Yangming Mountain National Park

Huddled as a group trying to stay warm before we went into the rain with nurses from the ED

Hot springs

So today really reminded me of weather back in Seattle, or rather in the Cascades. The last couple days we have been spoiled with nice weather in Taipei, unfortunately we have been inside the hospital during most of it (trying to keep warm with the AC on max!). We rode up to the top of the mountain, which the road reminded me of the Road to Hana on Maui. On our way up to the top, the weather got increasingly worse... Once we got outside of the car, all of us were fully decked out in as much rain gear as possible. Some people were in bright yellow ponchos, some with umbrellas, and others with great rain gear (or some had a combination of all of the above). Thankfully my wonderful sister, Erica, let me borrow her excellent Helly Hansen jacket and I stayed perfectly dry. The park was beautiful and had Cherry Blossums blooming throughout along with a lot of other flower varieties. On our way back down the mountain we stopped at hot springs. We weren't able to get very close to these hot springs, which is a good thing because the sulfur smell was VERY strong!! It was also very evident seeing where the sulfur had left large sections of yellow rock near the hot springs. There are other places throughout the national park where you can rent the hot springs or go into a group sort of hot spring, but those were different ones than we went to.

Our nature walk was followed with a 10 course lunch! The beginning of the lunch started out a little rough because I wasn't able to feel my hands due to the numbness still residing from being out in the cold earlier that morning. We were served such a large variety of foods. My favorite was ginger and sweet potato soup, which I will be looking up a similar recipe when I get back to the states.

Once we returned back to our dorms, I instantly took a hot shower to try to take away the chill that was still inside me. Tomorrow will be the beginning of my last week here, so crazy how fast time is flying!