Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival Part II

Friday, October 16, was the final full day of the festival. Though the festival technically centers around the Wang Yeh, to onlookers it may as well center around the boat.

Here's the boat in its "garage." I took this photo back in August.


The boat is painstakingly built by a master boat builder, exquisitely painted, and decorated with carved figures of sailors from around the world. Too bad this fine work of art is destined to become ash.

Detail of three of the sailors.


So anyway, we met at Xindian Station and piled into Robert's car. But just before we left, we saw some people looking with amazement at the ground. It was a Common Bluebottle (Graphium sarpedon). Unfortunately the poor critter was injured. A spectacular specimen.



So we drove down south. First we stopped at B&Q to pick up some folding chairs. I also bought a portable step stool. A worthwhile investment, especially when trying to take photos in a crowd!

We decided to take a more scenic route this time, along the coast, which added some time to our trip, but it was worth it. We got to Kaohsiung in plenty of time to meet up with Katannya, who took the High Speed Train because she couldn't get off work earlier. We had a dinner at a dumpling house near this local landmark:


We arrived at Donggang at about 10:30 pm, and got to the temple square just as the pace of events was starting to heat up. The boat was in the square, having finished its tour of the area to collect disease and bad luck.



Here, a man is placing lanterns on the boat.



Between the boat and the golden arch, a group of Taoist priests chant prayers.


A Taoist priest burns a piece of paper. He did this at five different stations.


We returned to the temple to witness the Feasting of the Wang Yeh ritual. A total of 108 dishes are offered to the gods, who are represented by colored plaques. People not directly involved with the ritual couldn't enter the sanctuary, but we could look in. There was a good-sized crowd outside the doorway peering in, trying to get that perfect shot. Robert managed to do just that, and I've borrowed his photo here:



Here's a closeup of plaques that represent the gods.



A view of what was going on in the front area of the temple:


Colorful sedan chairs, illuminated with flashing LED lights and playing music, are lined up in front of the temple, ready to carry the Wang Yeh to the beach to board the boat. Each one is powered by a generator, which is wheeled along behind it.





At that time, Sunny and two of her friends arrived. She's a family friend who is studying in Taiwan, and they decided to come down and witness this rare cultural event. I'm glad she came down: it's a great glimpse into local culture!

A select group of men clad in yellow and wearing tasseled hats prepare for the big event: pulling the boat to the beach. Only men are afforded this honor.


Finally, at 2:00 am, it happens! We moved to the archway, which is the best place to watch the boat pass, and what occurs next is one of life's magical, sublime moments. It's a surreal feeling watching this huge boat, accompanied by the sound of drums, gongs and horns, and lit up by the flashes of fireworks, float by.

I took a great photo of it, but I felt that Robert's photo does more to capture the grandeur of this moment.


Here's one I took right as it passed by us:


The march down the street to the beach is lively with firecrackers and festivity. That's Sunny in the foreground.






As we approached the beach, the tide of people got congested. There's no choice but to go left or right. We went left, and found a spot on the beach near this sedan chair.



Next comes the wait. Slowly, the gods are invited onto the boat. The boat is surrounded by joss paper. Then one by one the masts and sails are raised: three in all. A bamboo stalk, complete with leaves, is hoisted up to serve as a windsock.

The entire process takes two to four hours. This time it took about two and a half hours. Here I again use Robert's photo, since he was up close and he has a fantastic camera.



Finally, all the gods are aboard. The anchors are placed on the boat. And at about 5:15 am, the boat is finally set alight. Firecrackers are used to ignite the joss paper kindling.



This guy looks like he walked into the depths of hell to take a photo:



Burn! Burn!


Soon the sky gets lighter as dawn approaches.


The little sailor figurines are engulfed in flame!




As the sun came up, the crowd started drifting away. We watched the boat burn for a bit; then, tired and covered with ash, we walked back to the temple. We were greeted by the rising sun lighting up the gold-leaf-covered archway, with a blue sky backdrop. Nice!



Then we went to the other Golden Arches to wash up in the bathroom and enjoy Egg McMuffins for breakfast in air-conditioned comfort.

Then we drove back to Taipei, taking turns at the wheel.

Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival Part I

Yesterday, Saturday Oct. 10, was the first day of the 2009 Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival in Donggang, in southern Taiwan. It's one of Taiwan's prime festivals, and it takes place once every three years. We went to the final day of the 2006 festival, and this time around we decided to go to the first day of this week-long event. (Next week we'll go once again to the last day, which we just learned is Friday the 16th. The boat will be set alight on what will technically be Saturday morning.)

Robert wrote two interesting articles on this festival:

1. Taiwan Today
2. Wall Street Journal

We drove down south and overnighted in the city of Pingdong. The next morning we drove to Donggang, where the festival takes place.

Wang Yeh (wang ye, Royal Lords) are an aspect of Chinese folk religion. They are the spirits of what were once real, historical people, who centuries after their deaths have been elevated to divine status. Representatives from Wang Yeh temples all over Taiwan converge on Donggang for the festival, carrying their local gods in sedan chairs.

The festivities focus on Donglong Temple, with much of the activities happening in the temple square. On the first day, Wen Hong, the god of Donglong Temple, is carried outside and the doors to the inner sanctuary are ceremonially sealed during his absence.

Here's a scene from the ceremony in which the god is brought out. You can see, on the right, under the twin paper lanterns, the sanctuary door is open in the background.


The characters on the two lanterns above the doorway read "Inspection tour on behalf of Heaven," which is what is about to happen during the week: the gods go around on an inspection tour of the area, and will report their findings to Heaven.

A palanquin bearer, wearing the characteristic hat, inspects the sedan chair in which the temple god will be carried.


Music fills the air. Inside the temple, a group of young musicians play the suona, a double-reeded horn which sounds somewhat like a bagpipe.


Next, the gods are carried in their palanquins across the temple square, past the Wang Yeh boat still waiting in its "garage," through the golden arch on the far end of the square, and into the city streets.

The temple square is jam-packed with palanquin bearers, devotees and tourists. During this festival, Donglong Temple has been designated daitianfu: "Temple in Lieu of Heaven."


Make way for the King! Temple god Wen Hong is carried in his sedan chair.


Along the way, there are drums, gongs, fireworks along the pilgrimage to the beach. Finally, we approach the seaside.

A palanquin bearer cools down with a refreshing Taiwan Beer.


Dozens of palanquins are lined up on the sandy shore.


Lots of colorful characters can be seen here.




One of the gods arrives by sea.


Just beyond the lined up sedan chairs is a stretch of open sand in front of a stage, where another ceremony takes place. At this ceremony, the presiding Wang Yeh is chosen.



We had been told that the name is chosen by spirit mediums who write characters in the sand. We saw them carrying sticks presumably for that purpose, but either there were too many people or we were looking in the wrong place because we didn't see the sand-writing taking place. In any case, the name was chosen: with fanfare, firecrackers, cheers and a release of balloons, it was announced that the presiding Wang Yeh was named Luo.

Afterwards, the procession started in earnest, with all the sedan chairs being carried to another temple in the city, the first in a tour of many temples in the area.

We decided to go have dinner while we waited for the next major act of the day: the firewalk. On their return to the temple, the sedan-chair bearers walk barefoot through coals to purify themselves.

At around 7:00pm, the coals were burning with fierce heat.


The coals are smoothed out, and rice is tossed onto the coals as an offering. It bursts into a blaze with plumes of smoke rising into the night sky.


Next, salt is tossed on the coals, which lowers the temperature "so they don't get barbecued," the announcer said.


And across they go.


After crossing the coals, they left the temple grounds, went onto the street, and came back, forming a continuous loop of people streaming across the coals. I don;t know how many times they had to make the circuit.

Even SpongeBob was there to witness the festivities.


At night, the palanquins are lit up with colorful lights.


Festive fireworks enliven an already intense evening.




And this is only the first day!

On Friday the 16th, we go back down to Donglong Temple for the culmination of the festival: the Boat Burning!!

To get an idea of what it's like, check out the video I made for the last festival. Just click on the following YouTube link:

2006 Wang Yeh Boat Burning Festival

Jiajiuliao Hike

Last Saturday we did one of our favorite trails, the Jiajiuliao Trail, near Wulai. It was threatening rain, and this trail, clear, wide, level and not muddy, is a good trail for rainy days. We went here last February, so I blogged in more detail at that time. But this time we had some new people along, including Sunny, the daughter of long-time family friends.

Here we are in the hut.

Paradise Lost and Regained: Daxi River

This is the tale of our adventures on Daxi River, one of our favorite destinations near Taipei.

It all started in late spring of 2006, when we trekked along a previously unexplored (by us) trail starting from a farmhouse on Highway 007, and headed downhill along the Daxi River, which flows out at the fishing town of Daxi on the east coast, north of Yilan. I still remember the farmer's words of warning to us as we began the trek: "You won't make it by nightfall." Turned out he was right: we spent the last hour hiking through the woods on a leechy, overgrown trail in pitch dark, with just a couple of tiny flashlights to light our way. (But oooh, the fireflies!) Our hopes were finally buoyed when we saw, on the opposite hillside, a house with the lights on. We knew a road had to be nearby, and that we were coming to civilization.

That hike was a mixed bag: a mixture of tribulations and amazing discoveries. The biggest discovery of all was a fantastic-looking waterfall we observed from far up on the hillside trail. Unfortunately I didn't bring my camera that day.

On the way, we crossed the river a number of times, noticing that it seemed easily walkable. We were determined to come back someday and walk up the river to the waterfall.

The day came a couple months later.

We organized a group of perhaps 6 or 7 people, and "river traced" up the Daxi River.


Along the way, we scrambled over boulders and stopped to cool off in refreshing pools.



The surrounding mountains and jungle were gorgeous, and we noticed as we hiked up that there were no traces of human presence: not a scrap of litter or any artificial structures. The water was crystal clear, teeming with fish, including Taiwan shoveljaw carp (Varicorhinus barbatulus), which flash their silvery bodies in the sun.



As we hiked up, the trail got rockier. On our first hike, we stopped by a pool and had lunch, wondering how much farther it would be until we got to the elusive waterfall.





One member of our group went on to explore as we waited, and found our destination just 10 minutes beyond:

The waterfall!


Since that day, we've made this an annual hike, ideal for summer because of the cool water and the beauty of the place. And after each hike, we'd go and have a seafood dinner in Daxi, often buying fish at the harbor fish market and having a local restaurant cook it up for us.

Daxi Fish Market








The following year, we went there again. Here, Robert and Christian discovered a trail that brought them around to the top of the waterfall:



On this watery trail there are other interesting diversions, like the Massage Waterfall:





And the Power Waterfall

Robert taking in the power


Paradise Lost

After several memorable visits in 2006 and 2007, we decided to go again in 2008. This time wasn't so enjoyable. First, the air was filled with smoke from several brush fires that were burning along the river. We decided to quicken our pace by hiking along the trail that was up on the hillside. But when we were getting close to the waterfall area, we encountered some illegal hunters who didn't want us there scaring the game away. (They were presumably hunting barking deer and/or wild boar.) We took a trail down to the river, where we encountered yet another person, who seemed concerned that we were there. (It turned out he was the guy who lives at the house on the hillside, the same house that had given us hope a couple years before.) Dejected, we went back with the feeling that our secret paradise had been spoiled.

Paradise Regained

We went back on September 6, 2009. The weather looked promising and, according to Trailhacker, who owns a house near the trailhead, the local mulberry trees were bearing ripe fruit.

So we went. The weather was perfect, and the mulberries were delicious! And the area was teeming with butterflies. And the water and air were clear. We hiked up the river, as usual, and encountered no one. (Only bad point: we did find a few piles of garbage farther upstream, evidence of illegal fishing activities, since this is a closed stream. We cleaned up all the garbage we found.)

I had forgotten my camera, so I started using my cell phone as a backup. But early into the hike, my cell phone fell into the river. I managed to grab it after it was submerged for a second, and took it apart and let it dry for 24-hours. Surprisingly, it works fine now!! So anyway, all the photos below from Sunday's hike were taken by Robert.

An extraordinary specimen of Blue Pansy (Junonia orithya)


Four species
Common Jay (Graphium doson postianum)
Common Bluebottle (Graphium sarpedon connectens)
Chocolate Albatross (Appias lyncida formosana)
Common Mapwing (Cyrestis thyodamas formosana)


Mulberries!


And of course, this time we made it all the way to the waterfall, where we had a nice swim!


And discovered that those funny little fish behind the waterfall are juvenile Monk Goby: they climb up the wet rock walls eating algae, using their front pair of fins like arms. Later they swim downriver out to sea to mate, returning to the river to spawn. More than one hiker has mistaken them for leeches.

Monk Goby (Sicyopterus japonicus)


It was a truly enjoyable day, which, as usual, we topped off with a meal at the seafood restaurant. The meal included Yellowtail Barracuda! (A little bony, but very tasty!)

Dinner: Yellowtail Barracuda (Sphyraena flavicauda)


And this is the view of Turtle Island as we round a corner on the road from the trailhead, driving toward the coast (photo taken by me in 2006):