Hiking adventure

Well...I said "bring on the next adventure".....On my day off this week, I did have quite an adventure- I spontaneously decided to go hiking...alone. I know most people who know me cannot believe I would actually choose to go hiking...but anyway, I did. There's several mountains surrounding Nankan and one has what I had heard was a park...well it's actually called a "forest path" and well, in actuality it's a series of very steep paths going up and down a close mountain. It was an extreme workout for me and one that left me completely drenched with sweat and extremely sore! Things were going great for awhile and I was pleasantly surprised by the lovely forest and mountain breeze and then I decided to take a path that turned out to be a very, very bad idea. This path was marked with temporary signs instead of the old wooden ones (I course couldn't read any of them, but this should've been my first clue) and it lead into really, really dense forest where there were a lot of strange animal sounds and the biggest bugs I've ever seen in my life. Also, there weren't any other hikers on this path, so I was alone in a dark, scary forest with really freaky sounds and bugs. My heart was racing, but I was descending the mountain, so I assumed I'd end up at the bottom and back in town and then suddenly I popped out at this cement road and a huge abandoned cement building with a typical Chinese temple behind it. There was no one around still, so the abandoned building was interesting, but creepy. Then I figured this road would lead me back to civilization so I started down it only to come up to a construction site and as I started to walk past it- 6 huge black dogs ran out and started after me!! I already hate big dogs and to have 6 of them walking toward me and snarling at me and barking so loudly...I was freaked out! So, I had 2 seconds to decide whether to scream for help or just back away slowly and climb back UP the mountain and go back the way I came. I decided rather than risk the humiliation of some construction workers laughing at this stupid foreigner who was probably treading on private property...I slowly walked away and then had to climb all the way back up the mountain I had just descended! It was awful and felt like a nightmare. I had visions of the dogs ripping my flesh apart and some strange forest critters attacking me in the dark forest or some creepy person coming out of the abandoned building...Finally, I made it back up the mountain to the point where I had strayed down this horrific path and went back the way I came and was so relieved to pass other hikers again! So, it started as a nice scenic workout...but turned into more of an adventure than I bargained for. Next time, I'll just stick to jogging on the roof and staying home!!


The view of Taoyuan (town next to NanKan) from the mountain top and part of the non-creepy forest path.