Hiking Yushan (Jade Mountain) in Taiwan: 8 Tips You Should Know

Tip #1 – Applying for Your Yushan Entry Permit and Paiyun Lodge Stay

Yushan (Jade Mountain) is Taiwan’s highest peak at 3,952 meters above sea level. Most hikers complete the trail in two days, staying overnight at Paiyun Lodge (3,402 meters).

To hike Yushan, you must apply through the Hike Smart Taiwan Service. For Taiwanese locals, demand is so high that getting a permit to hike Yushan is a bit like winning the lottery. But for foreigners, your permit is almost guaranteed as long as you apply exactly four months in advance for one of the 24 reserved permits each day from Sunday to Thursday.

Your application will automatically include the overnight stay at Paiyun Lodge, provided that you select the two-day / one-night trail to the Yushan summit.

The Trailhead and Preparation

Yushan’s 3,952 m elevation means that acclimatisation is highly recommended. Most people stay overnight at Dongpu Lodge (2,580 m) before the hike.

That said, we stayed at Takulan Onsen Resort 達谷蘭溫泉渡假村 in Dongpu, Xinyi. While the resort’s elevation at 1,120 m didn’t do much for acclimatisation, it was a very nice onsen resort and only about an hour’s drive from the Yushan trailhead.

However, it is important that you understand the symptoms of Acute Mountain Sickness. If you are new to high-altitude hiking, we recommend using the Lake Louise AMS Score for self-assessment during the hike. There are only four questions, and it is really easy. Each symptom scores from 0 to 3, so in theory you get a total score from 0 to 12. You should consider stopping the hike or descending if your score is higher than 3.

If you are driving yourself to the trailhead, you should park your car at Shangdongpu Car Park 上東埔停車場 . From here, it is about a 500-metre walk up to the Paiyun Mountaineering Center 排雲登山服務中心.

Tip #2 – Check In at the Mountaineering Center

At the Paiyun Mountaineering Center, we presented our email confirmation, our passports and paid the NTD 480 per person permit fee in cash. We were then issued with the official park entry permit.

To get to the trailhead, you can either walk the 2.4 km from the Mountaineering Center or do it the easy way and take a shuttle at the very reasonable cost of NTD 100 per person. We chose the shuttle and saved ourselves a 2.4 km walk.

Stops on the Way (Trailhead to Paiyun Lodge)

Here are the stops that we noted on our trail. The time shown is elapsed time at our pace, including breaks.

Here’s the trail map for the route from the trailhead to Paiyun Lodge — 8.5 km with an elevation gain of around 800 m.

Tip #3 – Wear a Climbing Helmet

A few sections of the trail expose hikers to rockfall danger, especially during or after major earthquakes and weather events like typhoons. Judging by the amount of loose rock on the trail, we think the risk of rockfalls is real. We did not have helmets with us, but if we were to do it again today, we would definitely wear a helmet from start to finish.

There are free helmets available to borrow at Paiyun Lodge. There are two problems with that. As with any free gear, don’t expect the helmet to be of great quality or a perfect fit. Secondly, because free helmets are only available between Paiyun Lodge and the summit, you will have no helmet protection between the trailhead and Paiyun Lodge.

Tip #4 – Pre-Order All Your Meals and a Sleeping Bag

Once you get to Paiyun Lodge, you need to check in at the front desk, show them the park entry permit, and then pay all the fees in cash.

We pre-ordered both our meals and sleeping bags. The cost is NTD 850 per person, and the meals include dinner at around 5:00 pm, an early morning breakfast at 2:30 am and brunch at 7:30 am.

Hot water is available, so bring a stainless steel water bottle.

The sleeping arrangement is in dormitory-style bunk beds. My wife and I were assigned to the same room. There was another family of five in our room.

There are no shower facilities and the toilets are basic. This is typical of mountain lodges.

Tip #5 – There Are No Power Outlets Here

There is no power outlet in the rooms for you to charge your devices. Near the entrance, we saw a power distribution board where people were charging their mobile phones.

We didn’t use that as we had switched our phones to flight mode and relied on offline maps to navigate. The battery easily lasted a couple of days on our iPhones.

We did bring a power bank to charge our other devices.

Tip #6 – Get Up Real Early

As the weather forecast was predicting rain for the day, we decided to skip the sunrise and got up at around 2:30 am.

After breakfast, we set off at 3:00 am. Before we left, we stored some of the things we didn’t need for the summit in one of the many cubbyholes around the lodge.

Here are the trail map stops from Paiyun Lodge to the summit:

Here’s the trail map for the route from Paiyun Lodge to the summit — 2.5 km with an elevation gain of around 550 m.

Tip #7 – Get Yourself Organised in the Wind Tunnel

The wind tunnel is a structure built on the western face of Yushan. Its primary purpose is to protect the trail from falling rocks. It is also a nice place to shield hikers from the elements.

There is a reason why this is called the wind tunnel – you will be much more exposed to the weather after you exit the wind tunnel. This is the place to put on windproof and/or rain layers. From the end of the tunnel it is only about 300 metres to the summit.

Although we did not leave anything here, we saw hikers leaving their trekking poles to lighten the load for the final ascent.

Rockfalls are very real in this section of the trail. In fact, two weeks before we arrived, a section of the wind tunnel was destroyed by rockfall, making hiking through this part quite difficult.

Tip #8 – Take the Photo with the Monument

Of course, once you reach the summit, take that iconic photo with the summit monument. There was a bit of a queue and it took about 15 minutes of waiting before our turn.

Back to Paiyun Lodge

Descending back down to Paiyun took on a different perspective in daylight. You can clearly see the steep drop-offs on the descent. One thing for sure: hold onto the metal chains when they are available and watch your step!

We got back to Paiyun Lodge at 7:00 am, so it took us approximately four hours including the time we spent at the summit. We then waited for brunch (a nice hot noodle soup) before starting our descent back to the trailhead.

We reached the trailhead at 11:45 am, which means it took us about 3 hours and 45 minutes to hike the 8.5 km down, including stops. A shuttle bus took us back to the car park for NTD 100 per person.

Summary

Yushan is definitely a worthwhile hike for most seasoned hikers. Although we saw people joining tour groups to do the hike, it is absolutely something experienced hikers can manage on their own.