Like Yangmingshan National Park’s Cingtiangang, the Taoyuan Valley [桃源谷] also provides an opportunity to see grazing water buffaloes.

At some parts of the trail there are barricades to prevent the water buffaloes from going to certain areas. The tracks around these barricades show that the cattle always find a way around.

For awhile on the trail I was wondering if I would encounter any water buffaloes blocking the trail. Sure enough that was the case later. I really didn’t know how to proceed at first: Should I just walk slowly and calmly past them? Should I run past them in reckless abandon screaming? Ultimately I chose to walk through the grass to the side of them while maintaining a distance and narrowly dodging dung along the way:

More posts in this series:

• Creatures of Flight
• Views and Dasi