Three days in Kaohsiung: a working port that handed its warehouses to artists
Two nights by the harbour: the metro's stained glass dome and the Pier 2 galleries on arrival, the consulate hill and Cijin island the next day, and the lake of temples before the train.
- Length
- 3 days, 2 nights
- Where you stay
- Kaohsiung
- Places
- 7 across 3 days
Kaohsiung is Taiwan's port and for a long time that was the whole story: container terminals, petrochemicals, shipbreaking, and an air quality problem. Then the harbour moved out to deeper water and the city was left with several kilometres of empty warehouses on the water.
What it did with them is the reason to visit. Pier 2 is now a district of galleries, studios, bike paths and outdoor sculpture, with a light rail running along the quay, and the whole southern waterfront has been given back to people on foot.
It is also warm all winter, which is why Taiwanese from the north come down in January. Palms, wide streets, a good metro, and an island beach ten minutes across the water by ferry.
Highlights
- The stained glass dome over the metro concourse at Formosa Boulevard, thirty metres across and worth changing trains for
- Pier 2, several blocks of dock warehouses turned into free galleries with a bike path running between them
- The old British consulate on its hill, looking straight down the harbour mouth at the container ships coming in
- Walking into a dragon's mouth and out of a tiger's at Lotus Lake, which is supposed to turn bad luck into good
- The ferry to Cijin, a sandbar island of seafood restaurants, a lighthouse and a long grey beach
Where to stay
Kaohsiung, two nights
Stay around Formosa Boulevard or Yanchengpu, which puts you between the night market, the metro interchange and the harbour front, all within a walk.
Sizihwan, out by the university, is quieter and closer to the ferry and the beach. Zuoying is convenient for the high speed station and dull for everything else.
Day by day
Day 1 in Kaohsiung
A dome underground, and the warehouses on the water
Start with the metro station, which sounds like an odd instruction until you see it. The concourse at Formosa Boulevard is roofed with a circular stained glass work thirty metres across, made in Germany over four years, and it is free to walk in and look up.
From there it is fifteen minutes down to the old dock. Pier 2 runs for several blocks of converted warehouses, most of the galleries free, with sculptures between the buildings and a light rail line and a bike path along the quay.
Stay until dark. The cranes are lit, the harbour works all night, and the bars in the warehouses at the far end are the best in the city.
- 15:30
The Dome of Light
VisitA stained glass dome thirty metres across in the concourse of Formosa Boulevard station, made by Narcissus Quagliata and divided into water, earth, light and fire. Free, and reached without leaving the metro.
- 16:45
Pier 2 Art Center
CultureSeveral blocks of dockside warehouses turned into commercial galleries, studios and outdoor sculpture, with a bike path and light rail running through. Admission to most of it is free. Allow three hours and rent a bike.
- 20:00
Liouhe Night Market
OtherThe tourist night market, a couple of hundred metres of seafood, grilled squid and papaya milk near the main station. Not the best food in the city and the easiest introduction to it.
With more time: Ruifeng night market, four stops north on the red line, is where Kaohsiung actually eats: bigger, cheaper and open Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
Day 2 in Kaohsiung
The consulate hill, a beach, and a ferry to the sandbar
The harbour mouth is a narrow channel with a hill on one side and a sandbar island on the other, and the whole of today is spent going round it.
The British built a consulate on the hill in the 1870s, in red brick shipped from Xiamen, with an arcade looking straight down the channel. Every container ship entering Kaohsiung passes underneath it.
Below the hill is a curved beach that has been a bathing place since the Japanese era, with the old university campus rising immediately behind it.
Then take the ferry. Cijin is five minutes across, and the far side of it is a long grey beach with the Taiwan Strait beyond and nothing between here and mainland China.
- 09:30
The British Consulate
VisitA red brick consulate from the 1870s on the bluff above the harbour entrance, with an arcaded verandah and the best view in the city. A steep flight of steps connects it to the residence below. Go late in the day for the light.
- 12:00
Sihzihwan Beach
VisitA curved bay under the hill, developed as a bathing beach in Japanese times and backed by the red brick of Sun Yat-sen University. Swimming, sunset and not much else, which is the right amount.
- 15:00
Cijin Coast Park
VisitThe seaward side of the sandbar island, reached by a five minute ferry from Gushan, with a long path along the strait and a wind turbine field at the end. Rent a bike at the pier; the island is flat and narrow and you can cross it in minutes.
With more time: The 1883 lighthouse and the Qing fort above the Cijin ferry pier are a fifteen minute climb and give you the harbour mouth from the other side.
Day 3 in Kaohsiung
Lotus Lake, and a walk through a dragon
Lotus Lake is north of the centre, one stop from the high speed station, and its shore is crowded with temples that stand on causeways above the water.
The pair everyone comes for are the Dragon and Tiger pagodas. You enter through the dragon's mouth, walk the length of its painted body, and come out through the tiger, which is supposed to convert bad fortune into good. Doing it the other way round is meant to be unlucky, so watch which end people are queuing at.
Walk or cycle round the lake for an hour. There are half a dozen more temples, a very large statue standing on a plinth in the water, and the largest Confucius temple in Taiwan at the northern end.
Zuoying high speed station is ten minutes away, so this fits comfortably before an afternoon train.
- 08:30
Lotus Lake
VisitA lake ringed with temples that step out over the water on zigzag causeways, an hour's walk or twenty minutes by bicycle round. Best in the early morning before the light gets flat.
- 10:45
Spring & Autumn Pavilions
VisitA Taoist complex on the lake shore with a giant dragon you walk through, painted inside with murals along its whole length, and a matching tiger to come out of. Free, cheerfully garish, and the thing people photograph in Kaohsiung.
With more time: Fo Guang Shan, half an hour east, is the largest Buddhist monastery in Taiwan with a museum and a hundred metre bronze Buddha, and needs the whole morning rather than an hour.
Before you go
Getting there and around
High speed trains from Taipei take about ninety minutes to Zuoying, which is on the metro red line eight stops north of the centre. The slower coastal line runs into Kaohsiung main station.
The metro has two lines that cross at Formosa Boulevard, and a light rail loops around the harbour. An iPass or EasyCard covers all of it and the ferries.
Kaohsiung is flat and has proper bike lanes, and the public bike scheme is cheap. It is the easiest Taiwanese city to cycle in by a distance.
When to come
November to March is the season: dry, sunny and in the low twenties, which is why it fills with domestic visitors escaping Taipei's drizzle.
April to September is hot and humid, with a rainy season from May and typhoons from July. The south of Taiwan gets less rain overall than the north, but when it comes it comes hard.
Sunsets over the strait are the local ritual, and Cijin and Sizihwan are where people go to watch them.
Eating
Seafood is the obvious strength, and Cijin island is where to eat it: a street of tanks and grills opposite the ferry pier, where you point at what you want.
Liouhe night market is the famous one and is aimed squarely at visitors. Ruifeng, further north, is where locals actually go and is bigger, cheaper and better.
Kaohsiung is also the milk tea capital, with shops that have been pulling the same recipe for forty years. Ask for less sugar than the default unless you want a dessert.
Kaohsiung spent a century as the place Taiwan sent its heavy industry, and it still is one. The difference is that it stopped pretending the waterfront belonged to the ships.
The result is a city where you can walk from a stained glass dome under a road junction to a gallery in a warehouse to a ferry to a beach, all on one transport card, in a January that feels like June.
Or make it a longer trip
These trips pass through here on the way somewhere else.
Make it your trip
Every stop, day and place here lands in your account as an editable trip. Move the days around, swap a city, add your own bookings and costs, and share it with whoever is coming.
Common questions
- Is Kaohsiung worth two nights?
- Yes, if you want the harbour and the lake at a decent pace, and it is also the natural base for the south. One night is enough for Pier 2 and Cijin alone. Three would let you add Fo Guang Shan and a day trip to Kenting or the mountains.
- Kaohsiung or Tainan?
- Tainan for history and food, Kaohsiung for the water, the art and the space. They are forty minutes apart by train, which makes the question mostly academic. If you have four nights in the south, split them two and two.
- How do I get to Cijin?
- A passenger ferry runs from Gushan pier every few minutes, takes five minutes, costs almost nothing and takes bicycles and scooters. Your metro card pays for it. The other route is a tunnel under the harbour, which is for vehicles.
- What is there for a rainy day?
- The Museum of Fine Arts, the enormous National Science and Technology Museum, and the covered half of Pier 2. Kaohsiung gets far less rain than the north, so a whole washed-out day is unlikely outside the summer.
- Can I change this plan?
- Yes. Copy it into the planner, swap the last morning for Fo Guang Shan, or add a night and take the train down to Kenting.