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| 坪溪古道 Pingxi trail |
先月ぐらいから、SBT雪山山脈縦走という活動に注目が集まっている。雪山山脈は、台湾第二の高峰雪山主峰(3886m)を盟主とする台湾の主要な山脈である。この山脈は、北は
三貂角の岬から立ち上がり、海沿いに進んで宜蘭の蘭陽平野の西端をさらに下り、その後は中央山脈と並行して南下する。SBT縦走は、その北端から進んで雪山主峰を目指す活動だ。この活動をサポートするため、ボランティアが山脈北部の山々の道整備を行った。今回の山行は、
10年前に一度歩いたルートを、この活動によって整備された機会をとらえて歩いたものである。前回は北から南に歩いたが、今回はその真逆を歩いた。
3月に、雪山山脈尾端部分を歩き、登山ガイドとしてブログに掲載した。当山行は、それよりも南に位置する場所である。10年ほど前に、しばし訪れたところでもある。蘭陽平野から北に位置するこの地域は、現在は新北市雙溪區泰平の行政区画になる場所の開拓に関与した場所である。石空古道や坪溪古道は、現在淡蘭古道中線として長距離トレールの一部に選定され、多くのハイカーに歩かれているが、その昔は開拓民の生活路であった。一方、石龜山や叢雲山は、登山対象である。地元住民は、植林などの目的で登ってはいるが、生活路ではない。草刈が行われた後は、しばらく登山者が訪れるが、そのうちカヤや灌木が茂って踏み跡は頼りなくなる。もし訪れるのであれば、早いうちに行ったほうがよい。
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As more and more people come and join hiking activities in Taiwan, hiking trails receive more attention. That is why governmental entities as well as civilian groups have been more involved in maintaining trails, and even opening new trails in the recent several years. Under a new trekking trail project called SBT (Sandiaojiao-Baoshan Trail 雪山山脈大縱走), several volunteer groups have been working on major trails of this project since March this year. The trail commences at Sandiaojiao Horn (三貂角) by the ocean and ends at Mt. Xue-shan main peak (雪山主峰 3886m in elevation), covering 160 kilometers of the unbroken mountain ridge.
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| From the south to the north side |
For regular hikers like us, this is a very good chance to hike along the freshly maintained trail, which otherwise you would go through tall grasses and underbrush, sometime even bumping into fearsome thorn-covered groves like (黃藤 Yellow Rattan Palm). It was ten years ago that I hiked
the same route as this time in the reversed direction. Most of the trails that we traveled at that time were all traceable, a half of which we passed through tall graces or undergrowth, though. On this hike they were all in good shape, grasses and underbrush cut out wide and a lot of aiding ropes added.
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| At the summit of Mt. Congyun-shan, Guishandao island on the backdrop |
The location of our hike was trails going between Yilan (宜蘭) and Xinbei Shuangxi (新北市雙溪) . The two trails that compose the first half of our hike, Shikong trail (石空古道) and Pingxi trail (坪溪古道), are now designated as parts of
Tamsui Kavalan historical trail (淡蘭古道) middle route. The second half was to go up to Mt. Shigui-shan (石龜山) and Mt. Congyun-shan (叢雲山). The ridge trails of the two peaks have been very recently maintained by volunteers and were nice and easy to tread on.
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| Change to a local train at Fulong |
Six of us took a local express train #4006 leaving Taipei at 6:25. This train does not call at Waiao (外澳) station so we changed at Fulong (福隆) station to the next local train #4138, which reached our destination station at 8:08. The sky was so clear and blue. On our way along the coast line up here, Guishandao Island (龜山島) was beautifully seen through the train windows. It was almost ten years to be here since my last visit, and I was surprised to find that an extension of overpass had since been made to the other side. I remember that we directly walked cross the railway track to get onto the platform.
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| Arrived at Waiao station |
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| A new direction sign by the station and the extended bridge |
Since the Shikong trail has been designated as a part of Tamsui-Kavalan trail, a new direction sign has been built by the trail head. The trail went straight up for a few minutes and turned left to traverse the slope and merged another trail coming up. As many as ten plastic water pipes run along the trail. They feed water to the local residents from a creek up in the mountain. We passed over a high point named Rongling (榕嶺) and went down for a while to reach a Tudigong shrine (榕嶺舊土地公廟), which looked pretty good and shiny, obviously often worshipped by local people.
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| Looking over Waiao and Guishan Island |
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| Many water pipes passing Rongling |
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| Tudigong shrine |
The trail went down to a brook and proceeded along the water to pass a small pool named Qingtan (青潭). It then left the steam to steeply go up to reach a small open space where a small shop once stood. There should have been enough travelers to support business then. The end of trail came at Wuchalu (五叉路) where the trail split into for five directions. We took one of the paved road and down to a large Tudigong shrine called Huangjinling shrine (黃金嶺土地公, meaning golden peak shrine). It took us about 55 minutes to get to this point from the train station. From the edge of the shrine square, we was finally able to see the ridge that we would go over later.
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| Trail goes on the sream bed |
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| Qingtan pool |
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| 5-direction junction |
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| Huangjinling shrine |
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| Turn to the right at this junciton |
After a short break, we headed for the pass over the ridge in front of us. The paved road went down for a while to reach the bottom where we turned to the right, further down and up to another shrine named Jinding Jietian (金頂接天廟) with a long history of two hundred years. Its house is not big but beautifully decorated. There happed to be several worshippers to pray, indicating this is an important shrine of the place.
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| Jingdingjietian shrine |
Our trail started on the right side of the shrine. It went steeply up and then traversed to meet a paved road. We went up the paved road to the end where an inhabited house stands. An outdoor stove besides the house looked not so old. Residents supposedly left this house for good not a long time ago, maybe too old to live there. A dirt trail climbed just by the house and met another trail coming up soon. This was the final section of ascent to the ridge. We had a few minutes break on our way up and reached the highest point of the trail at 10:39.
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| Climbing the steep trail by the shrine |
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| A new steel bridge |
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| An inhabited house at the road end |
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| Outdoor stove |
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| Direction sign at the junction |
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| keep climbing |
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| The summit not far |
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| Junction on the ridge |
At a short distance from the ridge junction lies a vintage spot. On a small square stand a couple of benches and we rested for a short while. Guishandao Island looked as if floating on the calm waveless ocean. Vegetation had grown so dense that the view over the ocean was pretty limited. On this side of the ridge started Pingxi trail. The trail is wide and easy to walk along. It must have been widened to serve forestry industry in the past. On the either sides of the trail were all man-planted cedar trees.
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| Guishandao Island is visible over the vegetation |
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| Pingxi trail |
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| First crossing point |
The trail goes down a while to cross a wide creek. There laid some stepping stones in the stream to cross the water. The trail then went rather flat for a while to pass two wood bridges. Passing a junction for
Mt. Yinziling (鶯子嶺) on our left, the trail went further down to cross the stream again and then reached its end at 11:25 by a small concrete bridge. There was a flat space by the stream under trees. so we had a lunch break at that space.
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| A wooden bridge |
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| Junction for Mt. Yingziling on the trail's left |
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| Second stream crossing |
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| End of Pingxi trail |
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| Flat open space for lunch break |
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| Leaving Pingxi trail behind |
We were now in Shuangxi district. At 11:50 we crossed the bridge and came up to a flat paved space with a house standing by. This is the furthest point of the paved road coming up from Taiping (泰平) area. A old woman of the house was just chatting with a man of a motorcycle. We greeted and exchanged a few words with her. The road went along a river on our side and came to a junction for Wushan trail (烏山古道), another section of Tamsui-Kavalan historic trail, in about ten minutes.
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| Wide space in front of the house, 740 Peak is visible in a far distance |
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| House by the open space |
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| Advancing the paved road |
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| Junction for Wushan trail (left) |
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| Passing by a mushroom firm |
After seeing the Wushan trail forking to our left, we climbed the road for a while and came to a junction for Wantan (灣潭) at 12:17. Further up a little found a Tudigong Shrine and a trail head for Mt. Shigui-shan by its side. Volunteers came and made a maintenance work on this trail only a month ago. So the track was wide and clear, very easy to walk. We reached a small circle of Shigui-shan summit at 12:45 and had a break for a while.
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| Tudigong shrine, the Trail for Shigui-shan is next to it |
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| Climbing a first steep stretch |
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| Undergrowth widely cut out |
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| Summit of Shigui-shan |
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| Good trail continues |
The ridge route from the summit to the main ridge of 740 peak is a little more than two kilometers but there were many ups and downs in between. It really took time and was tiring after we had already come along a long way. We made a 15-minute break on our way and reached the 740 Peak at 14:21. A good thing, though, was that clouds gathered over us and reduced the sun heat while we passed an open grass fields. Occasional breeze also helped us.
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| Going down |
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| Up again |
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| Coming out onto a open field |
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| Mt. Congyun-shan comes into a view |
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| Widely cleared trail |
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| 740 Peak is coming close (right peak) |
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| At the summit of 740 Peak |
From the summit of 740 Peak the house by Pingxi trail was visible in a very far distance. We were there a couple of hours before. Over it stood a tall and massive Mt. Yingziling. A part of Lanyang Plain (蘭陽平原) was also visible beyond a triangle shaped Mt. Congyun-shan. On the north side spread rolling mountain peaks and ridges. On the other side, of course, Guishandao Island floated on the ocean. Our final peak, Mt. Caoyun-shan, was just in a short distance, but there remained a gap to pass.
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| Mt. Yingziling, the open space and house is at its bottom in the valley |
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| Mt. Congyun-shan is still far |
We went down to the gap bottom and up to the summit of Mt. Conyun-shan at 14:51. We were happy to be here at last as there was no more uphill to climb. After a rather long break of 20 minutes, we took on the final leg of our hike. This trail down is not a part of SBT project and has not upgraded by volunteers. Grasses besides the trail were tall and thick, but the track itself was clear and passable.
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| Climbing the last stretch for Congyun-shan |
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| Swimming through the sea of tall grasses |
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| Getting into woods |
We came out of grasses and into woods in a few minutes. Big boulders showed up one after another on a steep slope. The rock section ended by 15:30. I did pass this section 10 years ago, but memory came back only when passing this section. More moderate sections followed, with a couple of small humps, and came down onto a paved (and almost disused) road at 16:19. In a short distance from the point appeared a short-cut path down to the paved road where we had a final rest.
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| Track is clear between tall grasses |
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| Descending through undergrowth |
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| Going down through boulders |
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| Rocky section is over |
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| Coming down to the paved road |
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| Junction where we had a final break |
Fatigue showed on everyone's face by now, yet there were a few more of kilometers to go. We took a short but steep dirt path all the way down, passing an outhouse nearly at the trail's tail, and hit the road along which we otherwise would have came down. At a junction of a wide road, we took the left one, went around to a small community and passed over a overpass bridge to the Coastal Highway (濱海公路). At 17:08 Guishan (龜山) train station showed after a short walk along the highway, which marked the end of our hike.
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| Dirt trail |
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| Passing by a relatively new outhouse |
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| Looking back the mountains we coming down from |
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| A view from the overpass bridge |
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| Guishan train station |
On our way back to Taipei, we took a train to Jiaoxi (礁溪), walked to the bus terminus and took a highway bus back to Taipei. In total it took about a hour and a half, which would be almost same as by train. The bus service is pretty frequent and goes to several different destinations in and near the Taipei metropolitan zone. It could be a good alternative way to go and back for hiking in this area.
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| A local train for JIaoxi |
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| A bus back to Taipei |
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The hike was of 17 kilometers in length, nearly 1100 meters in total height gain. It took us 9 hours, which sums up 31 in the route physical index. This route could be said a strenuous one. It was almost the same hours as our last hike of the same route ten years ago in the reversed direction.
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| Waiao station in 2016, no overpass has yet been built |
Shikong trail and Pingxi trail belong to the official Tamsui-Kavalan trail system and would get reasonable maintenance as well as frequently traveled by hikers. So you would not face serious problems on these two trails while the trails on the ridge route of Shigui-shan and Congyun-shan would not be necessary good after the fever of SBT project dies down. You would better go there and hike soon if you would like to do so.
