Taiwanese Parks Continued. Why? Because I've had four days off to see every park in the county.

As I believe I have mentioned in one of my blogs, or at least I hope I have mentioned, I have four extra days off prior to the Chinese New Year in which I am able to come up with random things to do. Last week it was the parks and this week it is going to the big city. So with that said I will continue documenting my vacation.

I would like to be able to say that I was very inspired to help clean up the park system on this day. We had just begun our adventure's and I had found a broom and still had enough energy to work. I swept a few strokes and posed long enough to take the picture and then run up the mountain. You will notice by my attire that the weather is still warm enough to sometimes walk around in short sleeves. It sure feels good to have warm weather all through the year. So after I dropped the broom we, Laura, Joseph and myself, began our long march up the mountain.

When we reached the top of the mountain we found an interestind shrine. It looked more like a house with a tiny shrine in it and I thought it was quite odd. There were a few Taiwanese people there but I failed to ask what is was all about because I didn't think they would understand my broken and very weak Chinese skills. So even today I sit and wonder, trying to figure out exactly what it is that goes on up there in the mountains. In this picture it looks as if it is a home. There was a well kept garden on top as well as a sink, stove but no bed. So I'm not sure if someone is sleeping under the stars up here or if it is some kind of awesome rest area. If anyone has any bright ideas I would love to hear what they might be, but as of now I have no answer for you.

As I have mentioned before the parks in Taiwan can easily beat out the average park in America. Central Park in New York has no match of course, but the Davis County Parks just don't quite measure up to the parks here in Feng Yuan. With that said, this is a picture from the top of the mountain which we climbed. One can kind of see the city down below.

This was our second trip to the first park we attended last Friday. As you can see we were getting rather restless and Joseph had to get a little bit of energy out. Actually I think all of us had to burn a little energy. Joseph decided to do it by acting like a sloth and I opted for the Spiderman look. I'm trying to look evil, but it doesn't always work. Sometimes I just look like a goofball instead.

Although the next pictures looks happy and content there are a few incidents which happened behind the scenes which kind of destroy the happiness behind it all. As I was getting ready to hang my feet over the bar I stepped in sand of course. Well I wasn't really thinking about it and when I finally decided to hang down I ended up eating sand, a lot of it. It wasn't exactly the appetizer I had hoped for, but you can't be too picky in Taiwan. Also, because I was wearing my backpack, it also ended up with sand on it. When I came home that evening I made the mistake of putting it on my bed. So after I had taken a shower and spit out all the sand I still got to sleep with sand in my bed. I suppose that if I made my bed more often I wouldn't have that problem but that can be another story. Also, when I flipped upside-down I realized that I had 36 NT dollars in my pocket. It fell out of course and in the end I only found 21 dollars. It was a sad experience but I learn a lot of lessons trying to act cool while taking the picture.

As if spending all day at the parks on Friday wasn't enough, my exchange family wanted me to go for a bike ride Saturday morning at 8:30. So we went on a 2.5 hour bike ride and I am pleased to tell you that I didn't die. The first picture is of the father, Thomas, and me on a bridge over a large river.