Sunday 15 September 2013

We decided to take a trip to Keelung this weekend and then travelled up to Fulong Beach on the sunday. Fortunately the weather was on our side this time it rained the whole 2 days we were last in Keelung City. We stayed at the E-coast star hotel its about a 10 minute walk from the railway station. The hotel looked new in fact it was quite smart it cost us £54 for the night including breakfast, the hotel is a 10 minute walk from the temple night market as it was a nice night the market was packed, we also had the added attraction of a giant cruise liner berthed in the harbour. This was the biggest cruise liner I had ever seen apparently it has 15 decks , it looked like a floating hotel, all the outside cabins had balconies, the ship left around 8pm the promenade around the harbour front was absolutely packed with people taking photos, it did look pretty spectacular as it manoevered its way out the port.  On the sunday after breakfast which wasn't too bad incidentally we went to Fulong by bus it costs NT75 each and takes about an hour up the coast road.  In places along the route the scenery was really spectacular I thought it would be great taking a scooter or a bike ride this way, the road seemed pretty flat almost the whole time hugging the coast on the rocks you could see loads of people fishing. We got to Fulong around noon and went on the beach we had to pay NT100 dollars each first though, the beach was ok quite sandy and the water wasn't particularly deep, nice and warm though. I guess it would be a good place to go surfing, amenities on the beach were a bit sparse a few rows of sun umbrellas and what I think was a small bar, I never really investigated it. We were only there for 2 hours but I really caught the sun when it was out at one point we got a squally shower, after wards I thought had we spent the whole day there I really would have got severely burned, if you ever visit there take plenty of sun cream.  We then got the bus to Juifen on the way back towards Keelung. Once the bus turns off the coast road be prepared for a winding trip up the hill, the driver as usual was a bit of a lunatic but to be fair to him it probably was the best way to drive fairly quickly up that hill, the fare was NT30 from outside the visitor centre in Fulong.