The bikeway circling Sun Moon Lake in central Taiwan’s Nantou County was recently selected by global travel search engine Skyscanner as one of the world’s eight most beautiful cycling routes.
“You can take your family on a leisurely ride along the smooth cycling path to experience Sun Moon Lake’s paradise-like scenery from a completely different perspective,” a Jan. 17 article on the website stated. “Alternatively, you can challenge yourself to complete the 33-km round-the-lake route.”
Spanning 5.4 square kilometers, Sun Moon Lake sits at an elevation of approximately 750 meters and is surrounded by forested mountains. The scenic area is among the most popular tourist destinations in Taiwan, drawing more than 6 million visitors from home and abroad annually.
In addition to offering riders a close-up view of the stunning jade green lake, the dedicated bike path provides easy access to some of the most popular tourist spots in the Sun Moon Lake National Scenic Area, including Ita Thao and Shuishe piers, Wenwu Temple and the Xiangshan Visitor Center.
Besides Sun Moon Lake, the other seven scenic cycling routes named by Skyscanner include paths in Bohemia in the Czech Republic; Burgundy, France; Easter Island, Chile; Havana, Cuba; Hiroshima, Japan; Grand Canyon in the U.S.; and Udaipur, India.
The Taiwan bikeway received similar recognition in 2012 when CNNGo, a travel website run by U.S.-based media outlet CNN, named it one of the world’s 10 most breathtaking cycling paths. In its introduction, CNNGo noted that “the route around the largest lake in Taiwan is a three-hour ride, where visitors can enjoy lake scenery, experience Thao aboriginal culture and learn about the local ecology in Nantou County. If you arrive in early spring, you can even catch the cherry blossoms near this mirror-like lake.” (KH-E)
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