Taiwan: Farmlands in Taiwan

June 09, 2009

Manjhou Township, Pingtung county, Southern Taiwan

One of the first rural townships you will stumble upon if you decide to take a trip from Kenting up to Taipei along the east coast of Taiwan in Manjhou township.
Stop by here if you have time - as most of east side rural townships it has much more untouched old buildings and will get you more feeling of how real Taiwan - not polished for tourists one like you would find in Alishan, looks like. As a matter of fact, one of the scenes for Cape7 movie was made here, in one of those old buildings. More on Cape7 movie here.

Once you see the sign of Manjhou, it's already a reason to stop, because there are one of the first gorgeous eastern Taiwan coastal area landscapes waiting for your camera:

It won't be so much cars there if you come and regular weekend - it was dragon boat festival time when I made this picture.

Once you are in a township, numerous old buildings appears just in front of you. Eastern Taiwan is really much more intact as in terms of nature as also for living & culture. Some says (me also sometimes), it looks more poor than Western and Nothern areas.

Southeast coast as seen from Manjhou township in June 2009.

It will be harder to find such houses in Nothern Taiwan.

Unfortunately, they are dissapering fast and become replaced with such faceless block houses scattered all over in island in rural townships.

Kids play ball in one of backstreets in Manjhou.

Eastern areas (this in fact is still south part of Taiwan - belongs to Pingtung county), really are maybe not that rich as those in Nothern Taiwan, because here are much less factories and people make living most by farming. Ironically, the sign on this quite poor outlook house offers "money on credit".

Farmland in Manjhou.

I also tried to drive up on one of those small mountain roads.

It was worth to do it - below video in my opinion is not so worth for a view - but just listen a sounds!! You will never ever hear something in noisy - terribly noisy Taiwan's cities like Taichung, Taipei or any else bigger. 24h per day, motorcycles will drain your nerves system driving again and again - well, that's city life. I could not stop listen that:

Jun 9, 2009 11:17:31 PM | Eastern Taiwan, Farmlands in Taiwan, Southern Taiwan, Travel

March 22, 2009

West Coast of Taiwan - Tongxiao township outskirts and villages

Tongxiao (通霄鎮) is an urban township in southern Miaoli County, Taiwan. It is surrounded by the Taiwan Strait on the east and mountains on the west.

Area: 107.8486 km²
Population: 39,962 people (April,2006)

We decided to explore west coast of Taiwan due to several reasons. One of them - very less coverage in all Taiwan guides - usually the east coast are considered as gorgeous and beautiful, also south - where the resorts of Kenting are located. Lonely Planet even suggests to stay away from it as nothing interesting there.

Road to the west coast will bring you through numerous rice fields and villages.

West coast has less mountains, and the coastal area has much more plains. Above is typical village in Tongxiao outskirts. They all will look similar there.

You will need cross railroad which goes just along the coastal line in order to get access to the coast directly.

Older houses slowly disappears in western coastal area giving up their land for newer style housing . West coast villages have a mix of new and older houses.

Typical small farm road in Tongxiao. 3 main things you will see there - temples, small houses and rice fields.

Local woman works in a rice field in windy march Saturday.

Those typical to Taiwan mirrors are generously installed for your safe driving even in those rice fields. I am saying and always will say, that Taiwan is very convenient place to live.