Taiwan: Day 6 and 7 (Sun Moon Lake and Puli)

I know what you're thinking. I'm thinking the same thing. She's still not done talking about Taiwan?!? I know, I know. I've been a huge blog slacker and I have things I want to talk about that are not related to Taiwan but if I don't chronicle our vacation here, it'll never get done so I'm going to push through and finish our trip to Taiwan as quickly as possible.....that is, if I can still remember what we actually did.

We drove to Sun Moon Lake on Wednesday night, checked into the Full House Resort Hotel, and woke up Thursday morning, prepared to enjoy the beauty and scenery of Taiwan's most famous tourist spot. After eating a normal breakfast at our hotel (eggs, ham, and toast), we decided to drive around the lake and stop at any interesting spots along the way.

Our first stop was the Tutingzai Trail, a short trail that led through forest to the water's edge, and Taiwan's tiniest lighthouse. (Not as impressive as it sounds.)

This was the trail. Luckily, we were the only people on it. Along the trail, they had signs which explained some aspects of Thao culture.

After that brief excursion, our next stop was Syuanzang and Syuanguang Temples, nestled on mountain outlooks that offered a beautiful view of the lake.

That tiny little island in the center of the lake is called Lalu island.


Self-timers on cameras are a wonderful things. Otherwise, David and I would have no pictures of ourselves together.

Again, a view of the lake (and us). It had rained during the night (hence why it's so gray and overcast) but it was still a nice day and we were luckily spared from any residual rainfall.

At yet another stop, we saw more statues of the zodiac beasts (tiger, dragon, rabbit, monkey, etc.) and this sign which apparently says Sun Moon Lake in Chinese. All I know is that many people were trying to snap pictures of themselves next to this rock.

There wasn't much else there besides the statues and rocks and so we kept on driving. We'd already seen half the lake that morning and I certainly hoped that the other side of the lake would have more to entertain us with, otherwise it was going to be a short day.

This is near the village of Shueishe at the Longfong Temple. I'll probably get this wrong (since David is the Chinese-speaker in our family) but longfong means twins and is often represented by the dragon (above) and the phoenix (below).


Our next stop was Wunwu Temple, a very large and beautiful Buddhist temple that, again, offered great views of the lake. David was right when he said that after awhile all Buddhist temples would begin to look alike, but the Wunwu was a very interesting temple and probably my second favorite that we visited, after the one in Lukang.


The steps leading up the main entrance of the temple.

There were a ton of these golden balls hanging all around the temple. I believe they are used as a way to represent a wish or a prayer. I really liked them and so David asked one of the workers at the temple if we could buy one to keep even though we are not Buddhist and they kindly agreed. Now it's going to be an ornament on next year's Christmas tree. David and I like to collect ornaments from all the places we've visited and we hadn't found one in Taiwan yet so this was the perfect solution.

One of the cool things about this temple is that you could climb to the roof of one of the buildings to look out over the lake.

A man visiting from China took this picture for us. When he asked David how he came to speak Chinese, he explained that he was had been a missionary for the LDS Church in Taiwan and the Chinese man nodded his head and said, "Oh yes, the Mormons." We were both a bit excited that the Chinese are growing more aware of our religion even though we're not allowed to actively proselytize in their country......yet. But soon enough, I hope.


On our way back to our car, we passed this tour bus (one of many) but which I had to take a picture of because of all the tours I'd want to be a part of, it would definitely be the Cat's Family. Also, the cat looks like Suyom (who was I missing quite a bit by this point, crazy beast).

Wunwu was our last stop before heading back to our village and hotel. It didn't make for a very long day (we arrived home around 3 or 4pm) and we had no idea what to do with ourselves for the remainder of the day.

We walked around the little village and the docks but that only held our interest for so long before we returned to our room and started to watch one of the four English channels available to us. I ended up falling asleep at 8 o'clock that night and slept for a whole 12 hours. But hey, that's what vacations are for, right?

The next morning (Friday), we checked out of our cute little hotel, and drove to Puli to visit the Chung Tai Chan Montasery, a behemoth building tucked into a mountainside devoted to the study of Buddha.

Part of the monastery and the pretty pond beside it.

When David was a missionary in Taiwan, some missionaries got in good with some Buddhist monks and they were able to tour the entire building. But most visitors--like us--only get to see the first two floors which are mainly filled with various statues of Buddha and the history of Buddhism.


There's a museum next to the monastery as well, but we opted to not go in.

Inside the main entrance hall are four massive statues with four heads each that guard the entrance. We had a brief tour from a nice volunteer. Unfortunately, she only spoke Chinese so David had to translate for me.

After our visit to the Monastery was over, we got back into the car to head to our final destination, Taipei. Those exciting adventures--and the end of this dang trip--will be the last post.....hopefully coming up soon.