The cherry blossoms at Miaoli’s Xieyun Temple will bloom until early March. The purple-red floral sea on the mountainside is incredibly dreamy.

Text and photos byDouglas Fang

Date of visit: 2017.2.19

Last year, I saw photos of the cherry blossoms around the parking lot at Xieyun Temple in Shitan, Miaoli. Each photo was filled with magenta-colored cherry blossoms, and since many were taken in the morning, there was also a slight misty feel. I thought they were quite beautiful and dreamy, but due to time constraints, I couldn’t visit.

This year, I happened to find online that the cherry blossoms at Xieyun Temple were about 60% to 70% in bloom. After visiting the Immortal Mountain with my parents, I headed straight for Xieyun Temple, located at the border between Gongguan and Shitan. Currently, the cherry blossoms are roughly at the level seen in the photos—about 60% to 70% in bloom. The best time for cherry blossom viewing should be around the 228 Holiday. If you want to know the current blooming status, you can search for 【Xieyun Temple】on Facebook and judge based on the latest photos people have posted.

The road from the mountain down to Xieyun Temple isn’t very wide, so drivers must be extremely cautious when passing each other. Xieyun Temple is located at the border between Gongguan and Shitan in Miaoli, at an altitude of about 700 meters. According to online sources, there are approximately 3,000 cherry trees in this area around Xieyun Temple. Most are mountain cherry trees, also known as Prunus campanulata or “pale-pink cherry blossoms,” along with a small number of Yoshino cherries and double-flowered Prunus campanulata (also called multi-petaled pale-pink cherry blossoms).

You don’t have to worry about parking at all when visiting Xieyun Temple. There are quite a few parking lots here, and each one is surrounded by cherry blossoms. In addition to the blossoms around the parking areas, if you look down from in front of the main hall of Xieyun Temple, you can see a whole slope of cherry blossoms in front of the hall.

Although the cherry blossoms are currently about 60% to 70% in bloom, due to climatic influences this year, they aren’t blooming as beautifully or densely as they could. The winter wasn’t very cold, so cherry trees across Taiwan largely didn’t form buds. As a result, during the current cherry blossom season, many places naturally have no blossoms—just check online photos to see how Xieyun Temple truly looks when in full bloom.

On the day of my visit, I only brought a 22mm prime lens and a 10-18mm wide-angle lens. I hadn’t expected at all to come up to Xieyun Temple to see the cherry blossoms, so I couldn’t use a telephoto lens to capture the compressed effect of the flowers. I had to make do with wider angles and broader views to photograph the cherry blossoms here at Xieyun Temple.

The current state of the cherry blossoms at Xieyun Temple is that they look quite beautiful from a distance, but are a bit sparse up close. However, because there are truly a lot of cherry trees planted here, it’s still well worth a visit.

Xieyun Temple
Address: Search for “Xieyun Temple Parking Lot” on Google Maps
Blooming period: From now until early March 2017

Douglas Fang
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