Alishan 阿里山 Sunrise and Cherry Blossom ~ Happy Easter 2018!

Alishan, ah Alishan! Famous for its sunrises, tea, cherry blossom, ‘sacred’ trees, sea of clouds and its mountain railway. The place everyone goes once in their lifetime. Visitors from all over the world, and especially from the Chinese-speaking world are there in their thousands. Me too ~ and I was there on Saturday, Easter Eve ~ as dawn was breaking….

Taiwan’s most famous sunrise location is there at Alishan ~ just look at all these people waiting to see the sun come up!

That ridge over there in the distance is Yushan, Jade Mountain, 玉山 at 3,952 m, 12,966 ft ~ Taiwan’s No. 1 highest mountain. To the left of the Main Peak is the North Peak, with Taiwan’s highest permanently-manned weather station. We were up on the top of Yushan Main Peak and North Peak last July, and it was one amazing experience!

When the sun does come up, there’s a big cheer – at this exact moment!

2 minutes later, and it looks like this…

After the sun comes up, there’s the sea of clouds below….

And then, everyone spends the rest of the day enjoying the cherry blossom…

But say the name ‘Alishan’ to older people in Taiwan and they burst into song. This is the famous song, ‘Alishan Girl 阿里山的姑娘‘ sung by Teresa Teng 鄧麗君 in 1971. Check it out, it’s very famous!

Alishan is high up in the mountains of Chiayi County, in Taiwan’s central mountain range. The Chushan Train Station, near the sunrise viewing platform, is 2,451 m above sea level, the highest point of the Taiwan Railway System. The hotels and cherry blossom area are all above 2,000 m, so it’s a especially pleasant place to visit in summer – when temperatures down in Chiayi are 30-35°C. On Saturday very early morning it was 5°C, while lowland Taiwan was 20°….

So what of the history of Alishan? Briefly it runs as follows:

“The Alishan area was originally settled by the Tsou tribe of the Taiwanese aborigines; the name derives from the aboriginal word Jarissang…. Following the cession of Taiwan to Japan at the end of the First Sino-Japanese War in 1895, Japanese expeditions to the area found large quantities of cypress (檜木, or hinoki in Japanese). This led to the development of the logging industry in the area and the export of local cypress and Taiwania wood. A series of narrow-gauge railways were built in the area during this time to facilitate the transportation of lumber from the mountains to the plains below, part of which continues to operate as the Alishan Forest Railway.”

So how to go? This was my third trip from Taipei to Alishan by direct bus, and after my last 2 reports, in 2016 and 2017, I’ve had lots of interest from visitors who want to know all the details. Of course, from Chiayi there’s plenty of buses to Alishan, but this bus is special. For those of us in Taipei with not much time, and not wanting to spend much money, this is the way to do it. So this is an update on those details – all you need to know!

THE bus, ‘King Bus’ 國光客運 (known as ‘Guo-Guang-Hao’) goes only twice a week, and leaves from Taipei Bus Station, next to the Taipei Main Train Station in central Taipei. Departure time from Taipei is 20:45 pm on Friday and Saturday nights, the return trip leaves Alishan on Saturday and Sunday mornings at 11:30 am, and gets back to Taipei about 5:00 pm. Cost for the return tickets is now NT$ 645 each way, and tickets can be booked 2 weeks in advance in person at the ticket office. No online bookings. Yes, you can book one way only, but it may be a bit more expensive for a single ticket. You write down your name and tel. no. when you book, just in case they need to cancel the bus (like in snow, landslides or typhoons). Ideally of course, I would love to go to Alishan on a Friday night, spend Saturday night there, and come back to Taipei on the Sunday afternoon. But so far that hasn’t happened. I have never yet spent a night in Alishan. Nor seen the Alishan sunsets. But hey, I’ve seen so much else!

In the cherry blossom season in spring, tickets get sold out very quickly. In fact, the only reason why I could go this Easter weekend was because Saturday was actually a work and school day in Taiwan, except at St. John’s University, which took the day off to make up for graduation day in June. For everyone else, Saturday’s work and school day was making up for a day off later this week as part of the annual Tomb-Sweeping Festival. So there were far far fewer people than would normally be expected on a spring Saturday.

The 2018 Cherry Blossom Festival runs from March 15 to April 10, and after that, most of the cherry blossom will be over. But, y’know, it would be great to go there in other seasons too, and much quieter!

The bus journey takes about 5 hours from Taipei to Alishan, but on the outward trip, it’s extended to 6 hours, with a 45-minute rest at the small town of Chukou, the gateway to Alishan – and famous for its 2 suspension bridges. We got to Chukou at 12:15 am, then rested until 1:00 am. There’s a 24-hour convenience store, Family Mart, that’s open, and the bridge to walk across, but, well, it’s the middle of the night – and very quiet!

After leaving Chukou, the road starts to climb steeply upwards, round and round, up and up, on and on for the next 90 minutes or more. If you get travel sick, don’t eat anything at Chukou Family Mart! We arrived at the Alishan Main Entrance / Bus Station at about 2:45 am. Last year, the bus would drive into the Alishan area and drop everyone off. But now buses stay outside, and the new bus station area is there with its own 7-Eleven convenience store, which was open. YES! We all love a good 7-Eleven, especially one like this which has a large waiting area with benches to sit on. It’s cold out there, so bring warm clothes. Gloves, hat, scarf and coat. And make the most of the hot chocolate at the 7-Eleven. It’s hot and sweet and I love it. And the coffee too – cos there’s not much sleep to be had on that bus once it leaves Chukou and starts heading up the mountain! And there’s not much to do at Alishan at that time in the morning, until the ticket office opens to buy the train ticket to see the sunrise. So make the most of the 7-Eleven!

If you don’t want to go on the train and prefer to go by minibus to see the sunrise from a different viewpoint, then there’s minibuses at the bus station offering this service, recommended by (but independently of) the bus company. I did it once and it was good, costs about the same, but hey, I like the train. It kinda adds to the whole Alishan experience!

First you have to get your Alishan Entrance Ticket at the Alishan Main Gate. With a bus ticket stub, it’s NT$ 150 (otherwise it’s NT$ 300).

We headed to the train station to wait there. It’s warm (er) and hey, get in line, cos once all the people turn up, there’ll be hundreds lining up to get a ticket. As the time of the sunrise varies through the year, so the time of the sunrise trains also vary, and the ticket office opens 30 minutes before the first train leaves. The number of trains running depends on the season and the number of visitors too. On Saturday, the sunrise was at 6:06 am, the first train left at 4:50 am and so the ticket office opened at 4:20 am. At that point, the notice went up to say that there were 509 tickets available that morning….

Train tickets are NT$ 150 each way. The train takes about 30 minutes and it is packed out with people. So is Chushan, where the viewing of the sunrise happens.

Fortunately, there’s plenty to see and do, including a line of stalls selling bowls of hot soup, breakfast, coffee and tea – and well worth it. After all, it’s not the warmest place in the world at 5:30 am! It’s a very sociable place, and we’re all trying to get a good place to see the sunrise…

Stand to the right of the viewing area near the solitary tree – yep, that tree may be the most photographed tree in the world!

By 6:00 am, everyone was in place with cameras raised. At 6:06 – exactly on time, the first glimpse of the sun appeared and a loud cheer went up from all the hundreds of people gathered there. Kinda moving to hear!

For the next 10 minutes we all clicked and clicked away. And within 10 minutes, the sun was up and it was too bright to stand there any longer, so we turned our attention to the cherry tree – which was very old and very big and completely covered in blossom. The beauty of Alishan Cherry Trees, unlike those down here at lower elevations, is that the cherry trees there are so old. And so big. All so twisted and gnarled and full of character. And covered in lichens – it’s all that fresh clean air. And they were all looking splendid in the early morning sun. Most of the Alishan cherry blossom in flower at the moment seems to be white. Most of the pink ones, but not all, have finished flowering. The white ones are beautiful ~ and of course, most appropriate for Easter weekend!

On previous visits, I have taken the train back to the main Alishan station, but this time I walked back. If you have enough energy, then make the most of it and walk back. It’s well worth it. And it’ll save you NT$ 150. But first I visited Mt Ogasawara / Xiaoliyuan 小笠原山(2488m above sea level), 500m away up a very steep hill – the views are incredible, really amazing. If you go back by train, you will not really be able to get up there and back in time.

There’s also a small exhibition area half way there with an interesting display of art taking the outline of Taiwan….

The path from the sunrise area back to Alishan is downhill all the way, and there’s a footpath down through the trees. Usually takes 40 minutes, but I wandered off on some other paths, and took much longer. It’s such a great area for wandering!

And once you’re down there back at the main Alishan area, well there’s loads of places to visit. I wandered all over the place. Trails lead everywhere. So much to see. The sacred trees area is the furthest away, and with lots of steep steps up and down. But you don’t need to go far to see all the colours of Alishan.

It’s the first time I’ve visited Alishan’s most famous hotel, the Alishan House Hotel 阿里山賓館 when the cherry blossom at the main entrance was out. Those trees are so old and falling down that they are held up and supported by metal poles.

Cherry blossom galore…

Magnolias….

and calla lilies…

Plus plenty more, check out this tree stump that looks like a pigs’ head…

And there’s also Taiwan’s most beautiful (and highest) post office….

I had a spare hour at the end, and had done hours and hours of walking (after hardly any sleep!) and the weather was turning cloudy, so I bought coffee and sandwich and went off to visit the Sacred Tree Station by train – and returned 45 minutes later. One-way ticket is NT$ 100. Had my coffee break on the platform surrounded by huge trees. In previous years I had walked there, but this year there was no time, so I went by the train. It’s fun!

By the time I got back to Alishan Main Station, the sun had completely disappeared and the mist and fog had arrived. Wow! I passed the RC Church and hostel down below the main road – it’s apparently the best place to stay for those on a budget, but booking is not easy, mostly done by telephone.

And so back to the bus station in time to catch the 11:30 am bus back to Taipei. We stopped once on the return journey, for 10 minutes at the Chiayi Bus Station. Most of us were so exhausted from having virtually no sleep the night before and having walked around all day, that we slept most of the way home. Got back to Taipei Main Station at about 5:00 pm. The driver was the same for the outward and return journeys – really excellent!

Alishan is well worth visiting, it really is special. It’s true that the crowds might get to you at the peak times, but don’t let that put you off. It’s beautiful!