the narrow downtown streets following the flow and finally make it back to our car right before we are suppose to check out. And then we are on our way down via narrow roads, we still have a couple more nature stops planned for today.
