Beautiful red maple leaves against a blue sky ~ now how’s that for a perfect picture of autumn?! And the best place in Taiwan to see maples in autumn is at the high elevations, up in the central mountain range. … Continue reading Autumn Colours, Mountain Views! 台灣聖公會2017年蒙恩得福家庭生活營 Taiwan Episcopal Church Fall Trip 2017
Think of all those historic buildings in the UK: Durham, Norwich and Exeter Cathedrals; Rochester, Windsor and Warwick Castles and even my lovely CMS link church at St. Andrew’s Church, Haughton, Darlington. And what do they all have in common? Well, they were all being built at roughly the same time as the Angkor Wat Temple Complex in Cambodia. Now, how’s that for Interesting Fact Of The Day, eh? Angkor Wat has become such a symbol of Cambodia, that it appears on its national flag. How about this? Angkor Wat is considered to be the largest religious monument in the … Continue reading Angkor Wat 吳哥窟 and Siem Reap 暹粒市, Cambodia ~ oh, and nice crunchy spider for dinner!
Cambodia is THE country to go to, and Phnom Penh is THE city! Just forget for a moment that you’re not really sure where the country is, nor how to pronounce (let alone spell!) the capital city’s name. It don’t … Continue reading Phnom Penh, Cambodia 柬埔寨金邊 ~ and a great CMS Conference too!
Privileged to live so close to one of northern Taiwan’s best beaches, and today is THE day! Every year we have a kite festival on Baishawan Beach 白沙灣 in Shimen District 石門, with thousands of people, hundreds of kites, lots of sun and hopefully lots of wind. This is the scene this afternoon, with the lighthouse on Taiwan’s northern tip in the far distance… Last year’s blog post about the kite festival 2016 is here. This year’s kite festival is a bit different. Although it’s being held all this weekend, in fact yesterday was a working day for most people … Continue reading Taiwan’s North Coast Kite Festival 2017 @ Baishawan Beach 白沙灣, Shimen District ~ YES!
Occasionally, just very occasionally, so many good things happen all at once to make an event so amazing and unexpectedly awesome, that even the hardest of sceptics are won over. Such was our ascent of Taiwan’s highest mountain, Yushan / … Continue reading On Top of the World! Yushan / Jade Mountain 玉山 ~ Taiwan’s Highest Mountain 3,952 m 12,966 ft!
It’s hot and humid and the middle of summer, and yet, Elephant Mountain in Taipei is packed out with people. Not in the early morning so much, but mid-morning onwards, at the hottest time of day, hundreds and hundreds of everybody are going up! Last time I was there was Chinese New Year 2016 and haven’t been there since, oh no! So now I’m back, but early in the morning. 7:30 am. Today. Ready for the off. Would be earlier, but that’s the earliest I can get there from the far end of Taiwan. And boy, it is steep. And … Continue reading Taipei’s Elephant Mountain 象山 and Four Beasts Mountain 四獸山 and 9-5 Peak 九五峯!
Yes, at last, I’ve found them! The cattle of YangMingShan are smelt long before they are seen ~ the smell of ‘cow’ is everywhere in Qingtiangang especially on the grasslands, and there’s cowpats and muddy trails and hoof-prints all over. But often the cattle themselves are nowhere to be found. I’ve been up there twice recently and not a cow in sight. But yesterday, there they all were, taking it easy – with the egrets perched on their backs, chewing the cud, yes! YangMingShan is the mountain range on the northern side of Taipei City, highest point 1,120m above sea … Continue reading The Cattle of YangMingShan 陽明山, Taipei
It’s Dragon Boat Festival weekend, so we have 2 extra days off – yippee! So far I’ve spent 2 days up on the Yang-Ming Shan Mountains above Taipei doing the East-West Traverse (Chinese version is here), a 25 km route, which I did in 2 halves – it takes in 10 peaks in total. Each of the 10 peaks has a marker post with a Chinese character on the top, and using a pencil, you make like a brass rubbing in a special book. Together the characters spell out the phrase ‘陽明山東西大縱走活動’ meaning ‘Yang-Ming Shan East-West Vertical Traverse Activity’. So there … Continue reading ‘陽明山東西大縱走活動’ ‘Yang-Ming Shan East-West Vertical Traverse’ 2017!
Reflections on the water bamboo field in Sanzhi early this morning…. ‘Each day I seek a sunbeam, a luminous moment of grace, be it a poetic passage, a compassionate glance, an affirmative word. Just a single sunbeam, nothing more. This morning while walking, a splash of sunshine fell upon a maple tree. It was too much, like the Mount Tabor epiphany, and I turned away, overwhelmed. I walked on asking God to turn down His glory lest I, like Milton, too soon would lose my sight.’ (‘A Splash of Sunshine’ by Robert F. Morneau) And late this afternoon, a rainbow … Continue reading A Splash of Sunshine….
Catherine Lee 