Babel School in Taiwan

Pewnego upalnego letniego dnia natknęłam się na mały park w Xindian 新店, park ten nazywa się Dafeng 大豐公園. Jest on położony w pobliżu szpitala katolickiego, Cardinal Tien Hospital 耕莘醫院, niedaleko szkoły podstawowej Dafeng 大豐國小. 

Późna jesień w Taipei w niczym nie przypomina polskiej jesieni - brak jesiennych kolorów, deszczu, szarugi i przymrozków. W tym roku przełom listopada i grudnia przyniósł przepiękną pogodę, bezchmurne niebo i wręcz letnie temperatury.

W samym centrum wielkiej metropolii, niedaleko największego uniwersytetu (National Taiwan University) w upalne letnie dni można się przyjemnie ochłodzić w parku wodnym. I to nie jednym! Niedaleko stacji metra Gongguan znajduje się nie jeden, a dwa parki wodne. Jeden z nich to Road Castle 洛德城堡  , a drugi to Taipei Water Park 自來水園區 . Ten pierwszy jest dla ... dużych dzieci, młodzieży i dorosłych, a ten drugi dla ... dzieci.

Everybody (nature class teacher + two Polish moms + Taiwanese dads + kids) met at the exit 2 of the Elephant Mountain MRT Station. While waiting for the class to start, kids got a chance to climb some trees. On the way to the mountain trail entrance kids could try yummy seeds which made their tongues blue. The beginning of the trail that we took is right behind the Taipei City Hospital Songde Branch 臺北市立聯合醫院松德院區. And so the climb started: Here is the trunk of the elephant: Views from the top of Elephant Mountain are breathtaking: On the way down we went through a “Thread of the Sky", a narrow crack between two huge rocks: More stairs, but this time leading us down back to the city below:

Last time we went for a nature walk to the campus of National Taiwan University was in May and you can read about it HERE . This time it was a bit different - less leaves on the trees, more on the ground 😉 and also more birds around. Hong Kong Orchid Tree - Bauhinia × blakeana - 艷紫荊 Red-jasmine - Plumeria rubra - 紅花緬梔 (紅雞蛋花) Taiwanese rain tree - Koelreuteria elegans - 台灣欒樹 Camphor tree - Cinnamomum camphora - 樟樹 - Cynamonowiec kamforowy Ginkgo - Ginkgo Biloba - 銀杏 - Miłorząb dwuklapowy Australian pine tree - Casuarina equisetifolia - 木麻黃 - Kazuaryna a.k.a. Rzewnia skrzypolistna Paperbark tree - Melaleuca - 白千層 Tiger's claw (Sunshine tree) - Erythrina variegata - 刺桐 - Erytryna zmienna  Mountain gum - Eucalyptus tereticornis - 細葉桉 There is a small pond on the campus. It's a nice spot to observe water birds. There are also some turtles and fishes.  White-breasted waterhen -...

One of December nature class walks took us to Xianjiyan in Jingmei 景美仙跡岩. It was our second time there. I wrote about our first hike in March 2016 HERE  and HERE . This time we started our walk from the other direction, as the previous entrance to the trail was destroyed by landslide. We had to climb many, many stairs which led us through the old housing neighbourhood. It's hard to believe, but there are still people living in these houses. You can see a few old graves hidden among the bushes. Climbing up we enjoyed the wonderful views of whole Taipei. Despite the weather, which was wet and cloudy, Taipei still looked impressive. On almost all the hills and mountains in Taipei you can find bigger or smaller temples. This one had an impressive library. On the way down we saw a very unique tree - a rock hugging ficus. Other interesting features we found included a face on a rock, carved in a rock character ...