After the killing of foreign sailors on Taiwanese soil and the resultant Mudan Incident of 1874, which threatened the Qing’s claims on Taiwan, Chinese authorities decided to beef up defenses in the south by constructing a wall around what is today’s Hengchun Township (恆春) in Pingtung County. Today, it has the distinction of being the only city wall left in Taiwan with all of its original gates still intact.
Not only are the original gates still intact, but most of the original wall is still standing, and open to the public. A walk along — and often on top of — the wall is a great way to get familiar with the town and see a bit of history. At only 2.5 km around, an hour or two on foot is enough to finish the entire loop.
Standing in front of the Hengchun bus station, the original South Gate is visible at the end of Nanmen Road (南門路, literally “South Gate Road”) nearly straight ahead. This is the most ornate of the old city gates and a fitting place to begin the walk. For over a century, this has been the gateway to Kenting (墾丁). At one point, a rail line even ran through the gate down to Nanwan (南灣). Nowadays, vehicle traffic heading to Kenting still leaves the city on this same road, but now passes around the gate in a roundabout. After taking a few moments to admire the reconstructed tower atop the gate, start your tour of the wall itself by turning east along Lane 14, Nanmen Road.
Photo: Tyler Cottenie
AROUND THE TOWN
Remnants of the wall are visible on the until the junior high school is reached. Here, a section of the wall was demolished to make room for the schoolyard. More recently, however, a steel-and-wood elevated walkway was built along the original wall’s path, allowing pedestrian traffic to continue following the route of the old city wall without blocking the schoolyard below.
On the far side of the schoolyard, the walkway reconnects to the top of the original wall, which is then intact all the way to the East Gate. The inscription above this gate, as with the South Gate, states that the gate was built in the first year of the Guangxu Emperor, i.e., 1875. At that time, the Alangyi Trail (阿朗壹古道), which connected Hengchun with Taitung County, began here. Nowadays, County Road 200 leaves from beside the gate, leading to Jialeshuei (佳樂水) on the eastern side of the National Park, or to Syuhai Village (旭海), where a section of the old Alangyi Trail is still preserved.
Photo: Tyler Cottenie
‘GHOST GRAPPLING’
After climbing back up onto the wall on the other side of the road and continuing counterclockwise, you will pass by a high platform with 36 poles underneath it. This is where the annual “ghost grappling” (搶孤) festival takes place, during which teams form human towers and try to climb up heavily greased poles to a platform above. This year’s competition is set to take place this weekend, with the festivities spanning from today to Sunday, and the main event taking place Sunday evening.
Next up is the North Gate, which is still connected to the wall and allows both vehicle traffic through it and pedestrian traffic overtop of it. The land just outside of the wall around here is still undeveloped; the landscape of wild grasses and coconut trees probably hasn’t changed much since Qing Dynasty times.
Photo: Tyler Cottenie
Back to County Road 200, where a section of the wall was again removed for the road, you will have been on the wall for an entire kilometer. The section from the East Gate to here is the longest continuous stretch of original wall still standing. After crossing the road, you may continue on top of the wall again or follow the modern paths and alleys running beside the wall for the rest of its course.
THE BUSTLING TOWN CENTER
Just 100 meters ahead is the West Gate. Be careful walking around here as scooters run through the passage frequently, sometimes at high speeds. Larger vehicles need to be careful, too: this is the gate where a campaign truck for Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) got stuck last year. A temple and plaza sit just inside the gate, making this a popular spot for locals to go for a stroll or hang out. For people watching along the wall, this is your best bet.
Photo: Tsai Tsung-hsien, Taipei Times
The remainder of the wall passes near Henchun Old Street and the bustling business area around it, including the Hengchun Night Market, which lies just outside the wall. Walking along the wall at night is not only quite a bit cooler, but is perhaps the most photogenic time as the wall is beautifully illuminated in the parks and plazas. If you start your loop of the old wall in the late afternoon, you will arrive in the West Gate area just as the sky is getting dark — and just in time to turn in toward the shops or the night market for a bite to eat. If you want to complete the entire loop first, the wall ends rather anticlimactically across from the Presbyterian Church, with the last 150 meters back to the South Gate having been demolished for roadways.
Exploring the wall is a great way to spend a couple of hours in Hengchun, at any time of day or at any time of the year. With the ghost grappling festival taking place this weekend, however, there’s never been a better time to visit. Hengchun is sure to be livelier than usual, with street performances and additional food vendors around. Climbing up onto the wall is a great way to take in the party atmosphere from above, or to get away from the crowds for a while if they become too overwhelming. Whenever you choose to visit Hengchun next, be sure to take a moment to appreciate one of Taiwan’s best preserved historical monuments, right in the heart of town.
Photo: Tyler Cottenie
Photo: Tyler Cottenie
Photo: Tyler Cottenie
On April 26, The Lancet published a letter from two doctors at Taichung-based China Medical University Hospital (CMUH) warning that “Taiwan’s Health Care System is on the Brink of Collapse.” The authors said that “Years of policy inaction and mismanagement of resources have led to the National Health Insurance system operating under unsustainable conditions.” The pushback was immediate. Errors in the paper were quickly identified and publicized, to discredit the authors (the hospital apologized). CNA reported that CMUH said the letter described Taiwan in 2021 as having 62 nurses per 10,000 people, when the correct number was 78 nurses per 10,000
As we live longer, our risk of cognitive impairment is increasing. How can we delay the onset of symptoms? Do we have to give up every indulgence or can small changes make a difference? We asked neurologists for tips on how to keep our brains healthy for life. TAKE CARE OF YOUR HEALTH “All of the sensible things that apply to bodily health apply to brain health,” says Suzanne O’Sullivan, a consultant in neurology at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London, and the author of The Age of Diagnosis. “When you’re 20, you can get away with absolute
May 5 to May 11 What started out as friction between Taiwanese students at Taichung First High School and a Japanese head cook escalated dramatically over the first two weeks of May 1927. It began on April 30 when the cook’s wife knew that lotus starch used in that night’s dinner had rat feces in it, but failed to inform staff until the meal was already prepared. The students believed that her silence was intentional, and filed a complaint. The school’s Japanese administrators sided with the cook’s family, dismissing the students as troublemakers and clamping down on their freedoms — with
As Donald Trump’s executive order in March led to the shuttering of Voice of America (VOA) — the global broadcaster whose roots date back to the fight against Nazi propaganda — he quickly attracted support from figures not used to aligning themselves with any US administration. Trump had ordered the US Agency for Global Media, the federal agency that funds VOA and other groups promoting independent journalism overseas, to be “eliminated to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law.” The decision suddenly halted programming in 49 languages to more than 425 million people. In Moscow, Margarita Simonyan, the hardline editor-in-chief of the
RSS