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Home  /  Hiking  /  XinZhiShan & WuTanShan – 新置山 & 武潭山
featured image for 新置山 & 武潭山 XinZhiShan and WuTanShan
09 February 2020

XinZhiShan & WuTanShan – 新置山 & 武潭山

Written by Glenn
Hiking Cold Steel, Collared Owlet, Golden Orb Weaver, Hartford VR, hoof fungus, Ice man fungus, Kukri, Laiyi, machete, snare, WuTanShan, XinZhiShan, 來義, 新置山, 武潭山 Leave a Comment

Last year on exactly this date I attempted to hike to XinZhiShan – 新置山 and failed. I ran into a nightmare of the entangled sort. Overgrowth prevented me from reaching my goal…three times! But this year would prove to be much different. This year I would make it, easily!

Rather than rehashing the specifics of XinZhiShan, let me point you to my write up from last year: https://outrecording.com/hike-to-xinzhishan-and-toulunshan-新置山–頭崙山-near-laiyi/

And if that page doesn’t interest you, then here’s a map showing the three routes to the XinZhiShan peak. (The peak is located at the yellow pin that says “Start”)

satellite map of XinZhiShan 新置山 and GPX routes

For this hike I chose the northeast route as it seemed the easiest of the three. Despite the short length of roughly 1,100 meters (in a straight line at least), I was sure it would take me a few hours with all the bushwhacking I thought I would need to do. I brought along my cheap Cold Steel Kukri machete instead of my usual Vietnam War US Army style machete because of all the thicker branches I would encounter. The Army machete is a nice all-around workhorse, but takes a lot more energy to cut through the thicker stuff. I’ve had good results with this Kukri.

Trail Head

Getting to the trail head is pretty easy if you have a motorcycle or decent car/truck. It’s a dirt road most of the way, but you shouldn’t have a problem if you go slow enough. There’s also another route to the trail head from the north that might be easier.

When I arrived at the trail head it was a nice sunny day and the area looked much as it did one year ago.

Leaf covered dirt road - trees on either side - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Looking down at farmland from top of mountain - blue skies - XinZhiShan - 新置山

I set off into the tangled mess after securing my bike. The beginning would be easy I knew, because I had already cleared a path for a few hundred meters.

Red ribbon tied to tree in distance in forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Orange ribbon tied to tree in forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山

I followed the trail markers but noticed I was slowly deviating from the path I had carved last year. However, there WAS a trail to follow. Did I miss this other trail last time? Whatever the case, I kept following this new trail.

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

The Never Changing Story…I mean, Scenery

It was obvious to me by now that either I’m getting better at trail finding or this trail had been created within the last year. I’m thinking the former is more likely.

Last year I was following a GPX track that was somewhat old. The trail markers from that route are still around, but the trail is overgrown. I feel dumb for rigidly sticking to that route. Had I opened my eyes more I might have noticed that the current trail veered off in a different direction. Live and learn…

The good thing about this “new” route is that I had yet to even contemplate unsheathing my machete. Granted, it wasn’t smooth going, but it wasn’t bad.

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

The downside was the scenery. There was no scenery. Everything looked the same for the entire hike. I’m afraid that most of the following pictures will look the same to you. Sorry, but that’s all I’ve got.

There WAS this randomly placed bottom of a can nailed to a tree. That was different I guess. 😆 

Bottom of can nailed to a tree with a date written on it - XinZhiShan - 新置山

…and this open area with dense vegetation…

dense jungle - XinZhiShan - 新置山

…and even a break in the canopy with a blue sky…

Blue sky and trees - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Oh, and I heard something growling at me. That’s it.

The rest of it just looked like the beginning of the hike.

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Towards the top I DID find something interesting…to me at least. Two roads!

Abandoned mountain dirt road - trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Abandoned mountain dirt road - trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Sure, they don’t LOOK like roads, but they definitely were at one point in time. It would have been fun to follow them and map them out, but I didn’t really feel like it. I just crossed them and continued the hike up…with more of the same scenery.

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

jungle - forest - lots of trees and overgrowth - XinZhiShan - 新置山

I got poked a lot and scraped up pretty good, but I can’t complain because it was relatively easy. And before I knew it…I had arrived!

XinZhiShan – 新置山

It took me a little over two hours to reach XinZhiShan.

Open area with two stone markers and sign - XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

There wasn’t a view, but I knew to expect that. One thing I wasn’t expecting though was to see remnants of what I bet used to be at least an occasionally visited peak.

Broken upside-down plastic table in forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

Old broken plastic chair in the forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

If I had to guess, I’d say the trail that starts in Laiyi village (來義) used to be in much better shape – possibly used as a local exercise route. I’m not sure why it fell into disrepair. But it makes it all the more fun to hike here and a lot more relaxing for me knowing that I probably won’t be sharing the peak with anyone.

I didn’t really feel like staying here long, but there wasn’t any urgent reason for me to leave. I had plenty of time to get down and there was a second nearby peak I had planned to visit if I had time – and it was going to be an easy one. (or so I thought…) So I took an extended break here.

Peak Exploration

And for your viewing pleasure, here is all there was to see at the top of XinZhiShan.

The triangulation stone and sign…

Triangulation stone at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak - No. 6648

Back of the triangulation stone at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

A couple signs attached to trees…

Metal sign attached to tree with Chinese writing - XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

Plastic sign with Chinese writing at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

A flag from the recent Taiwan presidential election…

Flag of Taiwan's 2020 presidential election - XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

And a “water boundary” stone marker…

water boundary stone at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

Either they painted it in a typhoon or lying on its side. You’d think they would have been a little more careful, eh? (No, not really.)

water boundary stone at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

water boundary stone at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

water boundary stone at XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

On the other side of the peak was the trail that goes down to the other two trails.

Entrance to trail down XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak - trees and ribbon marker

That’s all there was to see.

After my longer-than-wanted rest I took my proof picture peak picture…

Man standing behind triangulation stone holding sign - XinZhiShan - 新置山 Peak

You probably can’t tell, but my face is redder than usual. Part sunburn and part…something else.

My neck had been itchy for half the hike, and later my nose and face. I think I rubbed up against something on my neck. When I later rubbed it with my towel, I must have transferred it to my face when wiping off the sweat with the towel. It wasn’t terribly itchy, but still a nuisance. That night I had bumps all over my neck. It took three or four days for it to go away. Luckily I had some leftover medicine from a hike where I got bit up bad by some little bugs. That cream apparently worked.

The Hike Down

I’m going to make this part quick. It took me an hour and a half. I got off trail at one point. I believe I accidentally followed the original trail a bit before realizing my error. A quick course correction and I made my way back to the correct trail.

Only two interesting things happened on my way down. The first was THIS thing…

Large Hoof Fungus on tree - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Large Hoof Fungus on tree - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Large Hoof Fungus on tree - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Large Hoof Fungus on tree - XinZhiShan - 新置山

As I’m hiking down I plant my hand on this tree and as I walk by it I look over and HOLY SHIT! I think I said something to that effect and quickly backed away cuz I thought it was a bee hive. 😆

Thanks to Twitter, I now know this is Hoof fungus.

Imagine coming down the mountain, hand firmly grabbing this tree for support…you turn your head and your face is within inches of THIS. I thought for sure it was a bee hive and acted accordingly. 😳First time I’ve seen a (mushroom??) like this. #Outhiking #hiking #Taiwan pic.twitter.com/smWwzQXreq

— OutRecording (@OutRecording) February 4, 2020

I’ve seen it before many times but never this large. An interesting fact about Hoof fungus: it can be used as fire tinder. Some of it was found on the 5000+ year old Iceman found in the Ötztal Alps. Hence, its nickname “Ice man fungus”. I kind of like that name. 🙂

The second interesting thing on the way down was this cluster of five snare traps.

Wire snare traps in forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Wire snare traps in forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山

Wire snare traps in forest - XinZhiShan - 新置山

They look similar to some of the snares I found on the other side of the mountain a year ago. I must have gotten off trail on my way up because I didn’t run into these. They’ve been placed directly on the trail, and I surely would have gotten tripped up by them. I really hate these things after a bad encounter with one that pulled me and motorcycle down hard. You can read about that here: https://outrecording.com/hike-to-huyayushan-戶亞宇山-in-taiwan/

And that was it for XinZhiShan. I hiked down without incident, jumped on my bike, and made my way over to the WuTanShan – 武潭山 trail head.

WuTanShan – 武潭山 Trail Head

It was looking like I would be having an easy day of hiking. XinZhiShan turned out to be easy and WuTanShan should be even easier! In total it’s about 500 meters of hiking, most of which follows an old dirt road.

But of course I was wrong…terribly wrong.

As I exited the main road onto the old dirt road everything was just as I had remembered it.

Dirt road in the mountains -WuTanShan - 武潭山

About six years ago I had driven up here on my old Hartford VR motorcycle. In fact, this was part of our maiden voyage.

Red Hartford VR Motorcycle with Mountains in background

I saw this side road and followed it up. After it leveled off I wasn’t sure which way to go. I stupidly followed Google Maps’ directions. There was an open grass area that I barrelled through. It looked something like this.

Tall grass with Golden Orb Weaver spider

I didn’t find anything interesting on the other side so I turned around and drove back through. I picked back up with the dirt road and about 20 seconds later looked down at my left hand. There was a HUGE Golden Orb Weaver spider standing on it! It was larger than this one:

Golden Orb Weaver spider on motorcycle hand guard - WuTanShan - 武潭山

I knew next to nothing about these spiders and well, I panicked. 😳 

I took my hand off the throttle to try and knock it off. It might have worked, but I’m not really sure because my bike stalled and we both went down. I rolled off to the side and down the mountain! Thankfully I caught myself before doing any damage. This was the exact spot right after it had happened.

Red Hartford VR Motorcycle on dirt road lined with trees - WuTanShan - 武潭山

Good times!

Current Conditions

Six years ago this dirt road wasn’t so bad. But now…

Fallen tree blocking dirt road in the mountains - WuTanShan - 武潭山

I was forced to stop here and heal toe it the rest of the way. It’s too bad because I had hoped to follow the road to wherever it went. After the spider incident six year ago, I had lost interest. 😆 

When I arrived at the grassy area I mentioned before, things had changed. The grass was still there but the rest looked really messy.

Overgrown dirt road - WuTanShan - 武潭山

This was another dirt road I was supposed to follow. Huh…it looked like this wasn’t going to be an easy one. This made me happy.

I busted out the machete and got to work! And boy did I ever!

I cut through this…

Taiwan jungle - WuTanShan - 武潭山

And hacked through that…

Taiwan jungle - WuTanShan - 武潭山

And made my way through this…

Taiwan jungle - WuTanShan - 武潭山

It never really let up until I arrived at the actual trail head that led away from the “road”.

Trail marker tied to a tree in forest

Along the way I ran into this old bee hive.

Bee hive - WuTanShan - 武潭山

The way it was positioned, there was no way to walk around it without disturbing the occupants. Lucky for me it was abandoned. Whew!

The Hike Up

From here the trail was well marked.

White trail marker ribbon tied to tree - trail in background - WuTanShan - 武潭山

Though marked rather unconventionally throughout most of it.

White tape wrapped around tree - WuTanShan - 武潭山

But whatever, it worked.

Despite being well marked, it still wasn’t easy.

Taiwan jungle - WuTanShan - 武潭山

This next section took me the longest to cut through.

Tangled mess of overgrowth -WuTanShan - 武潭山

Here’s the “after” picture looking back.

Tangled mess of overgrowth that has been cut -WuTanShan - 武潭山

About an hour after I started, I arrived at…

WuTanShan – 武潭山

Well, this was supposed to be the peak.

Overgrown peak -WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

But where was the stone marker???

After a quick search I found it.

Stone marker covered by dead overgrowth - WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

And spent the next several minutes cleaning up.

WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

Mission accomplished!

Kukri Machete sitting on top of stone marker of WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

Once again I wasn’t in much of a mood to stay long. There was nothing to see up here at all. So I took my usual set of pics…

White plastic card with Chinese on it - WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

Front side of stone marker from WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

Back of stone marker from WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

White card with Chinese written on it - WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

Man posing behind stone marker on WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

And quickly left.

A Hasty Retreat

It took less than thirty minutes to get back to my bike. Absolutely nothing of interest happened. Though I did stop for a few minutes to try my luck at attracting some birds with a Collared Owlet call.

I managed to attract this little fellow. I cropped the picture quite a bit.

Bird on tree branch - WuTanShan - 武潭山 Peak

And that’s it! My hike ended.

The End

This was one of those combo peak hikes that I enjoy. My expectations of both peaks were completely wrong. The hard one was easy and the easy one was hard. This kind of thing keeps you on your toes, you know? The Taiwan mountains are always changing and rarely disappoint.

Now for the average hiker…I don’t think you’ll like either of these peaks. :mrgreen: Don’t yell at me if you find yourself on one of these trails.

 

Date hiked: 2020 January 31

GPX Track Download Instructions: Click the track on the map to see the download link

 

XinZhiShan – 新置山

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WuTanShan – 武潭山

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