Taiwan look what we did !
Our Trip
During January 2019 we road around Taiwan on our tandem. Generally we followed the out aim was to follow the Taiwan No 1 bike route wich circumnavigates the island.
About Cycling in Taiwan
Generally cycling in Taiwan is done on roads with the exception of a few very good cycle paths around Taipai. Here is a run down on the type of failities you can expect:
- Cycle paths - These exist but are a little hard to find. I recommend using Strava with its heat map facilities to find them. Around Taipei the major rivers have cycle paths although we found it a challange cross over from one to the other when travelling from Tamsui to Taipei. Unfortunately Google Maps doe not have them marked.
- Motorcycle lanes - These are all down the West Coast and are quite OK to travel in. They are often marked with bicycle signs as well as they are intended to be shared with bicycles. Below you can see where we met up with some Kiwi cyclist and is typical of the ride down the west coast. The worst thing about this is the traffic lights and the tendency of vehicles to double park in the land.
Watch until the end - you will see stopping box for bicycle and motorcycles
- Open road - These are mostly on the East Coast and are what you would expect. Typically the traffic is not so bad here.
I think due to the large usage of motor scooters motorist are pretty good when it comes to safety. Also we say quite a few people getting booked so the roads are reasonaly well policed.
Getting away from the Airport (Trains no good).
We landed at Taoyuan aiport and had planned to take the train into the city. There is somewhat of an issue with bikes and trains. For a start Tandems are not permitted on trains at all (except perhaps as luggage). You can not ride the metro from the Airport to the Taipei with out a folding bicycle. We tried on the first day to get on with our tandem and I think the ticket office at the station thought we were nuts. This is a shame as there is really plenty of room on the train.
We ended up putting asking our navigator to find a route and just road in. This was not really a very good strategy, one which we did not use getting back to the air port. If you find the airport on the map you can see that we took a longer route hugging the river (passing Bali !). This roads leading up to the route are fine and as soon as you get to the river its cycle path all the way (have a look at our map and you will see two paths near to/from the aiport). I would recommend this route or perhaps looking at one of the other official cycle routes (see below) to get started.
Click here for more information on Taipei trains and bicycles (BTW we got this from a QR code in the Taipei metro - it seems to be impossible to find otherwise).
Cycle Tourism
Useful information
Taiwan Tourism has an official route named 'Route No 1' which runs around the country. The route is ridable but has not really been made to provide the best riding. It seems that someone has drawn a nice route around the country but not taken into account facilities such as nicer side roads or bike paths.
I recommend looking at the sub-routes as they take you to the top and bottom of the country (which we did ).
The roards a generally marked faily well with direction but I would recommend downloading the GPX (see link 2) version of the maps into your navigator or phone.
We went down the west coast and back up the east coast. In January there was a lot of wind which was behind us on the east and against us on the west. Speaking to other people this seems to be the weather pattern.
Accomodation
Accomodation is pretty easy to find and book. We used booking.com and expedia.com to book accomodation and just about everything was listed and available.
If you read the Korea section of the website there is a mention of 'love motels'. There was a similar concept in Taiwan but the places were bigger and the booking in process was not so secretive. There really good ones were very nice places to stay.
Something Special
Here are a few things you should make sure you do in Taiwan:
- High speed train - if you have never been on a 300Km/h train catch the high speed train down the west coast.
- Taroko George - beautiful gorge with marble cliffs. You do do this on a bike but we decided to hire a motor bike.
- Sun moon lake - The easiest way from Taipei city to Sun Moon Lake is to board a HSR train to Taichung HSR Station. Find the bus station at Taichung and ask for ticket to Sun Moon Lake
- Green island - worth the trip out to this island on the east coast. We hired a motor bike and road around the island (you only need a day). The island has a salt water hot spring one of only three that exist on Earth.
Motor Scooter Hire
Motor scooter (bike) hire is quite accessible in Taiwan and well run. You will need an international driver's license (which means you must have a local license) otherwise you will not be allowed to ride. At Sun Moon Lake and some other places they also hire out electric bikes which may not need a license (although you should know how to ride).
There is a major issue with helmets. Although it is compulsory to wear a helmet it seems that there are no standards (or at least they are not enforced). I would suggest that you choose a place with decent helmets before choosing where to hire the bike from. It is advisable to bring your own although this does not work if you are cycling as well.