About Shifen Waterfall (十分大瀑布 [Shífēn Dà Pùbù])
The Shifen Waterfall (十分大瀑布 [Shífēn Dà Pùbù]) was mostly likely Taiwan’s most famous waterfall as it was seemingly very reachable from the major population centers (namely Taipei and Keelung).
It was a major waterfall permanently falling some 20m high and 40m wide on the Keelung River (基隆河 [Jīlóng Hé]).
In fact, it was said to be the widest waterfall in Taiwan.
Thus, it had a bit of a horseshoe shape at its crest (common in most broad waterfalls), which even earned it the nickname the “Little Niagara of Taiwan”.
That said, I tend to think of the shape of Shifen Waterfall as being closer Cumberland Falls (i.e. the “Niagara of the South”) without the Autumn colors.
As you can see from photo above, the timing of our visit couldn’t have been better as we were treated to a bright bold rainbow refracting the sun’s rays in the waterfall’s mist right before its drop.
With this being the last waterfall in Taiwan that we visited in our trip in Autumn 2016, it whetted my appetite for more waterfalling experiences in the republic despite our waterfall fatigue.
The Recent History of the Shifen Waterfall
Like the real Niagara Falls, there was a bit of a history with the Shifen Waterfall.
In the past, the area was privately owned and the owners would fleece visitors to see it while building kitschy infrastructures completely irrelevant to the natural experience.
This was not unlike how Niagara Falls in its early days was developed and even exploited.
And while its more famous North American brethren still had a Las Vegas meets Mother Nature kind of feel to it (despite its undeniable grandeur), at least the smaller Shifen Waterfall retained much of its naturesque scenery.
I believe the Taipei government managed to assume control of the area (apparently this happened not too long ago) and they went in this direction.
So now, we were able to experience the falls with a very well-built trail featuring plenty of lookouts to view it from all sorts of angles.
Perhaps the only down side was the area had limited hours from 9am to 4:30pm (as of our November 2016 visit) meaning that there would be no way to beat the rush.
Indeed, we had to share this place with hundreds of other people despite our early arrival at 8am.
Walking the Shifen Waterfall Loop Backwards – early arrival and the Yanjingdong Waterfall
That said, our early arrival to the Shifen Waterfall actually yielded some benefits.
It meant that we had some time to survey the area around the actual main Shifen Waterfall complex itself.
We noticed on the map signs that in addition to the loop trail that seemed to suggest we should do the self-tour in a counterclockwise manner, there was another waterfall closer to the loop trail’s “exit”.
This waterfall was called the Yanjingdong Waterfall (眼鏡洞瀑布 [Yǎnjìngdòng Pùbù]; Eyeglasses Waterfall), and it was outside the paid and controlled area.
So we walked briefly back across the road bridge over the river then turned right to walk along the Highway 106 before reaching the small car park and complex closer to the Yanjingdong Waterfall.
This small cascade had nowhere near the size of the Shifen Waterfall, but the trail was fun.
In addition, the unusual situation of the falls being under a couple of bridges made it memorable (if not an excuse to kill that extra hour before the Shifen Falls viewing area would open).
Indeed, the trail required us to walk across a long suspension bridge alongside a railway bridge (most likely the Pingxi Railway) across the Keelung River.
Once we were on the other side, we then descended some steps and reached a lookout across the river looking right at the Eyeglasses Waterfall from beneath these long bridges.
Walking the Shifen Waterfall Loop Backwards – going against the flow of traffic at the Shifen Waterfall
Beyond the Yanjingdong Waterfall, we continued to walk the trail in the direction of the Shifen Waterfall where we could already see its mist rising further downstream.
We eventually went past some cafes before arriving at the “exit” gate for the main Shifen Waterfall complex.
Little did we realize that when the gate would open at precisely 9am, we would be closer to the Shifen Waterfall than just about everyone else.
That’s because most people would try to reach the falls from the main entrance gate and walk the loop in a counterclockwise manner.
So while they would do the longer loop walk until reaching the Shifen Waterfall at the end, we were already there!
As a result, we had a few minutes of enjoying the falls before it would get really crowded.
Thus, in doing the loop trail backwards, we first experienced the brink of the Shifen Waterfall, which was where we could appreciate the horseshoe shape at its crest.
When we saw that there was a rainbow appearing in its wafting mist, we quickly made our way towards the more frontal lookouts further downstream.
That was when we had the nearly perfectly-situated rainbow alongside the Shifen Waterfall that you see pictured at the top of this page.
The main trail descended into a lookout area that was sheltered and wide enough to accommodate dozens of people.
There were also steps ascending out of the main lookout area affording us even more angles of looking at the falls while also appreciating the power of Mother Nature.
Meanwhile, some rockfalls and landslides appeared to have damaged some prior infrastructure further downstream of the main viewing area, which attested to the unpredictability of Nature in general.
While the Shifen Waterfall was basking in the morning sun, it didn’t last for long.
Eventually, some pop up thunderclouds started showing up and blocking the sun’s rays.
At least that enabled me to switch to taking some long exposure photographs as a result of the reduced brightness and even lighting.
Finally, it was a good thing that we had gotten our early start (despite the restricted opening hours) because we definitely felt the crush by the time it was around 10am and we had our fill of the falls.
Walking the Shifen Waterfall Loop Backwards – concluding the Shifen Waterfall Loop
So on our return to the car, we continued to walk in the opposite direction of just about everyone else towards the entrance gate.
That was when I realized that the way they routed the trail, it seemed like a much longer hike going from the entrance to the falls (as opposed to the way we did it in the opposite direction).
Thus, although it was contrary to what the convention seemed to be, I would actually recommend doing this loop walk in a clockwise manner.
After all, we pretty much cut right to the chase, so to speak, and then we had the rest of the time at leisure to finish the rest of the loop hike, which I thought was less interesting anyways.
Anyways, after returning to the main car park across the visitor center, we found ourselves having spent nearly 2 hours within the complex.
This didn’t include the additional hour of checking out the Eyeglasses Waterfall before the Shifen Waterfall opened for the day.
While the park literature suggested that it would only take less than an hour to complete the roughly 2.4km loop hike (which was really more like a stroll), we really took our time.
And I definitely advocate not being in a rush to really experience this place.
Authorities
The Shifen Waterfall resides in the Pingxi District near the cities of Taipei and Keelung in Xinbei (New Taipei City), Taiwan. It may be administered by the Pingxi District Government. For information or inquiries about the area as well as current conditions, you can try visiting this website.
Although we took a more scenic route from Taipei City along the Hwy 106 towards the Shifen Waterfall, we’ll describe a more straightforward and faster driving route in this section.
Later, we’ll describe the approach from Keelung, which was the biggest neighboring city to the Shifen Waterfall.
Driving from Taipei to the Shifen Waterfall
So from the junction of the National Expressway 3 and the National Expressway 1 (east of Taipei City), we would keep going east towards Keelung along National Expressway 1.
However, we would then exit the National Expressway 1 to go onto the exit 2-八堵 (characters pronounced “bādǔ”) towards the Tai-2丁線 (characters pronounced “dīngxiàn”) towards Ruifang or 瑞芳 [Ruìfāng].
This exit was near the interchange for the Tai-62 Expressway.
Next, we’d turn right onto Shuiyan Road (also labeled as Tai-2丙 where the character was pronounced “bǐng”).
We would then take the Tai-2丙 Highway south for about 10km before turning right onto an access road to the Highway 106 (called 平雙產業道路 [Píngshuāng Chǎnyè Dào Lù]).
After another 400m, we’d then turn right onto Hwy 106 and follow it for 600m before reaching a fork.
Keeping right at the fork would lead another 300m to one of the main car parks (toll required) right across the street from the visitor center.
However, keeping left at the fork to remain on the Hwy 106 would lead another 600m to the signed turnoff and car park for the Yanjingdong Waterfall and “exit” for the Shifen Waterfall Loop Trail on the right.
Overall, this 32km drive would take about 30-45 minutes depending on traffic.
Driving from Keelung to the Shifen Waterfall
If we were coming from Keelung, we could take the Tai-5 before exiting at the Tai-2丁 (the character is pronounced “dīng”).
We’d then follow the Tai-2丁 as it became the Tai-2丙.
Next, we’d continue on the Tai-2丙 as in the directions given above and follow those directions the rest of the way to the Shifen Waterfall.
Overall, this 15km drive would take about 30 minutes depending on traffic.
The Possibility of taking Mass Transit to the Shifen Waterfall
Finally, given that we saw a railway passed by the Shifen Waterfall area, we’re aware that there’s the Pingxi Railway line (平溪線 [Píngxī Xiàn]) that can be boarded from Taipei and taken to the Old Street in Shifen Town (十分老街 [Shífēn Lǎojiē]).
From there, it would be about a kilometer walk to get to the Shifen Waterfall complex.
Then, we could walk the 2.4km loop to fully experience the falls without needing a car (something not necessarily desirable when staying in Taipei).
This might be something we’ll do the next time we’re in the area though we can’t divulge any more details on it until we’ve actually done this.
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Sweep showing the Shifen Waterfall with rainbow from a few different spots around the steps and the viewing shelter
Sweep starting from an elevated top down look over the falls' brink and profile before making my way down to the very brink of the falls. In the background was a recording on loudspeaker that played just when the park opened
Checking out the Yanjingdong (Eyeglasses) Waterfall from beneath the bridges while we were waiting for Shifen Waterfall to open
Short sweep showing some other small but wide waterfall well upstream of the main Shifen Waterfall
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![Jiufen_060_11022016 - Shifen Waterfall was also near Jiufen Laojie (九份老街 [Jiǔfèn Lǎojiē]; Jiufen Old Street), where we got these views towards Keelung while approaching the fun and atmospheric spot](https://images.world-of-waterfalls.com/Jiufen_060_11022016.jpg)
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