Kaohsiung, Taiwan

Kaohsiung well known as the second largest city in Taiwan, (founded during the Ming Dynasty, is among Taiwan’s oldest cities) and the third largest container terminal in the world after Hong Kong and Singapore, is also a major industrial center. Kaohsiung is largely built around its historical harbor. It was an important facility for the Dutch in the 17th century and continues to be a major international trading port. Waterways reach out into the city, especially the Love River, which is a top attraction in its own right. A thriving international metropolis at the southern tip of Taiwan, Kaohsiung  was the host city for the 2009 World Games. Due to the regulating effects of the marine climate, Kaohsiung is generally sunny and enjoys pleasant weather year-round. Known as “Taiwan’s Maritime Capital”, the city has worked hard in recent years to develop its tourism industry, through beautification of the urban landscape which you will see in the pictures. 

Kaohsiung has been shaped by an intensive railway network since a century ago and they have brought life into the city, and carried passengers, and goods. As an island surrounded by the sea, Taiwan counts on its seaports as gateways to the world. Seeds were sown for Kaohsiung’s destiny to become an urbanized harbor city, when the port development planning and works commenced in the early days of the Japanese Colonization Period. 

This whole post could possibly be a fun fact or boarder line ridiculous, since the both of us are still recovering from a cough and cold that left us very short on sleep. Given the circumstances, we decided to forgo an excursion to see how we were feeling. I woke up to John, our cruise director’s announcement that we had arrived and were cleared to leave the ship. Joe was still as a stone as opposed to wide awake, as he had been, when I had been up and down during the night due to coughing or going to the bathroom. As a result, we were still moving very slowly while drinking our coffee when the crew was put through their paces for emergency situations. I’ll spare you the detail but, there are a lot of bells, whistles and blaring sirens that are best left for when most passengers are off on excursions. It’s nearly unbearable without plugging your ears. Feeling like we finally had ourselves together, we left our room with the intention of taking the shuttle bus into downtown. Entering the hallway, we found crew members had donned their lifejackets and were going through their paces and assigned duties that would accompany an actual ship evacuation. My fellow former flight attendants, think recurrent training. Joe casually commented as we passed each crew member how nice they looked in their bright orange life vests. 

We stopped at Seabourn Square, which is the heartbeat of the ship to see about maps and ideas to discover the city. That is when I remembered that I had to return to the cabin for a forgotten item. During that time, the announcement came that all water safe doors were to be activated. I had no idea which of those I could pass through or not…quite frightening…as I imagined myself being squashed between two slammed doors. After boarding the bus to downtown we arrived to the drop point and realized we had no cash for riding the metro and a credit card would not work. Back on the bus, back to the terminal and inside to change money. Back to the bus and dropped downtown when we realized that the places we wanted to see where nearer the cruise terminal. Rather than humiliate ourselves further, we jumped in a cab and arrived to the Kaohsiung Museum of History. Our eager to please driver, used his translation app to point out a few sights along the way. The exhibits on regional history and culture were worth the hassle once we arrived.

Housed in what used to be the city hall was a comprehensive history of the founding and building out of the city that stands today. This museum was rich with the traditions and heritage of the city of Kaohsiung. We both really enjoyed the photographs and renditions of the railway system and ports of days gone by. There was an entire area that covered a tragic and historical event called the 228 massacre that was a anti-government uprising in 1947. Thousands of civilians were killed beginning on February 28. The incident is considered to be one of the most important events in Taiwan’s modern history and was a critical impetus for the Taiwan independence movement.

After enjoying the museum, we walked along the beautiful boardwalk that runs along the Love River toward our ship at the cruise terminal. It was a Saturday and there were many locals out enjoying the area. There is an arena called the Kaohsiung Music Center that was hosting a music festival by a band called Mayday. We could hear the music as we wandered around the area. It was a very nice way to cap off a frustrating start to our day. We felt we had a pretty good overview of the city given our rough start. Some of the things we missed out on were the tour of the stadium built for the 2009 World Games and Lotus Lake, a manmade marvel that has many temples along its banks. This lake was also home to many of the water sporting events during the World Games. I’m sure we missed some other wonderful excursions but, in truth, it was all we had in us to see the things we did. Hopefully, we can enjoy more in the next stops on this adventure. We have four more stops (Magong, Penghu Islands, Keelung, Taipei (overnight stay), Miyakojima, Miyako Japan, and Naha, Okinawa) until we have another three days at sea. Whew!