Taiwan Tripping Part Two - Jhiben hot springs

 Upon our return from Vietnam, we spent a few days recovering from Traveler's Tummy as it roiled through various people's stomachs.  Everyone else, except for yours truly (you know, the "sick" one), picked up the trots in Vietnam. Chad blamed it on the ice cubes in the iced coffee at the airport. Henceforth we referred it to Chad's ice cube illness.

Contagion

Mom got her recurring flu/cold and started coughing whenever we'd make a joke. It was very interesting to watch her try and hold in her coughing whenever we were out in public. When she finally gave into her urge, the Taiwanese people would look around at the rabid dog and would try and get out of her spray range. Which in turn would make us laugh even harder and the coughing circle would once again begin.

We tried to make Mom wear a mask but she refused, saying that she couldn't eat her candy while she was wearing a mask.

After a few days, they, aka "Weak and Feeble", were up and running on half cylinders. So we decided to head to the East Coast for hot springs weekend. Off we went, all of us - Nana, Aunt Kathy, me, Jesse and Jaclyn, and Shannon and Chad.

Showing up at Jhiben Springs, the clan descended upon the unsuspecting Taiwanese who just wanted a peaceful time, soaking up the waters. It took a few tries since people couldn't speak very much English, but we ended up at a posh hotel in the VIP Plus suite, all seven of us. The balcony overlooked the spa waters and the KariOKe bar.

All around us were the mountains, lush and green -- Nature at its finest. And the quiet! We haven't had such silence since we arrived. Silence, while deafening, was awesome. The moment passed and Chad let out a "Yeah Baby", and chaos resumed as our personal whirlwind went through the tiny little town.
Big Dave would have been proud.


Our next destination was the restorative waters of the spa. Outside the spa was a koi pond with the largest collection of koi fishes I've ever seen. They had fish food available which we called, "Don't Eats". We took pictures of the feeding frenzy. Jesse even stuck his hand in and called them slimy.

Then the spa. With lots of gesturing and pictographs, we got into our suits and headed for the waters. Only one photo was taken, but you can imagine.For the native ladies, the bathing suits were quite modest, with tank tops and shorts or little skirts. Very cute. The gentlemen wore, for the most part, Speedos or biker short style bathing suits. Jesse forgot his bathing suit, so he had to buy one. He took the largest suit available, an X-large, and it was still form fitting. Thankfully, he spent most of the time underwater.

We also all had to wear bathing caps, even Jesse, and he was bald. So he wore his like a French beret. Cut quite the dashing figure, and quite easy to identify. Chad also went for the subdued black instead of our colorful clown orange, lime green, canary yellow, and powder blue.

We tried out the different pools, ranging from cool to steaming hot. We quickly got used to slightly sulphur smell, and the water was silky smooth. The concept was similar to Baden Baden but on a smaller scale and more relaxed. We tried out all the different ways to take the waters -- jets that dropped down on us like a waterfall; a lazy river soak; jets that targeted our shoulders, back and calves; and then there were the underwater lounge chairs. We carefully put Mom into one and told her to hang on. Then Shannon pushed the button.

Well the waters started to froth and bubble and Mom let out a surprised shriek and levitated off her lounger. It was a toss-up as to whether it was a shriek of fright, surprise or orgasm. She let go of the bars and started to float away, bobbing up and down and flailing her arms in an effort to regain her balance. I looked back at Shannon and she had the biggest, most devilish, toothy smile on her little innocent face. Then Mom climbed back on the lounger and insisted on pushing the button herself.

Another unusual occurrence was when you looked in one of the smaller pools, sometimes hot, sometimes cold, and you would see a man floating face down. At first you were ready to haul out your rusty mouth-to-mouth skills and then you realized that nobody was particularly concerned. In fact, some were even watching and discussing the technique. Turns out to be a past time -- how long could one hold his breath. The tiny little bubbles that escaped from the nose and mouth from time to time. Different strokes for different folks.

Once again we proved to be the entertainment for the others, being the only Caucasians around. There was limited English, but everyone helped us figure out how to do things. Such nice people.

Dinner was Asian with the only funny part being when we were ordering -- we had ordered way too much food but then we wanted noodles. We assumed that the noodle portions would be similar to the individual rice bowls -- remember about ASSUME? well, the noodle portions turned out to be large enough for three people, and we'd ordered seven. Jesse, whom we nicknamed "The Cleaner", couldn't make much of a dent and Chad wasn't up to his normal eating habits after the "ice cube" episode. We did our best, and the Lazy Susan on the table kept whirling about, but the noodles didn't really disappear. Finally, we left, hoping the staff would take the remains home with them.

After a few cans of encouragement, we traipsed down to the KariOKe club, for which we had a free pass. A big room with a few families and minimal alcohol. We leafed through this huge book of available songs while we listened to some Taiwanese experts -- seems to be a national pastime. They were pretty good even to our untutored ears. Kathy and I started it off rocking "Proud Mary" and, I must say, we sounded pretty good. Of course, I'd consumed five Heineken beer cans, so I may not have been the most objective judge.

We tried to ignore the video going on behind us because it didn't really match the song. While it did have two people on a dock, they obviously were supposed to convey lost love in a very soft, lovey way. Not quite the down-and-dirty side of the city made famous by Ike and Tina Turner. We got polite applause from the very musical family sitting in front, while our table shouted and whistled their approval. Gotta love the family unit.

Then Jesse and Shannon got up and tried to sing Ace of Base, "All that she wants". Jesse had promised that he'd would sing Ace of Base earlier that day. What he didn't say was that he only remembered how the chorus went. Shannon, who has as much musical talent as her grandmother was able to carry the song until the chorus. Then Jesse and her exploded, both vocally and into funky (that's an old term, they refer to it as bad-ass) dance moves. Well, that brought down the room, garnering approval from the people in front, so much so, that the grandfather, when he left, gave them two thumbs up.

Our performances ended on an up note as Chad and Shannon belted out "New York, New York", with neither of them remembering the tune. But Chad redeemed himself by holding the "York" for an incredible length of time. Once again applause. Midnight came around and the little club closed up. So we tottered off to bed.

 The next day, bright and early we witnessed a ceremony where the hotel was blessed by Chinese gods , complete with huge ten-foot paper mâché god figures, loud wailing music booming out of portable speakers on a small truck bed and firecrackers let off in a man's hand.





Mom and I went down to get a better look and ended up being in a group picture with a bunch of people we didn't know but told us about the ceremony. Can you see us?  So once again, we will be gracing some unknown stranger's photo album somewhere in Taiwan. we feel so famous.

Then it was off to commune with nature. Even before we reached the reserve park, we saw monkeys.

They ran across the road that lead to the tiny village where you could purchase eggs boiled in the hot springs water. Wonderful idea, eggs with a sulphur taste. The monkeys were a family; one being larger than the others and a little baby that kept peering down at the weird two-legged animals that kept staring at him. Really cute, but I had no desire to get closer. So I used the zoom lens.

As Mom and Shannon were feeling a bit under the weather, Kathy and I stuck close to them while Jesse, Jac and Chad took the Brave Man's Trail, which we learned later was all stairs. We were glad we didn't go with them. Following the gentler path, we skirted the bottom of the mountain, admiring the flowers, such as orchids and azaleas and huge elephant ears.

Then Kathy and I decided to check out the waterfall. Mom and Shannon decided to stay behind by the pond.

So up we went, following the signs which were conveniently placed. The path, while not comprised totally of stairs, was certainly more arduous than either one of had expected.

We persevered because by now we could hear the sound of the waterfall. Then we reached a fork in the path - a set of steep stairs down or switchback and continue with the path up. Our luck, no sign. Flip of a coin and we decided to continued up the path. It got steeper and we could no longer hear the waterfall. Then we met a fellow hiker coming down who, when asked, responded, "I haven't seen a waterfall.".

Apparently we were inadvertently climbing the Brave Man's Trail. So, with a few select words, we retraced our steps and took a closer look the fork. There on the back of the signpost, in very faded lettering, an arrow DOWN to the waterfall. We almost didn't bother going down the four flights of stairs, but decided to finish our quest. The waterfall was pretty, but certainly, not worth the ache in our calves and knees.

Meeting back up with the others who had been scampering around the mountain, and a little lunch (a hot dog that tasted like a cocktail weiner, only infinitely worse because we speculated that they had cooked it in the "waters" to make it healthy.) In any case, it was not good and Gasex was used.

Then we all piled into the little town bus and headed for the train station. I should mention that with our baggage, our group took up about two-thirds of the bus. It was also amusing to see each new rider climb into the bus and stop dead in their tracks at the sight of SEVEN white people taking a little commuter bus.

As there was not much traffic on the road, our wizened, but wiry because he hauled our small suitcases into the bus, old driver was able to impress us by careening around corners and through the little hamlets (yes, that was about the size of the groupings of houses around a 7-11and a few restaurants) then screeching to a halt in front of the stops. By the animated spats of conversation that erupted around us, this probably not his usual driving habit. Not quite as hair-raising as the little yellow bus to Villefranche, but certainly interesting.

In any case, nobody died and we arrived safely at the train station in plenty of time to catch our train back to Kaohsiung.