Iʼve mentioned this hill-climb before, but permit me to drone on. Itʼs a 90km beast of an event that lives in central Taiwan, and goes from a sleepy town that goes by the name of Hualien, meanders through the rather magnificent Taroko Gorge amidst and sometimes through enormous slabs of ancient rock so delightful that entices riders even mid-race to utter ʻooh wow!ʼ and up and up and up to a small makeshift stage where a septuagenarian Robert Plant look-a-like is doing an acappella version of Stairway To Heaven in a string vest, leather speedos and Uggs — and then up a little more, all the way up to 3,275 meters.
I mentioned this climb (named Wuling) to one of my Peloton Buddies the day before the stage up to Genting and he actually said that he found my tale hard to believe — as if Iʼd make it up! Ok, there is no septuagenarian Robert Plant look-a-like is doing an acapella version of Stairway To Heaven in a string vest, leather speedos and Uggs. Heʼs actually 64, but the rest is true.
I raced up it late last year alongside Euro-peloton veteran Michael Carter, and he, of the Grand Tours of Spain, Italy and France, said he had never seen anything like it.
So Gending, Stage 6. I suffered, yes, and my time wasnʼt knockout, but it wasnʼt really that bad. I have, as maybe you can understand if youʼve tried even jogging for a few hundred meters at close to 3,275 meters, had worse days. Yet it wasnʼt easy by any means. Itʼs very beautiful up there in the Highlands and the mountain deserves respect, with the bottom 8km close to 16% average and the same for the top 4km or so.
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Friday, March 2, 2012
Wuling: A Cycling Icon Hiding In Plain Sight
Saturday Commute
MOTC Extends Caoling Bikeway
One of the best ideas the Taiwanese Ministry of Transportation has come up with, is to use disused railway lines as bike routes. In some areas this really works out for the better.
Anyone who has cycled through hilly countryside has, at sometime or other, prayed to the bicycle gods: “Let there be a tunnel around the next corner, and preferably one without cars.”
It was, perhaps, with this in mind that Taiwan’s cycling gods (OK, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications; MOTC) designated a 2.16-kilometer section of disused railway tunnel for development as part of the Old Caoling Tunnel Bikeway.
Offered the novelty of being able to cycle through a tunnel without sharing the road with countless gravel trucks – or maybe because the air is noticeably cooler inside – many Taiwanese tourists take a tour bus or train to the town of Fulong, near the tunnel’s northern entrance, cycle 15 minutes to the other end, drink a cup of coffee or eat ice-cream, then cycle back.
The MOTC recently extended the bikeway further along the coastal highway north from the tunnel’s southern entrance by constructing a barrier to ensure separation of the above-mentioned trucks with the soft flesh of cyclists. This route allows bikers now to safely cycle back to Fulong the long way after exiting the tunnel. On the way, its gentle slopes and curves take cyclo-tourists past a plethora of historical, cultural, and culinary places of interest.