Life at the Foot of a Volcanic Mountain

I live on an island, just a hop, skip, and jump from the coast. Not really. You'd need to hop, skip and jump over the mountains first. Between the apartment I call "home" and the ocean lies a mountain. I live at the foot of a gorgeous volcanic mountain.

Watching the moon set

Seeing that it was still early, I could easily pull over and take in gorgeous little waterfalls

The volcano is extinct, though. But it still has sulfur springs. Some are hot enough to boil eggs in. Which people do. Just for the fun, I guess.

You can smell the sulfur as you ride up the mountain. Having lived higher up on the mountain during my previous stay in Taiwan, I've grown to love the smell. I had driven the roads around the northern tip of the island many times, usually in the small car I used to have. I called it the Silver Bullet. It was actually gray. And not too fast. The name was an optimistic take on life.

Today was my first time to drive these roads on my scooter. A friend had left me her 150CC Yamaha scooter, which has been a tremendous blessing. I'm calling the scooter Solomon, since it has three stickers on it with Salomon written on it. I'm guessing it's the snowboard company. I'll call it Solomon instead. For the wise king of Israel. Partly because I'm working on a class on church history right now. But mostly because I seek to be wise. Part of my Chinese name, in fact, is "wisdom," since that is what I seek to have.

But that's another story.

Seeing that I've been waking up at crazy hours, thanks to jet lag, I decided this morning to head up the mountain. Beat the crowds and go early. 'Cause the mountain really gets crowded on Saturdays. As in bumper-to-bumper traffic most of the afternoon.

Once you're up on the mountain, you can explore various nearby mountains, all with hot springs

By 5:30, I filled up Solomon (it cost me all of $3 to fill its tank with gas - nice!) and headed up the mountain.

There were hardly any cars on the road. Some bicycles. A few other scooters. The cars started trailing up the side roads only as I made my way down.

It didn't take long before the smell hit me. Sulfur. It made me smile. I passed the turn-off to my former home, passed the alleys leading for former friends' homes who have all since moved. Stopped at the 7-Eleven high up on the mountain to get a cup of latte. The Starbucks next door was still closed, else I may have stopped to study there.

Kiptoo and I, stopping at the top of Yangming Mountain (with the Taiwan Cultural University in the back) to enjoy some hot latte from 7-Eleven

But I kept going higher up the mountain, passing many older people who were heading out for early-morning walks. Many greeted me in Taiwanese as I waved at them. I don't speak Taiwanese, only Mandarin. But a smile and a wave transcends language barriers.

Looking down at my neighborhood... Due to the haze you cannot see it clearly, but the ocean is visible towards the top right corner of the photo

Not wishing to go all the way over the mountains to the coast (not today, I didn't want to be stuck in the traffic later in the day, plus I need to study), I turned around at the entrance to Yangming National Park and took a side road down to my neighborhood.

I took a side road down to my neighborhood

The side road is much steeper and way more curvy. You constantly have to make hairpin turns. I was glad there were only a handful of cars winding their way up the side road by that time.

Suddenly, a rock about the size of 3 baseballs landed a meter or so in front of me... I looked up and saw a whole group of macacus monkeys up in the trees right above me. They weren't happy, for whatever reason, so I didn't pause to take a picture...

Passing through the bamboo forests

As I kept winding down the mountain, I passed through bamboo forests, then past small-scale farms until the road spit me out in Tienmou, my neighborhood, where I stopped for breakfast and to come and change into something cooler.

Closer to the foot of the mountain, some small-scale farm with persimmons ripening on the tree

At the same farm, the "moon fruit" aren't ripe yet, either. These are giant grapefruit that are usually ready by Moon Festival, which is coming up next month

Entering Tienmou, I passed by two local temples. The one at the back is a Buddhist temple (it's more simplistic) while the one in the foreground is a Taoist temple

Some detail on the Taoist temple roof

Now, I'm heading out to make myself at home in some little coffee shop someplace and study.

Life at the foot of this volcanic mountain is good.

Hot. But good.

Roads, rain and rhinos

It's late Saturday night, and the rain is falling outside, a strong, constant rain, the type that makes the crops grow and that fills the dams. We use hydro-electricity, I've been told, so drought means power rationing. It makes me like the rain even more.

It's been a full day. I was up by 5:30 after having had little sleep thanks to our hotel being in Nakuru's club zone, it seems. Our hotel? Nakuru? I had taken the three interns on safari.
We left for Nakuru yesterday afternoon so we could stay at a hotel and enter the park as the gates open at 6:30, which we did in fact do. I drove the girls around with both the safari hatches on my car down, so they stood the entire time, appreciating the wildlife. We stopped for chai and a time of debriefing, reflection and prayer around 11:00. (Went to Sarova Lion Hill, which overlooks the lake. What a treat to sit there and talk about "Now what? As a result of having experienced what you had experienced, what do you believe God wants you to do differently when you return home?" This truly is one of my favorite parts of my job: walking this journey with visitors.) After the break, we drove along the lake shore for another hour or so and then headed out, the girls to go shopping, and me to have the car washed... (The lake is very salty, so it's smart to get the underbody pressure washed after driving along Lake Nakuru.) We were on the road to Eldoret by 3 and arrived home by 6, praising God for a safe journey.

Perhaps you'll understand better if I tell you that the journey between Eldoret and Nakuru is all of 160 kilometers. That's about 100 miles. It takes 3 hours because of the potholes and speed bumps. There are sections where you simply cannot go any faster than 20 kmh at the most, constantly zigzagging across the road. It's times like those that I yet again thank God for a good vehicle.

But back to our safari. (I'll upload photos in the morning. Too tired to do so now.) Some highlights:

• MOST AMAZING: It was incredible to see the sun rise and shed the most amazing light on the lake and its tens of thousands of pink flamingos!
• MOST IN NUMBER: The flamingos. They're breathtakingly beautiful. And because there are so many, you hear a constant chatter when you approach them! We also saw lots and lots and lots of other birds, including spoonbills, saddlebilled storks, pelicans, and an African fish eagle.
• CUTEST BY FAR: The baby vervet monkeys and baby olive baboons we saw. The smallest one may have been all of one week old, and it was exploring the world with great courage.
• UGLIEST: The spotted hyenas. I don't like them. They're mean.
  
• NASTIEST: We saw two olive baboons fight. One sounded like it was truly crying. The other one was bullying him...
• BIGGEST: Not sure if the herds of eland (world's biggest antelopes) were the biggest mammals we saw, or if it were the Cape Buffaloes. The heaviest, though, was certainly the rhino. Which leads me to ...
• SCARIEST: There was a lone, male white rhino that mock charged us! As we approached, I stopped, realizing that this male was so close to the road and I didn't want to annoy it. It is, after all, strong enough to tip my Land Rover! We waited, and he showed us who's the boss by first of all stomping his hind legs (kicking up grass), and then spraying to mark his territory. We waited and waited till he turned his back to the road, at which time I decided to go for it. As we got right close to him, he turned around and through his head in the air as if to say, "There! Gotcha!" My heart was pounding. I know rhinos can't see well at all, so that gives us and advantage, but he had the greatest advantage in terms of weight!
• SADDEST: Nothing, really. It's just a pity that the girls didn't get to see any of the cats in the park. The lions were as elusive as ever. Same with the leopards.

It's good to be back in my bed, though. I hope I don't dream of driving...