Bao Island Storyteller: Journey to the West

Episode 50 visits one of Taiwan's most surprising institutions — the Chimei Museum in Tainan's Rende District, a world-class collection of European fine art, musical instruments, natural history, and armour, housed in a Neoclassical building surrounded by reflecting pools and greenery — entirely free to enter. Over coffin bread (thick-fried toast hollowed into a box and filled with creamy seafood...

Episode 49 heads to Tainan's North District and the Flower Garden Night Market — the biggest and most beloved night market in the city, with over three hundred stalls running on select nights of the week. Tainan is called the 'Temple Capital' with more than 1,600 temples packed into the city. Over a warm bowl of Tainan salty porridge and loach noodles stir-fried in sweet-vinegar sauce, we watch Su...

Episode 48 heads out to Anping — the old port district of Tainan, where the first permanent Chinese settlement in Taiwan was established. Anping Old Street is the oldest street in Taiwan, running through what was once the heart of a harbour city, and nearby Yuguang Island offers sunsets over the coastal lagoon. Over golden shrimp crackers and plump Anping shrimp rolls, we follow the pilgrims to on...

Episode 47 rolls into Tainan — Taiwan's oldest city and its food capital. We park at Chihkan Tower, a Dutch fort built in 1653 that now sits quietly among noodle stalls and temples in the old city centre. Over beef soup ladled at six in the morning, chewy bowl cake, and a bowl of danzai noodles that has been made the same way for over a hundred years, we follow the pilgrims to a river eight hundre...

Episode 46 comes down from the mountain pass into Liugui District — a quiet valley where the Laonong River runs between steep green walls and a giant white Buddha watches over everything from a ridge above. Nearby, Bulao Hot Springs offers mineral-rich water that local tradition says keeps you young. Over creamy hot spring eggs with deep amber yolks and hearty mountain cuisine — wild boar with mou...

Episode 45 takes us up the dramatic southern cross-island highway — one of Taiwan's most spectacular mountain roads — to Tianchi Lake at over 2,300 metres, where mist drifts across the water like something out of a scroll painting. The Taoyuan area is Bunun indigenous territory, and the mountain farms here grow wild greens and millet that have sustained communities for thousands of years. Over sti...

Episode 44 heads into the mountains northeast of Kaohsiung — first to Qishan, the old banana capital of Taiwan, with its Japanese-era old street and famous banana-flavoured everything, then to Meinong, a Hakka farming town where colourful paper umbrellas are made by hand and the traditional ban tiao noodles are the thing to eat. Over banana ice cream and a steaming bowl of Hakka flat noodles, we a...

Episode 43 takes us across the harbour to Qijin — Kaohsiung's narrow sandbar island, reachable only by ferry or an undersea tunnel. The ferry ride from Gushan is only ten minutes, but stepping off the boat puts you in a completely different world: salty sea air, grilled seafood smoke rising from every stall, and an old street that stretches from the dock all the way to the beach. Over freshly gril...

Episode 42 brings us to Zuoying's Lotus Pond — one of Taiwan's most photographed landmarks. The Dragon and Tiger Pagodas stand in the middle of the water, connected by zigzag bridges. You enter through the dragon's mouth, walk through its body, and exit through the tiger's mouth — according to tradition, washing away bad luck. Over veterans' village noodles and cool sesame-paste cold noodles, we f...

Episode 41 brings us into Kaohsiung — Taiwan's great harbour city. We park at Pier 2 Arts District, the enormous old warehouse complex right on the port where cranes and container ships backdrop murals and galleries. Up on Shoushan — Monkey Mountain — Taiwanese macaques watch tourists from the treetops. Over dry-tossed noodles from the legendary Yancheng stall and a plate of crispy oyster omelette...

Episode forty takes us to the edge of Taiwan — Mudan Township and the Xuhai coast, where the Alangyi Ancient Trail follows the last stretch of completely undeveloped coastline on the island. No road, no electricity, just cobblestone beach, raw Pacific waves, and forest running down to the sea. Over Checheng mung bean soup carried in a thermos and smoky wild boar sausage grilled on the trail, we me...

Episode thirty-nine takes us into the Pingtung mountains — to Sandimen and Wutai, where Rukai and Paiwan indigenous communities have lived for centuries along the Ailiao River. We cross the Shanchuan Glass Suspension Bridge sixty metres above the jade-green river, visit the famous Shenshan aiyu jelly stall, and taste millet wine and qinafu — the traditional glutinous rice roll wrapped in leaves. T...

Episode thirty-eight brings us to Pingtung City — home of Shengli Star Village, one of Taiwan's most complete veterans' village communities where Japanese-era military housing became home to Nationalist soldiers and their families after 1949. The quiet lanes, old trees, and single-storey houses hold seventy years of stories. At the Pingtung Night Market, black sugar mochi and savoury meat rice cak...

Episode thirty-seven takes us offshore to Little Liuqiu — Taiwan's only purely coral island, floating in the waters off Pingtung's Donggang. The whole island is just twelve square kilometres, but it holds Vase Rock, the Wuguidong sea caves, and one of the highest sea turtle populations in Taiwan. Over black sugar mochi dessert and the chewy, savoury meat rice cake, we enter Chapter 37 of Journey t...

Episode thirty-six brings us to Checheng Township — a quiet town on the Hengchun Peninsula famous for two things: Fuan Temple, the largest Earth God temple in all of Taiwan, and Sichongxi Hot Springs hidden in the hills. While we eat fresh squid balls and seafood grilled by the roadside, we soak in the warm alkaline springs and listen to Chapter 36 of Journey to the West — one of its quietest, mos...

Welcome to Local Guys in Taiwan: Journey to the West — where three friends road-trip Taiwan, eating street food while listening to the story of the Monkey King. Today we've driven to the very tip of Taiwan — Eluanbi, the southernmost point, where the Bashi Channel begins and the Philippines lie just across the water. The lighthouse here has been guiding ships since the Qing dynasty. Heading east i...

Welcome to Local Guys in Taiwan: Journey to the West — where three friends road-trip Taiwan, eating street food while listening to the story of the Monkey King. Today we've reached Kenting National Park — Taiwan's first national park, at the southern tip of the Hengchun Peninsula where three oceans converge: the Pacific, the Taiwan Strait, and the South China Sea. Coral reefs thrive offshore, grey...

Welcome to Local Guys in Taiwan: Journey to the West — where three friends road-trip Taiwan, eating street food while listening to the story of the Monkey King. Today we've taken a boat from Taitung's Fugang Harbour and sailed two hours across the Pacific to reach Lanyu — Orchid Island — a volcanic island home to the Tao people, Taiwan's only oceanic indigenous group. They build tatala canoes by h...

Welcome to Local Guys in Taiwan: Journey to the West — where three friends road-trip Taiwan, eating street food while listening to the story of the Monkey King. Today we've taken the ferry out to Green Island — a small volcanic island off the east coast of Taitung, ringed with some of the healthiest coral reefs in Taiwan. The lighthouse here is one of the most photographed in Taiwan, and the Xiaoc...

Welcome to Local Guys in Taiwan: Journey to the West — where three friends road-trip Taiwan, eating street food while listening to the story of the Monkey King. Today we've arrived in Taimali — the final stretch of the Taitung coast before the mountains close in, home to fields of golden daylilies on hillside slopes and the most breathtakingly placed train station in Taiwan. Duoliang Station is a...

Episode thirty takes us along Taiwan's wild east coast highway to Chenggong and Changbin — one of the most dramatic stretches of coastline in Asia, where the mountains drop straight into the Pacific and the road clings to the cliff face. We stop at Sanxiantai, where a curved arch bridge crosses to a small coral island, and drive through fishing villages where the boats come in at dawn. We eat dayl...

Episode twenty-nine arrives in Taitung City — the unhurried capital of eastern Taiwan, where a former railway yard has become an arts village full of murals and studios, and a chain of coastal lagoons has been turned into a sprawling forest park of boardwalks and herons. Over bowls of dark, warming Beinan pig blood soup and stretchy handmade Chen Family mochi, we hear the story of Princess Baihuax...

Episode twenty-eight takes us to Luye Township in Taitung — a wide grassy highland famous as Taiwan's best paragliding spot, where colourful gliders drift above rows of tea gardens and a view of the Rift Valley stretching below. We stop at Chulu Ranch for legendary fresh milk ice cream and a delicate oolong tea jelly, and we sit on the hillside watching paragliders launch while we follow Sun Wukon...

Episode twenty-seven takes us across the county border into Taitung — to Chishang and Guanshan, where the East Rift Valley opens into a patchwork of emerald-green rice paddies stretching from mountain range to mountain range. We ride bicycles along Brown Avenue, the famous unpaved road with not a single telephone pole in sight, and climb to the Luye Plateau for a view of the whole valley. Over hea...

Episode twenty-six brings us to the most dramatic stretch of Taiwan's east coast — the Qingshui Cliffs in Xiulin Township, where white marble mountains rise two thousand metres straight out of the Pacific Ocean along the old Suhua Highway. Nearby, the Zhang Family Tree Garden offers a hidden oasis of rare tropical trees. We eat fresh seafood grilled at the Jiqiwan fishing harbour and crispy sweet...