Taiwan Today

Yushan National Park of Taiwan came into official existence on April 10, 1985. An earlier attempt by the Japanese colonial authorities to create a park in the same region floundered with the advent of World War II. Interestingly, the Japanese and ROC governments each took four decades to reach the same conclusion: the land around the highest mountain in Taiwan deserves close protection, if not outright reverence. It is a conclusion that most observers have come to over the years. One of the first recorded impressions of Yushan, or Jade Mountain, is found in Chinese travel writer Yu Yung-ho's 1697 account of a visit to Taiwan. "Yushan stands amidst 10,000 mountains," he wrote. "It is uniquely tall. There's no distance at which it cannot be seen. It has a precipitous crag. It is white like silver, and appears at a distance covered in snow. It can be seen, but not reached. The mountain is like jade." While an obviously fanciful second-hand report, Yu's description does give an early sense of the power the 3,952-meter peak can hold over the imagination. This is especially true for the Bunun, among the earliest inhabitants in the region. Evidence of settlement in the Yushan area goes back 1,000 years to small bands who lived on river terraces in areas such as modern-day Dongpu. While many Bunun live today in Dongpu, they are not likely the descendents of these earlier people. Originally, the Bunun lived on the western plains and migrated to the central mountains around 300 years ago. Regardless of when they arrived, for Bunun Yushan is “Tongku Saveq,” the sanctuary, and the final resting place for the spirits of ancestors. The mountain has a central place in Bunun mythology, and according to older tribesmen, in the past the peak could only be climbed for ceremonial purposes. Yushan National Park covers some of the wildest and most rugged terrain in Taiwan. Even today there are few roads through the region and few permanent settlements. During the Qing dynasty little effort was made to administer the territory until the late 19th century (and this was only in direct response to foreign powers eyeing Taiwan's strategic location and abundant resources). Then defense commander Shen Pao-chen recommended that three cross-island routes be established. These would both pacify mountain tribes, and show an envious world that the Qing had actual control over more than just a thin sliver of the west coast of Taiwan. In 1875 the Batongguan old road was hacked across the spine of Taiwan. It ran 153 kilometers from Zhushan in Nantou County to Yuli in Taitung County, crossing through what is now the national park. By 1890, the trail had been abandoned. Aboriginal attacks, the threat of disease and washouts were too much for Qing authorities. In the end it did not matter, as just five years later Taiwan was ceded to the Japanese. The modern history of Yushan was just beginning. When the Japanese began their colonization of Taiwan, they had big plans for exploiting the island's natural resources. In 1896, a Japanese officer was given the lonely and dangerous task of scouting the Yushan area. His climb to the main peak, part of a 17-day adventure, is the first recorded ascent, though doubtlessly aboriginals had been there first. For the next two decades there were frequent climbs, mostly by teams of Japanese scientists and engineers. Recreational climbing began in the 1920s after a series of deliberate moves by the Japanese to open the mountains to ordinary people (and hence tame them, in a sense). First the colonial government reopened the Batongguan trail, and established a side-route up to the main peak. Then in 1926 they opened a second route that began in Alishan. This was a long trail, almost 50 kilometers. A few years later, when the railway from Chiayi to Alishan was extended to Tatajia, climbers began to hitch a ride as far as they could. The number and type of hikers expanded as a result. In 1921, only a few dozen adventurous souls dared tackle the mountain; by the end of the 30s, middle-school-aged girls were hiking it as a graduation trip. Part of the appeal of Yushan, then as now, is its beauty and grandeur. The region sits on the junction of two colliding plates, the Philippine and Eurasian, and is marked by deep valleys, high cliffs, rugged peaks, and thick forests. For the Japanese, there was another reason: Yushan was the highest peak in the empire, 176 meters higher than revered Mt. Fuji. In 1897, it was renamed Niitakayama, or New High Mountain. As an interesting historical aside, the code name for the attack on Pearl Harbor was "Climb Niitakayama." Such was the fame of Yushan, and such was the respect it was garnering in Japanese circles that in 1937 the Governor General of Taiwan selected 185,000 hectares of land in the Yushan-Alishan area to comprise a national park. World War II unfortunately scuttled the plans and for a long period after the war, conservation of the environment took a back seat to development. But one cannot keep a good mountain down, and by the late 70s, the idea of creating a national park in the center of Taiwan had once again gained currency. Though it would be 80,000 hectares smaller than the original Japanese plan, when it came into existence, Yushan National Park nonetheless established once and for all a proper reserve for one of Taiwan's most bio-diverse regions. The best way to get a feel for this diversity is to hike the 90-kilometer-long Japanese era Batongguan Trail (temporarily closed because of damage from Typhoon Morakot). One starts in a broadleaf forest where up to 80 species of higher plants crowd together in every 100 square meters. Gaining in altitude the hiker passes through a mixed forest of broadleaf trees, cypress, oak, cedar and camphor. Climb higher and hemlock begins to dominate, and still higher, fir which grows tall and straight. In the sub-highland zone (above 3,500 meters) beautiful junipers are twisted into gargoyle-like shapes by the wind and rhododendron fill the slopes with colorful blossoms in the spring. At the highland herbage zone simple plant species cling to the highest slopes and pinnacles. The national park is not short on fauna either, with 151 species of birds, 34 mammals, 17 reptiles, and an astonishing 228 types of butterflies. Given that recent studies have shown that Taiwan is home to about 2.5 percent of the world's species of plants and animals, the national park is rightly considered a natural treasure trove. Though visitors are welcomed to Yushan, and a series of hiking trails cross the interior, preservation and conservation are the top priorities. Hikers are limited to 90 a day on the main peak. Research projects study the Formosan black bear, the sambar deer and also the 100 species of butterflies that mysteriously blow past Tatajia every spring. A project called VERP is now looking at the sustainable limits of human activity in the park. In the future visitors should not be surprised if they have to wear a GPS tracking device to make sure they do not wander into restricted areas. On July 21, 2009, Yushan was shortlisted by the New7Wonders Foundation to run against 27 other finalists including the Matterhorn, Mt. Vesuvius, the Amazon and the Galapagos Islands in a contest to choose the world's new wonders of nature. The panel, which included a former director of UNESCO, hopes the inclusion of Taiwan's highest mountain will help bring recognition to the diversity of the whole island's natural environment, and the national park in particular. --Robert Kelly is coauthor of “Lonely Planet Taiwan.” Copyright © 2009 by Robert Kelly