Therese in Taiwan: Yehliu Geopark 野柳地質公園

As I mentioned in my earlier blog entry, my friends and I went to Yehliu Geopark. It is a 1, 700-meter long cape located at the north coast of Taiwan. The entrance ticket costs 25 NT (~PhP 37.5) for students/children above 115cm/senior citizens and the regular price is 50NT (~PhP 75), if I'm not mistaken. The entrance is waived for disabled people.

I did not take up a lot of science courses back when I was in university because I belonged to the College of Arts and Letters, but let me try to sound a bit knowledgeable in the field of geology for a moment.

Yehliu is full of seawater-eroded holes as well as numerous rocks in various shapes due to the rock layer of the nearby seashore containing limestone subject to marine erosion, weathering, and earth movements... Yes, you caught me! I actually just copied that statement up there off the official brochure.

There are actually a lot of rocks in the area - mushroom rocks, candle rocks, honeycombed rocks, ginger rocks, tofu rocks, etc., so I'm pretty sure you're going to see something you'll find interesting.

Mushroom rocks

One of my friends really like hiking, so we decided to walk the entire cape up to the scenic outlook. We didn't regret it because the view was amazing! We stayed there for quite some time, just taking in the fact that we were surrounded by this immense body of water. I found it to be very peaceful and relaxing.

The main attraction of Yehliu is the Queen's Head. The first picture below is how it originally looked like (picture taken from the brochure), but because of the continuous eroding process, the neck is slowly becoming narrower and narrower (see second picture). There are some people who fear that after a couple more years, the Queen's Head might totally be deformed. Be sure to look at it yourself before that happens.

How it originally looks like

Back of the Queen's Head, how it currently looks like

Operating hours 8:00AM-5:00PM

How to get there via public transportation:

You actually have a lot of options in getting there. As for us, we got off at the MRT Zhongxiao Fuxing Exit 2 (捷運忠孝復興站，出口2). Nearby is a bus stop with buses heading straight to Yehliu (I think it's bus number 1815, if I'm not mistaken. You should check out the signboard just to make sure.)

More information can be found in their website: http://www.ylgeopark.org.tw