What is the battle of the iron ass

Photo: unknown Yangzhiren

Wen: somehow

Difficulty level: mediumXC

Highlights: highaltitude mountain landscape, mixed road control, high-speed downhill.

Terrain: high mountainroads

Must carry equipment:

Bicycle repair tools,raincoat, warm clothes, gloves, sports glasses.

Recommended equipment:

Portable cookingutensils, telescopes, lighting equipment

I haven't been to mountahehuan, I don't know how high Taiwan is, I didn't ride a bicycle to wuling, Idon't know what a steep slope is.No more than 3,000 meters, not to mention youknow the air is thin.

But remember, you haveto ride a bike.

In Taiwan, cyclists mustgo for a ride on mount ahehuan, no matter which direction they take.Nowadayspeople go to mount ahehuan almost by car, unable to experience the feeling ofriding a bicycle on the roof of Taiwan.Distance, height and slope are notdriving by.

Really go to do perhaps very tired, but after doing, that kind ofcool degree of feeling, will never forget.

This part of theitinerary planning route, from the dayu ling on the hehuan mountain, shimenmountain, wuling, followed by almost all of the high-speed sliding route,through cuifeng, kunyang...Qingjing farm arrived in foshe, then turn to wan da,qubing, finally into the qubing ancient road back to the end of the journey.Thefront route is smooth all the way, the last qubing ancient road but roadbedinterruption, has been impassable, had to turn back to return to the fogsociety and turn into the pu li.This last detour is rather laborious, and isthe fly in the ointment of this journey.

the ultimate goal of thebattle of the iron ass

The tai-14 a highwaythrough the mountain area of ahehuan is considered to be the best mountainlandscape highway in China.

It is the most popular place to enjoy snow inwinter especially during snow accumulation. All this is because of thishighway.Wu Ling altitude of 3275 meters, is also the island was a peak ofunpaved road, in addition to tourists, biking ethos prevalent for these years,I do not know a few years ago, the central region of drivers each year to theparty, and participation is only increase didn't decrease, how important isvisible in the heart of a bike race here.

Although the slope issteep and the height is high, it is not too difficult to ride with time, onlythe thin air makes it more difficult to ride than on the ground.Generally described the request of mountain range from dayuridge, 14 a line along the platform across Wu Ling until kunyang, we startedalong the table by the concept of the original eight line cross roads to dayuridge direction, close the original elevation 2374 meters, by GuanYun heights,began to dayu ridge distance is about 4.5 kilometers, the entire for slowascent that ride to relaxed and happy, along the way are almost underconiferous pure forest, early in the morning or at dusk is the the best time towatch the sea of clouds.

Dayuling is the highestpoint of zhongheng road, with an elevation of 2,565 meters.It is the only placewhere the zhongheng highway leads to pear mountain or turns to the hehuanmountain area. During the snow season every year, as long as the amount of snowexceeds a certain level, tourists must take a taxi or walk to the hehuanmountain area to enjoy the snow.This section of the steep slope is up to 8kilometers, which is actually not long, but because of the high altitude andsteep slope, it is not easy to ride a bicycle with a backpack equipped for manydays.

Although always a slopeis not flat, a slope again, as if there has been a steep climb not to play, butthe scenery of this section of the road is beautiful, wide vision, than fromthe direction of the fog society climb up the hehuan mountain morepleasant.Along the way is almost all zigzag curve, especially the steepestslope of the curve, not only step hard, but also to maintain the weight of thehead to avoid the front wheel jump.A better place to rest is on the way to theeagle hill, which has climbed about three kilometres so far, and the slope willbe a little more gentle.With three or four more turns to get close to thebiocentre, the rest of the distance becomes more gentle.People with normalexercise habits should be able to ride this section of steep slope in half aday, which is quite an elite section of mountain landscape highway in China.

Small mark: the mostrelaxed hundred yue

Shimen mountain is oneof the 100 mountains in Taiwan, with a height of 3237 meters.You must pass bybefore you arrive at the mount.Although known as 100 yue, but the road candirectly reach the mountaineering mouth, from the road side of the mountainalong the trail to the top only about 700 meters of distance, standing in thetriangle point looking good, and along the way is a slow grassy slope andtrail, even the elderly and children can climb up.When the weather is good, wecan clearly see the north peak of qilai, the main peak of qilai, nanhumountain, central jianshan and other mountains.

Trails along the centralmountain ridge, the yushan across the low mountainous grassland extends to thetop of the hill, riding a bike can't ride the climb up the ladder, of course,but quite easy to carry the car and walk, mountain from the top of the hilltowards the mouth is another challenge, ride a mountain bike quite enjoyable onalpine grassland, playing time is absolutely not enough, so we stay here for along time.

long slide

From the mountain villa,as long as another hard about less than two kilometers can reach the wuling,but this section of the road is also the most difficult section, if not becauseyou can see the wuling parking lot, and from time to time by the side of thevehicle heard the sound of refueling, really want to stop the cart onfoot.Reaching wuling is the most important indicator. No matter which directionyou come up from, you will go downhill no matter where you go.

From there, there is along slope of nearly 30km to foshe, with only two or three sections in themiddle. Without the brake grip, the speed of a cycle can easily exceed60km/h.Although this section of downhill road is very exciting, but it isactually very dangerous, brake control is very important, although it isdownhill, the hands are almost numb and weak, brake rod grip to soft.

Small label: the bestdorm area

The distance from wusheto "wandaitou 71 line" is about 9 kilometers, which can reach wanda.This distance is all along the road around the lake of bi lake. Basically, itis still down the long slope until the wanda power plant.

Ten thousand tenthousand big power plants built in 32 years of the republic of China, is aspecial terrain on platform, besides there are mountain water, also has a longrow of neat japanese-style cabin with big cherry trees, the scenery beautifulliving environment, elegant taste, is full of the breath of a calm and quiet,here is a very good rest place, but also little-known sakura scenicspot.Originally the power plant was open to visitors, but at this time thepower plant itself is currently under construction of a new bridge, the sitewithin the power plant is not accessible for a short period of time.

Carry thecar to find the way qubing ancient road

Has been toward thedirection of qu bing tribes, this section of the road traffic have ups anddowns, the landscape is roughly along the direction of the then downstream,before entering the tribal ruins after "qu bing" scene, this is alegacy of settlement ruins more than two thousand years ago, but today the siteof the scene is messy, everywhere is junk, it is not worth staying too long.Qubing tribes from puli town not far from the linear distance, but because of theterrain, foreign transit line can only throw 71 roads around a big circlethrough WuShe again into the Po and make here feel quite remote, now there is abreakthrough in the Po the tunnel opening, soon will be by the end of the roadinto a starting point, to qu bing will be easier in the future.

The main purpose ofcycling here is to enter the qubing ancient road, which was interrupted by theearthquake before. This ancient road could lead to the wujie dam, but it hasbeen interrupted for a long time. We still want to explore it, so we still godeep.Not only that, the original entrance of the ancient road is in the rule oflaw bridge, but this ancient suspension bridge over the chuo-shui river hasbeen washed out, so we can only cross the river bed by the footpath on theriver bed, and then look for the trail of the ancient road on the otherside.The last few kilometers of the trip turned into road haulage. Afterfinding the path, the first kilometer was still cyclable, but the deeper youwent, the worse the road became.

I was wrong on a verysteep slope under a bamboo forest. I couldn't stop when my tires were pressedon a slope covered with bamboo leaves.The ancient road will indeed cross thistributary, and the road track is obvious, but the road surface is smaller andsmaller, but still able to walk, but the path is too small, and finally onlyabout the width of the body, even pulling the car is difficult.But when I sawthe final collapse of the road, even the hillside collapsed completely. I didnot expect that this section of the ancient road near chuo-shui river would bethe end we could reach now.Had to turn back, but that would have to work allthe way back to the fog club, and then to the Po li.

Cycle carrying

Due to the distancebetween the starting point and the ending point, we chose to take the publictransport connection for the smooth journey. However, after the disassembly ofmountain bikes and the addition of backpacks, it is not very convenient to takethe passenger or train. Moreover, if you are not careful, your bike isvulnerable to injury, which is a troublesome part.Other than that, it's muchmore travel-friendly than driving your own bike.

It is important to notethat when carrying a bicycle for passenger transport, the front and rear wheelsand handlebars of the bicycle must be removed, preferably along with the seatcushion. In this way, the bicycle can be stored in a small volume.But thegeneral car bag protection is not good, car body and parts are easy to damage,must pay special attention to.If choose to take a train, had better be toreceive hind to take section train, because door of general pair of trains andthe corridor inside carriage are too narrow, quite inconvenient.

Notes:

1. The high and low ofmount ahehuan highway is very dangerous.Must be handled with care and alwayshave a spare brake pad.

2. The hotel is locatednear the hehuan mountain, such as the hehuan mountain resort, the guanyunmountain resort and the yueying mountain resort. If you want to go on holiday,you must book first, otherwise, it is difficult to get a room.

3. Since the air is thinat high altitudes, cycling is not too difficult.It is best to form the habit ofexercise on weekdays, otherwise it is easy to have an accident on riding abicycle.

The ancient road fromwujie to puli is impassable.But the tunnel between puli and wujie has beenopened, reducing the round-trip time by at least 100 minutes.

5. There will berestrictions on the roads leading to hehuan mountain during winter snow. Evenif vehicles are equipped with snow chains, they may not be allowed topass.During the key period of snow season, in case of < accumulation of >snow, the section from kunyang to hehuan mountain resort is planned to enjoythe snow on foot, except for official vehicles and snow plows, all kinds ofvehicles are forbidden to pass.Outside the snow viewing area on foot, vehiclesentering the snow without snow chains may be restricted or prohibited,depending on snow conditions, road conditions and whether they have four-wheeldrive performance.

6. Taroko national parkwebsite: www.taroko.gov.tw

Traffic information:

1. The terminus ofnational highway no. 6 can be directly connected to the tai-14a-line highway toreach the periphery of puli and then get off, turn left all the way up towushe, qingjing farm, hehuan mountain, tai yu ling, connecting to tai 8 Themiddle highway.

2. From yilan tai 7 aline can reach pear mountain, take tai 8 line to turn left to tai yu ling canconnect to tai 14 a line to the hehuan mountain.

3. Hualien provincialroad no. 9 to taroko and Taiwan provincial road no. 8 can reach dayu ling, turnto line 14a to hehuan mountain.

4.National road no. 1,down zhongqing communication road, connect with zhongchang express road andtransfer to line 14 of Taiwan, pass through pu li and transfer to line 14 ofTaiwan to wushe and hehuan mountain.

5.National road 2xiachuotun exchange road connect tai14 a to hehuan mountain.