my beloved mountain

It's been day two since I hiked to the top of "my" mountain in Kaohsiung. The mountain that was restricted military training ground until about two decades ago when army privates carved out a hiking pathway all the way to the top in the 40% of mountain area that became open to the public. This hiking oasis had been one of my solitary places to go and destress when I was working both day and night shifts in Taiwan during my first full-time job out of college. I would hop on my moped and ride through the city to reach it either in the early twilight hours just before the sun is rising, or around dusk when sometimes I would bump into the nightly patrollers with their headlights-on-helmets as I was descending towards home.  The thick forest canopy covers the harsh sun even during midday, and I loved listening to the birds, watched the giant butterflies, kept an uneasy truce with the pack of macaque monkeys that would sometimes eye my ankles as I walked past their supine, nit-picking forms.

It's been two days and I'm still ridiculously sore in my calves. Like, painfully so, walking like I had a vasectomy kind of sore. My mom said that was the first time she's ever heard me pant while hiking. I hope that I'll be able to return to the mountain enough times during this visit to get back into my former fitness, at least while hiking. Not sure if that's possible while pregnant, but I'm going to try. 

The mountaintop was refreshingly cool, and we drank tea brewed by volunteers who carried at least 25kg of water up from ground level to brew it with. They do this on a regular basis, simply because it would be nice for hikers to have something good to drink when we get to the top. Visibility out to the Taiwan Strait was excellent. I saw at least seven ships and the varied shades of blue/green that belie the ocean depths.

                            Declan enjoyed the exercise equipments on the mountaintop