At the speed of thought (with pictures)

OK, this is going to be heavy on pictures.

Today I am going to tell you about the trip we made on the Taiwan High Speed Rail link, from Taipei in the north, to Kaoshung in the south.



The trains are Japanese built and based on the famous Shinkansen trains which pretty much set the standard for high speed rail travel in Japan way back in the 60s. The Japanese trains of the 60s reached speeds of around 200 km/h (124 mph). Now they run at speeds of up to 300 kmh (186 mph) as do the Taiwanese models.



The trains look as though they belong on a Star trek set, but unless you're a real train geek, the technical details are probably boring. I would recommend you have a quick look at the excellent Wiki page though, which has maps, pictures, and a few technical details which you can skim over. Hey, they travel at nearly 200 mph, what more do you need to know?

We took the train from Taipei Main Station, the most northerly station currently in service, and near our old home in Nanjing Don Lu, right down to the most southern station, Zuoying in Kaoshung.



I know Taipei well, but I had never been to Kaoshung, Taiwan's second biggest city. The entire journey from one end to the other is about 335 km (208 miles) and the train we took stopped only twice, in Banciao and Taichung. Conventional trains would take about 4.5 hours to make the journey. The Shinkansen trains take about 90 minutes.

I don't know anything about the technology behind these trains, but I did notice that they appeared to be powered by overhead cables. The concept seems old and clunky juxtaposed with the space-age appearance of the vehicles. But a lot of trains are powered electrically, and with good reason. Electrical motors have a huge advantage over internal combustion engines in heavy vehicles because they provide better torque at low revs. This you see makes gearboxes and clutch mechanisms less of an issue. Intercity trains in UK are driven electrically, but the power for them is generated on board by an internal combustion engine, in case you wanted to know.

OK, I'm not going to recount the whole journey for you. It was fast and comfortable. It felt much like an ordinary train. Things flashed past the window quite fast, but other than that, the only indication that we were travelling at the speed of thought was a scrolling led display which occasionally informed passengers of the current lary speed. I couldn't work out when the display was going to inform us of the speed, it appeared to be quite random, so I sent much of the journey perched, camera in hand, looking over the back of the seat trying to get a picture. I'm immature like that.



One thing that occurred to me was the fact that our train had 12 carriages, and there were 100 seats in our carriage. That's a lot of people if there's a 180 mph accident.

Kaoshung was OK, much like every other Asian city I've ever seen. We hired a tandem bicycle with a baby seat and went cycling round the city.



I'm sure it was outrageously dangerous. We spent some time on the beach looking for shells and watching the waves.



And we visited the light house, which was a long way up a mountain.



And on the way down we passed an old gun battery from the Ching dynasty apparently, and a radio beacon station. We also took the ferry across the harbour.



The most amazing thing we did in Kaoshung however, was eat raw lobster. I was quite proud of myself actually. Shellfish scares me. I rarely eat it because I am violently allergic to crab. In fact I have only in recent years plucked up the courage to eat lobster at all, and I only ever eat a small amount. It was therefore a fairly terrifying moment when I agreed to sample the raw lobster. It came to the table waving at us, I shit you not ladies and gentlemen, the bugger was gesticulating wildly. What's more, the damn thing was cut in half by that time. It's not for the squeamish.



In fact, once you get over the 'ohmygod-that's-disgusting' factor, it really doesn't taste too bad. It's sweet, and cold obviously, but not really fishy at all. I wouldn't want it every day, but I'm glad I had the experience. Of course, being Taiwan, there had to be a final shocking twist in the process, and this time it was lobster blood, which arrived at the table in a paper cup, mixed with alcohol. Lobster blood is blue apparently, and one is supposed to drink it because it's good for you.



I tried it, I didn't like it. I won't be doing it again. The oddest thing about lobster blood, is that it becomes gelatinous. We discovered this when we knocked over the cup, no one had been brave enough to sample more than a single sip, and the contents more flopped onto the table than ran over it. It's foul. You should do it once to say you've been there, and then never look back. Actually, my sister in law told me the following day that it wasn't lobster blood at all, but lobster wee. Not a pleasant thought.

In the evening we ate fried dumplings, which was altogether much less dramatic than the lobster. We also walked along the banks of the "Love River" which I understand used to be awash with raw sewage but now is really rather nice.



We played in the fountains, drank coffee, and ambled back to the station around 10pm. I did the tourist thing and bought a t-shirt...



... and a model of the T700T train for Dumpy.



I don't think I have ever put that many pictures in a single entry before.