Taroko

Taroko National Park is one of the seven national parks in Taiwan and was named after the Taroko Gorge, the landmark gorge of the park. It spans the counties of Hualien, Taichung, and Nantou on the island of Taiwan.

The park was originally established as the Tsugitaka-Taroko National Park by the Governor-General of Taiwan on December 12, 1937 when Taiwan was part of the Empire of Japan. After the Empire of Japan's defeat in World War II, the Republic of China assumed control of Taiwan. The ROC government subsequently abolished the park on August 15, 1945. It was not until November 28, 1986 that the park was reestablished.

Sights include:

* Tunnel of Nine Turns

* Eternal Spring Shrine

* Swallow's Mouth

* Jinheng Park

* The Bridge of the Kind Mother

* Tiansiang

* Jhueilu Precipice

* Lioufang Bridge: 1,666 meters above the riverbed

* Hill of Yu the Great

* Buluo Bay

Origin of the name

The name, Taroko, means the "magnificent and beautiful". Long ago a tribesman of the Truku aboriginal tribe saw the beauty of the azure Pacific when he walked out of the gorge. Astonished by the elegance of the scene, he cried: "Taroko!". And so it became the name of the place, in fashion not dissimilar to how the island, Formosa, got its name.

Geology

Taroko Gorge and its surrounding area are well known for their abundant supply of marble, leading to its nickname, "The Marble Gorge". The rock now seen in Taroko began over 200 million years ago as sediment on the bottom of the ocean. As the sediment collected, it was subject to increasingly large amounts of pressure which eventually hardened it into limestone. Over the past 100 million years, compression between the Philippine and Eurasian techtonic plates supplied additional pressure that metamorphosed the limestone into marble. Uplifting forces from the plate collision pushed this rock above the surface of the ocean to where we see it today. In fact, the region is still being uplifted by approximately 0.5cm per year.

The gorge itself was carved into the marble by the erosive power of the Liwu River.

In addition, there are known to be Mt. Jade in this gorge. This jade is only found in Taiwan and the jade from this area supplies the jade market in Hualien. These mountains can be seen from rafting (a common activity during summer months in Taroko Gorge) through the rivers.

credited to wikipedia and flickr:ctfang