Manapan - the second most popular hike in Taiwan
Today I went hiking at Manapan Mountain at Miaoli in Taiwan. It's said to be the second most popular hike in Taiwan, and now I understand why.
馬拉邦山天然湖登山口停車場 8/10
It was a beautiful day for a hike, and we arrived at the car park at 10am. There was a beautiful pink sakura tree at one end. Taiwan is more southern than Japan, and our sakura trees tend to blossom earlier than Japan. I thought the other trees behind the sakura were like green giants protecting the little princess. As I came out from the car park, I walked past an orange orchard.
Manapang Mountain Hiking Trail 8/10
The Manapan hike is a shortish walk, around 2.3km ascending 400 metres up and descending back down the same route. This hike is a family friendly one suitable for kids as there are no difficult scrambling, just some stairs, which although hard work, nothing that a child can't manage. In fact, on my way up, I saw a few families with kids already on their way back down from their hike. The hike starts off on gentle terrain, crossing a couple of bridges, and gradually ascending into the mountain forest.
Manapang Mountain Hiking Trail 8/10
As I ascended further up, there are more steps. This normally means the hike is going to get a bit tougher. I love the variety of the steps, that come in different forms yet all blended in with the trail. The other thing I like about this trail is that it's not enclosed under the trees and you get to see the beautiful blue sky above you.
Manapang Mountain Hiking Trail 10/10
After an hour and half of hiking, I finally reached the Manapan peak at 1406 metres above sea levels. I started off at 1020 meters. The path towards the summit is lined with pretty pink flowers in the one side, and the blue skies filled with clouds on the other side. I wonder if this is what walking towards paradise looks like. The trig point here is classified as a class 1 trig point in Taiwan. There are four classes, and I'm told tclass 1 means you can see the furthest away. The view was absolutely breath taking, and I think really worth the not too strenuous hike up here.
梯田料理 9/10
I lingered up at the summit for about half an hour soaking in the scenery around me, realising why it is the second most popular hike in Taiwan. I would have loved to stay longer had me friend not said it was time to leave. He said he found a great restaurant down in the village that specialises in local ingredients, specifically strawberry. This area is well known for its strawberries. It was a great way to round off the hike, particularly as I could see the Manapan summit from outside the restaurant. Hard to believe I was up there only an hour ago.
Finally with a bit of time to read through this @livinguktaiwan and definitely looks like my kind of place! 😊 Very nice photos taken of the flowering trees and the trail up. And a nice one of you on the summit appearing as though you were "fresh as a daisy"! 😊
Loved this ...
... as I am often inspired with similar thoughts when "out and about" in the great outdoors. I don't have thoughts even remotely close to this, when traipsing around a big city ... 😉
Topped off with what appears to be an excellent meal, must've been a very special day. Thank you for sharing with us! 👍
I'm glad you liked my hike @roleerob.
I think nature doesn't need to do much to satisfy one. Just the sounds of the wind blowing, birds singing, and the trickle of water from the streams is very relaxing and soothing. We must get you over here for a hike sometime!!!!
!engage 30
Yes, amen @livinguktaiwan ...
... as there is nothing in this life which provides a greater sense of peace and serenity. At least for this Steemian ...
As for going on a hike "over there" sometime, I would really enjoy the opportunity, if it ever presents itself. We'll see what the future holds! 😉
Thank you, my friend!!
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some of that looks quite tough but overall appears to be a wonderful place for a hike. I hope i can remember this should I end up visiting there.
Taiwan's a great place for visa runs as well!!!
!engage 20
that could end up being something i do!
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Some parts looks like not easy to walk but at least it's not wet.
Actually this is quite an easy one, there is a bit of climbing but there are stairs, so it's not as bad as it looks.
!engage 20
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Hi @livinguktaiwan, your post has been reviewed by the TravelFeed content team, but it does not qualify for an upvote since you did not post through TravelFeed.io.
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Based on your post, we have the following feedback for you:
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I'm not sure what your curation criterias are now. I notice some posts aren't posted from Travelfeed.io but are still curated by you. Is there a double standard that some get curated even though they didn't post through Travelfeed.io and others don't? To leave a comment to say a post does not qualify for upvotes when clearly this does not apply to all users seems very odd.
I don't mind if a post is not curated because there are other stronger posts, and you can just ignore it like all the other major curation guilds, but to review a post and say it doesn't qualify because it wasn't posted through your interface seems like another way to get the travelfeed name out on more posts. I'm sure it's not your intention, but it's gradually looking like that to many.
You guys are doing a great job, and its awesome that you are onboarding new users, but please don't do that at the expense of pushing existing users away. Many of us have been around for a while and know what we're doing and don't need to be told over and over again how to write our posts.
Finally, using a particular tag is not all about upvotes, is about sharing relevant content to the applicable audience as well.
Well said @livinguktaiwan! 👍 I "second the motion" ...
Thanks for your feedback! All posts are reviewed equally by our curation team and receive a quality score that impacts their ranking on TravelFeed.io and the upvote they receive. As it has always been, only the best posts receive an upvote. The exception to that is that all (even low-quality) posts published through TravelFeed.io that are now guaranteed a (small) upvote, unless they are blacklisted for violating our policies. Quality posts from other apps can still receive an upvote, but it is now capped at 50%. There are no "double standards", some posts simply don't rate high enough by our content team.
No TravelFeed team member has ever been paid for their contribution and for the past two years, we have invested a lot of time and money to build TravelFeed into what it is today and we are far from done — we are getting ready to go big. We have supported many bloggers over the past two years, and we are happy to see that most of our users are now supporting us by publishing their travel blogs through TravelFeed.io and giving us valuable feedback on how we can further improve TravelFeed.io. We like to return the favour by doubling the upvotes for these users.
Another reason why we want posts published through TravelFeed.io is that posts published through other apps will never send any Google traffic to TravelFeed.io and are therefore of almost no value to us. While TravelFeed started as a curated tag, we have always seen our future as much more than that: The Steem rewards-pool incentives high-frequency but low/mediocre-quality posts. Sure, Steemians "know what they are doing" in order to maximise their author rewards, but very few write long, SEO-optimised high-quality blogs that will show up on the top of Google searches, which is what we are looking for. Similar to private blogs, TravelFeed will focus on the long-term monetisation through advertising and affiliates, where a high-quality post can potentially bring in hundreds of Dollars in passive income over the years, without the hassle of growing, managing and monetising a private blog.
While the rewards-pool is misaligned and we don't believe that Steemit nor most Steem apps in their current form have any chance for mainstream adoption, we do believe in the potential that the Steem blockchain offers. In order to make TravelFeed appealing to mainstream users, we are doing many things differently than apps targeted towards experienced Steemians.
Even tough this poses some technical challenges, we are trying our best to make the transition for Steemit users as smooth as possible by still accepting submissions from other apps and as far as we are aware, we are the only app that upvotes posts that were published through other apps - ever noticed dTube upvoting a 3speak video with the tag #dtube or Steempress upvoting Steemit posts tagged with #steempress?. If innovating means that we lose some Steemit users who are not willing to go with the time, that makes us sad, but it is a price that we are willing to pay.
Thanks for your lengthy response @travelfeed. I am absolutely fine with not being curated if your curators believe that there are stronger more deserving posts. Whilst curating for the Steemitworldmap, I am well aware that the quality of the travel posts are getting stronger as time goes by. Every curation guild, and even curators within the same guild have their own standards and preferences for particular posts, so even the strongest authors should not expect to be curated all th etime, let along the low quality ones.
My issue is your comment your post has been reviewed by the TravelFeed content team, but it does not qualify for an upvote since you did not post through TravelFeed.io. This says absolutely nothing about quality, it is all about your app and not using it, and contradicts with your statement:
If you comment said your post has been reviewed by the TravelFeed content team, but it does not qualify for an upvote due to the volume of other higher-quality posts... or something along those lines, then that is consistent with your statement only the best posts receive an upvote. But that's not the case with. As you are aware, I am not the only user who feel this way about your comment, and I am aware of others who have not voiced their concerns in public.
I get it that you have your vision and plan to take Travelfeed to better and greater places and I sincerely hope you succeed as I know you have all put a lot of effort in this. I can only say, there are ways, not a way to do things, and it doesn't always have to come at a price.
Being more than casually interested in this exchange @travelfeed, while you've made salient points and while I am even sympathetic to some of them, I don't think you have addressed the most basic point made by @livinguktaiwan. Is that by design? Unintentional? Only "you" (if you are willing to identify who "I" is, that would be welcome information) would know which.
And what is that you might ask? Addressing the contradiction between this in your original message:
with this in your response:
… and …
Which is it? It cannot be both. It is hard to imagine any unbiased observer not drawing the same conclusion. And “for the record,” I am not an unbiased observer, as I received a similar message (although you did bestow a 1% upvote and a “smiley” on it …) from you myself on one of my posts a few days ago …
While waiting to “hear” which it is, I’ll take the opportunity to comment further on what you have to say about your current efforts and future plans. Again, I’ll stress as a preface to what I want to say, that I am sympathetic to some of what you have to say.
I would caution you to tread very carefully on how you choose to strike the balance between handling your historic association with the Steem blockchain and your apparent plans to expand beyond it. Even the perception by others, along the way toward your stated objective, that they have been or are being mistreated in any way will not serve you well. Particularly true of those who have invested a great deal of time into helping you reach the status you enjoy today.
I won’t bore you with a retelling of some case histories of what I am talking about here. As an experienced Steem community, you either are or should be well aware of them.
To be crystal clear, so as not to be misunderstood, I am not making any accusations. I am merely providing you the reaction, from a Steemian who has been “in here” for ~ 20 months, that I have to what I am reading here and elsewhere …
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