[ Swag Temple Guards! ] South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride Part 1 雲林廟海騎之一

South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride Summary

• Self Ride
• Starting/ending Location: near MingXiong Train Station, ChiaYi (民雄，嘉義)
• Bike Length: ~ 111 km.
• Hill profile: Flat.
• Good for: Base training ride.
• Route Highlights:
  • MingXiong Ghost House (民雄鬼屋)
  • JingPu Cat Wall Art (菁埔彩繪村)
  • BanTaoYao Cochin Ware (新港板陶窯)
  • BeiGang Old Town (北港老鎮)
  • Santiaolun Haiqing Temple (三條崙海清宮)

Background

The South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride is the 7th effort after Tainan History and Coastal Ride, to develop near 100 km Taiwan shore riding route.

With YunLin being a main agricultural town, the South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride presented more authentic rural Taiwan coastal and temple experiences. Thus this Ride is great for those who really wanted to check out traditional Taiwanese lives and culture, particularly Taiwan’s temple culture.

Start: MiaoLi MingXiong 苗栗民雄

Our South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride started near MingXiong, Miaoli. Tons of old buildings awaited.

Old Japanese wooden houses waiting to be rebuilt at previous Japanese broadcast station base.

MingXiong’s DaShiYe Temple (大士爺廟). A rare type of temple in Taiwan, the temple worships DaShiYe, or “buring face ghost king (面燃鬼王)”

Cool wall art.

As usual, around the temple was the market area.

ChiaYi University.

After a while we reached our first main point of interest: MingXiong Ghost House. It was actually not a haunted house but an old abandoned building, with trees growing onto the house. Pretty cool.

Nearby was a cafe.

Entrance.

Old well.

The ghost house.

Trees growing around the house.

Cat Wall Art

After the ghost house, our South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride continued to pass through rural roads and to XinPu (青埔), a small village with cool cat theme wall art.

Some elementary school art.

XinPu’s community center. Pretty old fashion style.

My favorite: swag surfing cats.

A cafe within rice fields.

XinGang FengTien Mazu Temple 新港奉天宮

After XinPu we went into a major town called XinGang. Here there was the famous FengTien Mazu temple, as it was the destination of the annual parade of DaJia Mazu Temple.

Interestingly, FengTien and the other BeiGang Mazu Temple we later visited all claimed they had the “First Taiwan Mazu (開台媽祖)”.

Main entrance.

Market in front of the temple.

XingGang Rural Side & Cochin Ware

As we left the main town center, our South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride went through XinGang’s rural side, along the old sugar cane train route.

Old sugar cane trains.

A very strange cultural park.

Old sugar cane station converted into resting pavilion.

Along the old train route there was a cool place called  “BanTaoYao” (板陶窯), an experience center for traditional “Cochin Ware (交趾陶)”, the pottery art used for Taiwan’s temple decoration.

BanTaoYao entrance.

Modern Cochin Ware art.

Cochin Ware chair.

Local Cochin Ware style mailbox.

Rail converted to walking path.

Nice camel toe…

Cochin Ware flower wall art.

Near the riverside, there was the old sugar cane train rail bridge ruins.

Old rail ruins.

Riding on top of the river bank.

Temple car mannequins.

Very old temple called “ShueSien Temple”, or “water deity temple”. It worships water deities, who were some famous Chinese historical people that were either skilled water equipment technicians, or those died in water. LOL.

Very old door guard depiction.

Crossing this bridge and we were in BeiGang Town (北港鎮)

BeiGang Old Town 北港鎮

Riding along the river bank, our South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride soon entered BeiGang (北港), YunLin’s south most popular old town.

There were a lot of sesame oil shops here. Smells really good!

TaiChi fish statue.

Old wedding cake store.

Big market street in front of the Mazu Temple.

Old Japanese era water tower.

Street side Buddha statue.

Wall art in town’s alley.

Bags of garlic….

Temple Parade

In our South YunLin Coastal Temple Ride we were fortunate to encounter a traditional temple parade!

First firecrackers cleared the path.

Then Dancing lions.

Then guardians.

Finally the deity’s wagon.

VIDEO: Temple Parade

Continue to Part 2!

Also Recommended:

Taiwan Bike Routes Map

[History Everywhere! ] Tainan History and Coastal Ride Part 1 台南古蹟塭田騎之一

[ Giant Buddha Holding Earth! ] HsinChu South East Back Road Ride Part 1 竹東翻山越嶺騎之一

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