????????KENTING Trip: East Coast WHERE LIFE OF PI WAS SHOT (墾丁/恆春半島東海岸)
Last week we went to the southern tip of Taiwan for a four day trip to Kending (Kenting). Here is the first video, showing you places on the eastern side of the Hengchun Peninsula.
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Music by Steve Combs
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Kangkou Nursery, White Fig Park (白榕園)
Add: No. 457-10, Chashan Rd., Gangkou Village, Manzhou Township,
Pingtung County (屏東縣滿州鄉 港口村茶山路457之10號)
For information about entry to the park, call Ms Zhuang at 0963-522-868
Longpan Restaurant (龍磐餐飲)
Add: No. 13, Kengnei Rd., Kending, Hengchun Township, Pingtung County (屏東縣恆春鎮墾丁坑內路13號)
Tel: (08) 885-1511
Eluanbi 鵝鑾鼻
Gangkou 港口
Hengchun 恆春
Jialeshui Scenic Area 佳樂水風景區
Kending 墾丁
Longpan Park 龍磐公園
Southernmost Point 最南點
Gear used for this video
Camera:
Panasonic Lumix GH4:
Lenses:
PANASONIC LUMIX G X Vario Lens, 12-35mm:
PANASONIC LUMIX G Vario Lens, 100-300mm:
Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8:
Panasonic DMW-MS2:
GoPro Session 4 & 5
Travel in Taiwan Jul./Aug. 2017:
East Coast and Eluanbi Peninsula
Like its Maobitou sibling across the way, the Eluanbi peninsula juts from its Hengchun Peninsula anchor pointing south. Its southernmost point is also the Southernmost Point of Taiwan, reached on foot in about 15 minutes from the Highway 26-side parking lot (paid parking), the last 500m along a wide, pleasant path shaded by thick tropical growth, notably various cacti species. You emerge, quite suddenly, right on the jagged, wave-pounded rocky shore, at a lookout deck with an artistic geo-point marker. Neighboring-area sightseeing spots are the historic Eluanbi Lighthouse and pristine Longkeng Ecological Protection Area.
Spread out alongside Highway 26, Longpan Park is not much more than a selfie-stop for most – move beyond the roadside parking lots to the most popular lookout points, however, and you’ll be rewarded with what to your writer are Kenting’s most magnificent visuals, save perhaps for the color-circus of its snorkeling/diving excursions. The eagle-vantage views from the coastal clifftops, with their disintegrating cliff sections (off-limits), wave-pounded reefs below, river-mouth Chashan village to the north beyond, mountain after mountain falling into the sea beyond that, are stunning. Watch for water buffalo and sika deer having a grassy meal on the cliff-base close-cropped grassy areas.
Note: Beyond selfies, this is by far the national park’s most in-demand location for wedding-photo shoots, TV-commercial shoots, etc.
North of Longpan, Highway 26 ends at a T-intersection. Turn right for almost immediate entry into Jialeshui (entry fee). This isolated, cliff-backed 2.5km stretch of coastline is one of Taiwan’s premier geological classrooms. Tours are given on open-sided golf-cart-style buses, drivers explaining (in Chinese) the three different geological layers clearly discerned, most notably pointing out the nature-carved outcroppings of the sandstone stratum, once on the sea bottom, resembling such familiar figures as the hare, frog, and seahorse.
Back at the T-intersection, inexpensive eateries line the periphery of a large parking lot. Beside this lot is a ticket booth, at the head of a picture-perfect pedestrian bridge that shoots across the river mouth here. Purchase a ticket to access the eco-park across. Better yet, call the Gangkou Community Development Association (09-6352-2868) three days in advance for a guided tour of the park (fee), learning among other precious things where/how/why the many local crab species dig “secret” homes, and also visiting the restricted White Banyan Tree Park. The magnificent old Japanese-planted banyans here are featured in Life of Pi, with special-effects help, when Pi comes across a magical floating “island,” exposed roots everywhere.