What begins as a scenic escape quickly becomes a deeper experience in Alishan’s slower, softer mountain rhythm.
Watching the sun rise in the famous mountain retreat of Alishan is one of Taiwan’s top tourist experiences.
For most people, catching an ideal Alishan daybreak vista typically involves hiking for about an hour in the dark or hustling for a place on the sunrise train just to get to a crowded viewing platform while praying the weather cooperates.
But not for me.
I simply woke up to my alarm (set for 15 minutes before first light), slipped on my dressing gown, slid into some slippers, took the elevator up one floor, and padded out onto the roof of my hotel. There were clouds, but they didn’t obscure the gradual paling promise of dawn – mere wispy scarves draped around the tops of the Yushan Range to the backdrop of an indigo-gray sky.
Minutes later, like a piece of bread popping out of a toaster, the sun sprung up from the horizon, its white needle rays creating a seductive reflection in the hotel’s infinity pool. Behind me, I heard a bubbling sound – a fellow guest was watching the iconic sight from the rooftop jacuzzi. Moments later, hotel staff were serving us mugs of hot chocolate and pastries to ward off the chill of the early morning.
I was fortunate to be hosted by Hotel Indigo, a boutique establishment run by the InterContinental Hotels Group. Hotel Indigo is in Longtou, a small village surrounded by tea plantations about an hour’s twisty drive downhill from the Alishan National Forest Recreation Area. The enviable sunrise rooftop more than makes up for the hotel’s location outside the Recreation Area’s abundance of natural beauty.
Hopping on a historic train
I was initially attracted to Alishan by all the hype last year when the acclaimed Alishan Forest Railway resumed its full service from Chiayi City to Alishan Station after a 15-year hiatus due to destructive typhoons.
Like many other eager tourists, I also wanted to experience the locomotive climb into the mountains, a zig-zagging ascent made possible by lumberjacks back in the Japanese colonial era. The train first started operations in 1912 to bring felled timber from the mountaintop forest. Many visitors describe the ride as the highlight of their trip to Alishan.
However, securing tickets on this popular route is no easy task. The official approach is to try online when tickets first go on sale at 6 a.m., 15 days before departure. Countless Alishan travel forum posts on Reddit and Facebook had forewarned me that I was unlikely to be successful.
Nonetheless, 15 days before my planned trip, I woke up full of hope at 5:30 a.m. I had studied from the forums and typed out all the information required in a Word document, ready to be swiftly copied and pasted into the online form. I had the ticket page open and ready to refresh at 6 a.m. My eyes were trained on the clock on my laptop. As the numbers flipped from 5:59 to 6:00, I clicked, filled in the form, and pressed Send.
“Your requested itinerary is currently sold out,” was the response. “Please enter a new booking request.”
I had been warned.
We have since learned that it’s worth trying to secure tickets in person at the counter in Chiayi Train Station a few days before the trip. That seems to be the best way to get a seat on the historic Alishan route. Some visitors have also been successful by trying online a few days before departure, when, the thinking goes, more seats are released, possibly because of travel agent returns of unsold tickets.
An enchanted forest
Instead, we got to Alishan by bus. Even these tickets were not easy to purchase, requiring online booking on the FamilyMart website (Chinese text only) and then a wrestling match with a FamiPort kiosk in order to print out the tickets. Nick Kembel’s excellent travel blog Taiwan Obsessed has detailed instructions. Early booking (perhaps a week in advance to be safe) is also advised.
The bus takes about two and a half hours, about half the time as the train but nowhere near as pleasant. We lurched up the mountain on a corkscrew route that left me queasy even after taking a motion sickness pill.
It’s a short walk from the bus station uphill to the gates of the Recreation Area, where the NT$300 (US$10) fee is halved if you show your bus ticket. The station is in a small tourist village with hotels, restaurants, and a 7-Eleven, and it is the most convenient place to stay. The cheapest rooms go for around NT$3,000 a night at a simple establishment – prices run high due to the captive market – but it’s a trade-off that’s often worth it if you want lots of time to explore the park and intend on doing some ambitious hiking.
Perched atop the village is Alishan Station, a beautiful wooden building with honey-hued vaulted ceilings and arched beams. Even if you didn’t manage to get a train ticket, you’ll have a chance to ride any of the three short train routes that jut into the park from here: the Zhushan Line (for watching the sunrise) and the Shenmu and Zhaoping lines (for reaching the hiking trails).
Trains leave around every half hour, cost NT$100-150, and take about six to seven minutes to get to that line’s one-stop destination. Some of the trains screech like banshees as they trundle through the forest. On Wednesdays only, the Zhaoping Line runs the elegant Hinoki Train with its sweet-smelling cypress wood carriages.
The main tourist trails inside the park (Sister Ponds and Giant Tree) begin and end near the Zhaoping and Shenmu stations. More like genteel walks than hiking, they are still magical. If you do both, it will take at least half a day, especially if you arrive by bus that morning.
The Sister Ponds path starts just steps from Zhaoping, meandering through hushed, haunted woodland. The giant red cypress trees, some over 1,000 years old, stretch so far upward that it is impossible to fit the whole tree into the viewfinder of my phone’s camera. A sign explains that the older cypresses escaped being felled by Japanese loggers because they were crooked or hollow. Moss clings to fanning tree roots, while ferns uncurl like umbrellas on the forest floor. Sunlight filters down through the canopy but is so patchworked that the trunks are left cool and damp to the touch. The ponds themselves are tranquil spaces fringed by foliage in various shades of green, from light olive to a deep froggy hue. Just over halfway along the trail is Shouzen Temple, a welcome rest stop and an opportunity to grab some food. The temple fronts a square ringed by stalls selling sausages, braised meats (luwei), tea eggs, millet wrapped in leaves, sticky rice packed into bamboo tubes, and packets of pickled and sugared gingers.
We walk only a portion of the Giant Tree Trail because we need to get back to Alishan Station to catch our shuttle bus to the hotel. For those staying longer or the dedicated mountaineer, there are several “real” hikes. Mianyue Line is probably the most famous, described by travel bloggers as “achingly pretty,” a “nostalgic trek,” and “exhilarating.”
It’s also pretty dangerous.
Mianyue follows a 9-kilometer abandoned rail line, and hikers need to scramble through tumbledown tunnels in the dark and balance across railway line bridges with no barriers. There has been at least one fatality in the past few years and half a dozen injuries. You’ll also need a permit (which you need to apply for online at least five days in advance) if you want to trek all of it.
Back at Hotel Indigo, the wider Longtou area has its own hikes, surrounded by tea plantations (Alishan High Mountain Tea is grown here) and bamboo forests. In the evening, since it is May and firefly season, we walk a couple of minutes along a trail to a small clearing at the rear of the hotel to watch the glowing insects float around like dancing stars. The following morning, after the stunning sunrise and a huge breakfast, we follow the previous evening’s trail in daylight. It meanders through bamboo copses and crests a hill next to neat rows of tea bushes stretching off into the distance. We can see for miles, a very different experience to the shady woods at Alishan.
Bento boxes and boardwalks
Our final stop is Fenqihu, a half-hour drive on the hotel’s shuttle bus. This charming mountain town, with a Catholic church and two old streets, is well worth including on an Alishan itinerary. The forest walks here are even more beautiful than those in Alishan because they are less touristed, and the hotels are better value. The town’s hilly lanes, reminiscent of Jiufen in the north, are packed with little cafés, gift shops, snack stalls, and restaurants. The latter specialize in the famous traditional bento boxes. It’s practically a rite of passage to eat one when you are in Fenqihu.
The town, roughly halfway up the line, is an important stop on the Alishan Railway. The old timber trains would take a break here to refuel and resupply. Sometime in the 1960s, according to the Fenchihu Hotel’s website, locals started selling freshly made bento boxes to suit the transiting passengers, and now they are a cultural cornerstone.
We try the hotel’s bento box. It comes served in a lidded, stainless-steel container instead of a plastic box, which feels unexpectedly deluxe. My vegetarian bento has a slab of mock fish, glistening sheets of bamboo, sweet pink bean curd twists, and a delicious ferny green.
But it’s the hikes, not the bento, that make Fenqihu worth staying overnight. There are three trails to explore – the short Fenqi Trail, the longer Fenqihu Cedar Boardwalk Trail (do not miss this one), and the Logging Trail – with the latter two forming great loops that swing back into town. Birdsong is louder here than in Alishan, which can be almost hauntingly quiet. We spot great sprouts of ferns unfurling on branches as if the forest were kindly preparing nests for the birds.
Sadly, the Logging Trail is closed for repair. Laborers toiling on the path tell us they are from Egypt – a sign of Taiwan’s dwindling supply of local construction workers but an encouraging one for deepening international connections.
Back in town, we wander the pedestrianized lanes. There are gift boxes of Alishan tea, bags of Alishan coffee beans (Fenqihu grows its own coffee, and some cafés offer it on their menus), peanut crisps, and egg rolls flavored with sesame and green tea. Popular too are fresh millet donuts. You can watch stall owners whip curls of dough into rings and bake them in minutes into crispy snacks. Ugly stems of bulbous wasabi are everywhere; the spicy root, which is locally grown, is used to flavor a lot of the snacks in town, including ice cream and egg pancakes.
The ride home
Two trains a day leave from Fenqihu back to Chiayi. We catch the later one in the mid-afternoon of our third day in Alishan after securing our tickets in person in Chiayi a few days earlier. And it is the real highlight of our trip. For the first hour or so, we descend through misty forests that open out onto equally misty valleys while our carriage rattles and clacks its way down the mountain – a dream sequence, as though we are traveling back in time.
Alishan at a glance
Where to stay: Hotel Indigo is a luxurious experience about an hour’s twisty drive down from the Alishan Forest Recreation Area. As well as offering a more decadent way to see the sunrise, firefly watching, and tea and bamboo forest walks, the hotel has a rooftop infinity pool and jacuzzi, a restaurant serving international cuisine, and a modern design that incorporates elements from the historic railway. Rooms are funky with glowing light panels, plush beds, and balconies designed for relaxing. It’s better if you have your own transport, but there are two free shuttle services a day connecting the hotel, Fenqihu, and Alishan.
What to take: Pack some warm clothes, as the higher altitudes are at least 10 degrees cooler than the plains. A water bottle will remind you to stay hydrated and avoid plastic waste. The weather can be unpredictable, so bring a raincoat or other waterproof gear. And finally, not something to bring, but something you’ll need to hold onto: patience. The train ride takes more than five hours, and Alishan is 2,200 meters above sea level. You may feel a bit short of breath a few hours after you arrive from the effects of the altitude, so take it slow.
What not to miss: A ride on the Alishan Railway (up or down), the Fenqihu Cedar Boardwalk Trail, and the sun rising over the Yushan Range.
