Guqifeng = Guqi fun!

After some searching through our newly inherited Taiwan tour book we made the decision to head south into the mountains to a temple called "Guqifeng." According to the map it looked simple enough just head through Hsinchu until you see Shida road then head into the mountains and there it is. Yeah well...for those of you planning to visit us in Taiwan you will see that what is on the map is not necessarily the way it is in real life.

We drove "Duke," our newly purchased 125 cc scooter, into downtown Hsinchu with our eyes pealed for any romanized variation of Shida Rd. (i.e. Sida Rd, Xida Rd, Hsida Rd...you get the idea), naturally we passed through the city without seeing anything resembling the road we wanted. In fact we found ourselves wanting to turn right on a road of only left turns. After some searching and backtracking we found that certain sections of Hsinchu require the use of alleys and or scooter lanes. These consist of a small space (both in height and width) between two large buildings that lead through, over and under other major roads emptying into a different section of town. This might seem ridiculous, but we lived in Seattle and we know what true terrible city planning is, so we managed just fine.

We made our way out of the city looking for our turn into the mountains. After a good long drive we felt like we must have missed it. I pulled the scooter over at a gated community and decided to talk to the gate guards the where abouts of this temple. There were three men "guarding" the gate, and by guarding I mean sitting in the shade drinking beer and chewing beetle nut. When we walked toward them, they did what most Taiwanese do when they see a foreigner and immediately pulled a chair up for us to join them. We gave one of them the copy of our guidebook (which contained the name of the temple in Chinese) and he gave us a huge toothless smile then ran to the gate to get his glasses. He explained to me that I needed to go right for 3-4 kilometers and then there would be a HUGE sign. They all discussed the matter amongst themselves then agreed that he was in fact correct.

So we went right and drove almost a kilometer when we knew we were going the wrong way. We made another U-turn and stopped at the first convenient store we saw. After showing the clerk the same characters, we waited while she discussed the matter with another woman in the store. We waited, enjoying the blast of AC when a young man approached us and in very solid English told us to go the way we came and to turn at the hotel--from there it would be a straight shot.

Long story short...that is what we did. We made our way up the mountain to a little town that surrounded a very large temple. On top of the temple was the statue of "Guan Yi" being restored--he must have been 75 feet tall.


After some reading we discovered to our amazement that this temple contained artifacts that rivals the collection at the renowned Taipei National Palace Museum. If you enjoy Asian art, particularly Buddhist art...this place would be your dream. Unlike a museum, this is an active temple--that is to say that all the art in the pictures below is set out either in a garden, or in the temple itself to be worshiped.

These carvings were about 5ft tall and each carved from a single piece of wood








Of course after seeing all these priceless works of art we have...
A display case full of random musical instruments circa 1970?!





Honestly we could only post a fraction of what we saw in the gardens and the temples of Guqifeng. If you come and visit, we will take you here so you can see the huge (6-7ft tall) Chinese war boats carved from solid jade and ivory, or the life-sized chariot made of jade...or the city of a thousand people carved out of wood with a huge seven level temple in the center. Honestly this was one of the most incredible places (in terms of art) that Katie and I have ever been.

This guy is my favorite...