Long Dong

Our last day we spent at Long Dong to do some rock climbing.  Darren had been preparing for this portion for some time and had purchased a guide book many months prior to leaving the States.  He woke up before dawn and took these pictures.

This was our campsite the night prior with a view of our cute van.

Darren willingly hiked back out to the overlook with me so I could see it too

Awe, Nutella for breakfast!

Pokari Sweat at the Climbing Yard.  I was scared to try it.

Darren and I headed out early while Rika and Aaron bought some provisions. Darren first climbed a terrible route and told me it wasn't worth it, so we kept hiking until we found much superior climbing.  Rika and Aaron found us by the time we are almost done climbing up our first good route.  They bore coffee with them that they had lovingly hauled over very difficult and slippery sea terrain to where we were climbing.  It was extremely thoughtful of them (we hadn't even asked for it!).

Everybody climbed some and then bravely got in the freezing water.  I was amazed at all the fish, anemones, and corals we could see just in our tide pool.

Darren and I climbed a couple other routes until we noticed Darren's rope was shot.  Good thing it didn't come completely apart while we were climbing!  We donated it to Aaron and Rika and they later made a beautifully intricate rug out of it.

Hiking back to our van in a semi via ferrata

We had a lovely ocean filled drive back towards Taipei.  We made a stop at some hot springs which are supposedly off limits, but there were hoards of local people in them.  I think they just want to keep away tourists.  There was a waterfall with cold water and hot springs.  People had adapted the area so that there were multiple pools with different temperatures.  In one of these pools we could sit under pipes pouring out hot water with massage intensity.  Another pipe nearby fed out cold water if one wanted to cool off a bit.