Mid-range · 6-hour walk · Taipei
Beitou and Elephant Mountain in six hours
The hot spring valley, the wooden bathhouse museum, then the climb with Taipei 101 in front of you.
The three-hour route walks Wanhua and Ximending. This one uses the metro properly: twenty-five minutes north to Beitou, a volcanic hot spring valley the Japanese developed in the 1890s, and then back south for the twenty-minute climb up Elephant Mountain, which is the photograph of Taipei 101 everyone has seen and is genuinely worth the steps.
The route, stop by stop
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Beitou Hot Spring Museum
Arrive by metro from the previous stop
The 1913 public bathhouse, in brick and half-timber with a stained-glass bathing hall. Free, shoes off at the door.
50 min here Walk here → -
Thermal Valley
A steaming green sulphur lake at 80°C, the source of the valley's water. Boardwalk only; the water is genuinely dangerous.
30 min here Walk here → -
Beitou Park and the public baths
The park strings the valley together — library, museum, hot spring stream — and the terraced open-air public baths sit in the middle of it. Swimsuit and cap required, sessions in fixed blocks, and it costs almost nothing.
70 min here Walk here → -
Taipei 101
Arrive by metro from the previous stop
Tallest in the world until 2010, and the tuned mass damper hanging in the upper floors is a 660-tonne gold sphere you can walk around.
60 min here Walk here → -
Elephant Mountain
Twenty minutes of steps from the trailhead to the rock platforms, with 101 filling the frame. Busy at sunset and worth it anyway.
60 min here Walk here →
More in Taipei
Every walking route in Taipei, or the full Taipei guide for where to stay and what a day costs.