Cloud Forest Waterfalls: An idyllic summer retreat

The trailhead for the remaining two falls is clearly marked by an exuberant flourish of plastic trail ribbons to the right of road, a fifteen minute climb beyond the sharp bend in the road. The trail is wide and clear, following the contour line as it winds along the thickly forested mountainside. It's a beautiful walk, and although other hikers are far more common now than a few years ago, the vast forest through which the path passes is still wonderfully quiet and mysterious, and the forty minutes up to the second, and finest, of the three falls passes swiftly and painlessly.

Cloud Mountain Falls (雲山瀑布) is close by when the trail suddenly and shockingly emerges from the forest to cross a huge and hideous scar of earth and rock – the bed of the stream, devastated by a typhoon a year or two back. It's an unpleasant shock after the unspoilt beauty of the walk through the forest, and an eyesore that will take years to soften, but hurry across and the trail soon disappears back into the jungle, climbing stiffly for a minute or two, and then veering right towards the sound of falling water, and the snow white curtain of water now visible through the trees ahead.

Although very close to the devastation wreaked on the main stream below, countless regular hikers must be mightily grateful that Cloud Mountain Waterfall escaped damage, as it is possibly the most perfectly beautiful waterfall in Taipei County. Surrounded by a dense canopy of thick rainforest, the water falls free of the rock in a wide curtain, only to catch on a well-placed ledge two-thirds of the way down.

Fine as the view is from the path below, climb onto the rocks in the stream below the fall, and work a way carefully up through the boulders to the edge of the pool to see the waterfall at its loveliest, plunging into a deep and large plunge pool invisible from the trail. It's a truly idyllic place.

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