Taiwan photos and a lot of marble

Taiwan photo album: (arent you impressed at my promptness??)

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=91678&l=dd493&id=661120474

A'lo and I took a voyage out to Hualien, which is a city about 15km outside of Taroko Gorge National Park. The city itself is sort of "eh". It had a beautiful temple, but other than that there wasnt much to see. It poured rain all day (all week actually) so we hit the night markets for street food and possible shopping. After spending so much time in the Taipei night markets, small city ones werent much use to us. It was Chinese New Years Eve, so we figured it would be party town. Not so much.. we wandered through city center for 2 hours looking for a bar, restaurant that served beer, or really any place we could sit down and have a drink, besides the bench outside the 7-11. It seems that New Years over here is a family event, and not the wild drunk fest it is everywhere else. eventually we stumbled on the only open establishment in the city. it turned out to be really good. Live music! and i tell you, there are few things better than a Taiwanese band covering "Final Countdown" on New Years Eve. Magic. On the way home i ran into a street performance with a lot of cymbals and interprative dancing, which was very cool

This morning we had a (surprisingly) early start, heading to Taroko Gorge first thing. The gorge is a really famous tourist destination in Taiwan. its massive, and completely made of marble. Its incredible! We spent pretty much the whole day there, doing various walks and enjoying the scenery. Taiwan is the 2nd most thermally active place in Asia, but there were no hot springs in the park, OR in Hua lien, which is dissapointing. i actually carried my bathing suit around all day today and yesterday, just in case we ran into one!

Ive got a few days left in Taiwan, which may or may not be spent shopping and trying to stay warm!