Down in Tainan: The holiday begins

I knew that as I got on the ferry to reach Green Island, my holiday was going to improve. I had heard lots of good things about the place.

As soon as I got off the boat I was accosted by an old lady with bettle nut stained teeth who gave me a great offer on a hotel and scooter. I accepted, jumped on the back of her scooter, and off we rode to the scooter rental shopt (it must have been a strange sight to see, a little old hunched Taiwanese woman with a tall white guy sitting on the back).
At the hotel, I paid for my room and and extra $300 for something that I didn't have a clue for, but I did now that I had to be back at 3pm to see why I paid it.
When I returned at 3pm, I realised what I had paid for, I was going snorkelling, Taiwanese style.
I joined a group of 20 Taiwanese guys (as everthing here has to be done in groups); put on the full body wet suit and life jacket (as not many people here can swim properly), jumped on the scooter, drove to the diving area where there about another 100 people going snorkelling.
Once we reached the beach I thought the instructors would allows us to go off and swim by ourselves, but that was not to be. Instead, there was a long rope that had lifebelts attached to it. Two people had to hold onto each lifebelt and at the front of the rope the instructor would pull as along. At first I resented this restriction, I knew how to swim and I wanted to dive down to the coral. However, after a while I began to enjoy being pulled along, I could just float along and see all the fish and coral, and how amazing was that! I just did not expect to see anthing like it. At first we were being pulled along the shallow water spotting the odd fish here and there, then suddently the sea floor drops around 15 feet and I was surrounded by fish and coral. So many different kinds of brightly coloured fish swiming around. I just never knew Taiwan had such things!

Green Island is an island made from volcanic rock, so lots of hills, cliffs, hot springs and greenery to be seen. One of the best things to do on the island is to drive around it and see the sights, which makes for a fun two or three hours.
When driving around, I spotted some places which I wanted to return during sunset as I thought they would make good photo opportunities. So I returned, took some photos and watched the sun set. Then I decided to drive around a little longer and enjoy the cool night. However, when it gets dark on Green Island, it really gets dark. There are no street lights and the moon was nowhere to be seen. All I could see when driving was what my headlight shone on, everything else was pitch black. At first it was a bit of an adventure, but after driving for about half an hour without seeing any light along a road that wound up and down precarious cliffs and hills, I got worried. Not something I want to do alone again.

The next day, I was walking along the main highstreet when somebody called out my name. I looked back and found that it was my flatmate Ryan. We had both planned to go to the east coast, but to do different things. I wanted to sightsee and Ryan wanted to surf. We had planned on meeting up somewhere along our travels, but neither of us could believe we had accidently met up on this small island. Ryan wasn't even planning to come to Green Island, but after finding no surf in Taidong, he and his friend walked around the city and somehow ended up at a travel agents shop, and soon afterwards found themselves on Green Island. So we spent the next few days hanging out.

1. The road around the island 2. Big White Sand beach - great for snorkelling