Dateline: Kaohsiung

Kaohsiung, the second largest city in Taiwan, is located at the south west corner of Taiwan, a 55-minute flight from the Taipei domestic airport. It has a huge container port and a good hospitality college.

I stayed in the Gold Chain Hotel and had a decent, “Holiday Inn-ish” room for US$35 a night including breakfast and the use of the gym. Tel: (07) 223 3775. Email: gd233291@ms27.hinet.net

A notice stickered to the wall of my bathroom in room 2212 said:

That reminds me of a letter I received at The Point many years ago:

“Dear Mr. Carter, I want to tell you that my visit to your home/hotel was distinctly marred by the affluent gushing out of the ground near the boat house one morning.”

I answered by explaining that “the ‘affluent’ was actually pure ‘effluent’ – resulting from our monthly flushing of the reserve freshwater storage tanks.”

(In fact, I created ‘The Point’ specifically for those who know the difference between affluent and effluent…many don’t!)

The best place to eat in Kaohsiung is the new Lotus at #396 Ming-Chern 2nd Road; tel: 07-5577775. There are lovely original oils of Lotus flowers above each table and a fresh example on the table. Really wonderful Taiwanese food in an expensively-architected, romantic space. Very reasonable.

Less wonderful place to eat: Ruth’s Chris Steak House. In spite of the efforts of Victor Young, the manager, the flowers are fake, the service insincere. Of course the steaks are great, but for US$100 each, with a couple of glasses of house red, they better be.

I took the train three and a half hours north along the east coast to the jumping off place for Green Island, a one-hour catamaran ferry ride. Green Island is famous for its hot springs. I walked the 4 miles from the town to discovered that the hot spring was a round pool about 30 feet in diameter. Oh well, the walk was good exercize.

My hotel was about as basic as one can find, but the newest in town has nice bedrooms and good food. Fortune Hotel/Teashop.

There was a wreck of an hotel on the way to the hot springs. I thought it would be a great place to develop and wondered why no one had done it. That evening at dinner, our waiter said it was haunted. Huh?.......

A temple on a back street in the town:

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