Enjoying nature’s handiwork at Shibi Scenic Area

Especially impressive is the approach from Touliu (斗六), the county town of Yunlin. Following route 149, Shibi is signposted on the left, shortly before the road dives into a tunnel. Climbing higher and higher, it seems like the road will climb right over the summit of the lofty mountain ridge and crest the other side. Finally the interminable twisting ceases, the landscape becomes gentler, trees begin to clothe the hillside on either side of the road and Shibi Scenic Area is reached.

On the left, a wooden sign points left up a side road to the Tiger Cave (虎洞). You’ll need a good set of wheels (or legs) to get to this high and remote place, 5 or 6 kilometers up this road (which becomes much rougher and more overgrown further up - we gave up long before getting there), but it’s just a few minutes’ easy drive along this same road to a pair of pleasant, signposted footpaths through attractive forests of pine and maple.

Follow the main road ahead and in a couple of minutes, another sign on the right points to Shibi’s most famous attraction, the curious ‘Holy Valley.’(石壁神谷) Winding down into the valley for a kilometer or so, park just before the bridge at the bottom, and a path on the right, surfaced with wooden railway sleepers, makes its way down into the valley, where the Shibi (the name means ‘stone wall’) Stream runs over a long, smooth sheet of sloping rock about 400 meters long, cutting at intervals into faults in the rock to create small cascades and deep, boiling cauldrons.

The great, flat rock is a fine place for a picnic or a bit of sun bathing, while explorers can follow traces of an old, overgrown path further downstream: the path originally continued for a couple of kilometers downhill to the top of the spectacular, 50m-high Penglai Waterfall, where a cable car (long since disused) carried hikers down to the bottom of the falls. Penglai Waterfall (蓬萊瀑布) is now always accessed from nearby Caoling (草嶺) Scenic Area; signs from route 149 point to the trailhead, from where it’s a twenty minute walk to the foot of the cataract.

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