The Tengjhih National Forest Recreation Area (藤枝森林遊樂區) in Kaohsiung is to reopen on Friday next week after a nearly 12-year hiatus.
The forest park in the city’s Taoyuan District (桃源) has been closed since parts of the park were flooded and many roads were damaged during Typhoon Morakot in 2009.
The park would be open to up to 500 visitors from 8am to 5pm daily, officials from the Pingtung Forest District Office said yesterday, adding that no accommodation would be provided.
Photo: Hsu Li-chuen, Taipei Times
An online booking system for visits to the park showed that it is fully booked until May 16.
After the 12-year respite, the park’s trees and vegetation have grown taller and richer, office deputy director Chu Mu-sheng (朱木生) said.
The recreation area, which is at an altitude of 1,500m to 1,800m, is often shrouded in mist, he said, adding that this makes visits to the park special.
Photo: Yang Chin-cheng, Taipei Times
While a major trail is not open due to unstable foundations, visitors can choose four other routes at different levels of difficulty — the Begonia Trail, the Taiwan Rhododendron Trail, the Morrison Spruce Trail and the Sea of Trees Trail, he said.
In other news, Tainan’s Baihe District Office yesterday opened its annual lotus festival, a series of events running until the end of July.
The district’s lotus fields at their peak covered 400 hectares, the office said.
However, as farmer who plant and tend to the flowers age, the fields shrank to 290 hectares last year and to 170 hectares this year, it said, adding that a shortage of irrigation water also contributed to this year’s situation.
Additional reporting by Yang Ching-cheng
Organizing one national referendum and 26 recall elections targeting Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators could cost NT$1.62 billion (US$55.38 million), the Central Election Commission said yesterday. The cost of each recall vote ranges from NT$16 million to NT$20 million, while that of a national referendum is NT$1.1 billion, the commission said. Based on the higher estimate of NT$20 million per recall vote, if all 26 confirmed recall votes against KMT legislators are taken into consideration, along with the national referendum on restarting the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant, the total could be as much as NT$1.62 billion, it said. The commission previously announced
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday welcomed NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s remarks that the organization’s cooperation with Indo-Pacific partners must be deepened to deter potential threats from China and Russia. Rutte on Wednesday in Berlin met German Chancellor Friedrich Merz ahead of a ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of Germany’s accession to NATO. He told a post-meeting news conference that China is rapidly building up its armed forces, and the number of vessels in its navy outnumbers those of the US Navy. “They will have another 100 ships sailing by 2030. They now have 1,000 nuclear warheads,” Rutte said, adding that such
Tropical Storm Nari is not a threat to Taiwan, based on its positioning and trajectory, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Nari has strengthened from a tropical depression that was positioned south of Japan, it said. The eye of the storm is about 2,100km east of Taipei, with a north-northeast trajectory moving toward the eastern seaboard of Japan, CWA data showed. Based on its current path, the storm would not affect Taiwan, the agency said.
The cosponsors of a new US sanctions package targeting Russia on Thursday briefed European allies and Ukraine on the legislation and said the legislation would also have a deterrent effect on China and curb its ambitions regarding Taiwan. The bill backed by US senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal calls for a 500 percent tariff on goods imported from countries that buy Russian oil, gas, uranium and other exports — targeting nations such as China and India, which account for about 70 percent of Russia’s energy trade, the bankroll of much of its war effort. Graham and Blumenthal told The Associated Press