貓空 Maokong

This weekend I finally made it to Maokong 貓空, a hilly area to the south of the city proper, best reached by the gondola from the Taipei Zoo MRT stop (NT$60, or NT$50 for students like me).

The gondola ride is very impressive indeed, swaying gently over several thickly wooded ridges crammed with bamboo and all sorts of other vegetation.

There are actually two classes of gondola ride – the standard and the deluxe ‘crystal’ ride, the latter with a glass-bottomed cabin and insanely long queues, the former with perfectly good angled windows and almost no waiting at all.

When you finally reach Maokong the feel is a little like an Indian hill station (but colder and damper, at least this weekend).

Tea is definitely the focus, with various cafes and teahouses scattered along the few winding roads, and small hedges of the stuff in places.

Some of the teahouses have trays of leaves drying outside, and the Taiwan Tea Promotion Centre even dispenses free mugs of Tieguanyin, and has an impressive garden.

For some reason the only thing I took photographs of was this fallen leaf – I like it a lot.

This cafe (the one with the white-painted woodwork and the cat in its logo – I’m really not sure what the name was, but turn left out of the gondola stop) has very impressive tea and waffles, which I can’t recommend highly enough.

After lurking a bit too long, the weather turned chilly, and the sun began to set in a beautiful way over Taipei during the return gondola ride.