The BETTER Taroko Gorge Tour

We attended the Taroko Gorge Tour and found it to be an amazing experience. We would like to recommend our guide, Jimmy, who was very accommodating, friendly, knowledgeable, and helpful in many ways.

Private Tour in Taroko Gorge. We had a great tour with The Better Taroko Gorge Tour.

We liked that fact that the group is a small group and that guide has much knowledge about the area and history of the National park.

We have also like that the tour has covered most if not all the most important parts of Taroko National Park. Something we couldn’t do alone without a guide.

We had three walks. The first walk was a long side the river with few tourists and that was the best part of the tour.

Great! Really great Tour! We were 6 people with our Guide Alan and he did a great job in showing us around and explaining things, I/we can really recommend this tour.

Taroko Gorge. Had an amazing day in Taroko Gorge together with tour guide Allen. We beat the crowds with our little group, and everything was taken care of. Highly recommended!

Private Tour with Tour Guide Jimmy. My husband hired Island Life Taiwan for private tour guide service. Our tour guide Jimmy was awesome! He is friendly, professional, knowledgeable about local culture/ customs, and the historical background of Taroka Gorge and its indigenous people. He communicates well in English and is great with children, and offers to take wonderful pictures of the family which he later sends via Airdrop. Jimmy is a safe driver and took us to different areas including Shakadong River, Nine Turns, Eternal Springs and several Buddhist temples and a walk on a suspension bridge.
Our experience was a pleasant one because Jimmy performed above and beyond what we expected from a tour guide. He welcomed us with a “welcome gift” of freshly made mochi, took us to a street-side kitchenette for local fare for breakfast, a Taroka restaurant serving indigenous Tarokan food, and a Japanese restaurant for dinner at the end of the day. He exceeded our expectations when he drove to the train station before taking us to the restaurant so that we would know the route to walk from the restaurant to the train station! Overall, we highly recommend Island Life Taiwan, and specifically hiring Jimmy as a private tour guide! Thank you, Island Life Taiwan and Jimmy!

Taroko Had a well paced and informative tour of Taroko National Park with Allen. Good guide, amusing dad jokes. Also convenient, collected and dropped off from your hotel Thanks!

Great tour of Taroko Gorge. The tour was wonderful and Santa is a great guide. His English was great and he answered all of our questions, told us some stories and history, And made this day very special for all of us. I would certainly recommend this to anybody who would be coming to Hualien.

AMAZING tour. Allen was such a good guide, and this tour was incredible. We went to see so many incredible sights and did so much – I was thoroughly impressed with the number of sights we went to. Additionally, it never felt rushed; Allen knew exactly how long was the right amount of time to spend at each attraction. His English was very good and we got lots of information about the history of the park and of Taiwan. The price is also very very good. Definitely worthwhile, was the highlight of my trip to Taiwan.

Great tour of Toroko Gorge. Tour guide Alan was great, and my wife and I really enjoyed the tour. The first walk in the Gorge was by far the best part of the tour.

Good fun. We had an amazing day with our guide Alen. He spoke perfectly english, gave us interesting insights and avoided the crowds.

Wonderful Tour. We were impressed with the professionalism of Island Life. With just a days notice Jamella responded promptly to our email inquiry and booked us the tour. Alan our guide was at our hotel exactly when Jamella said he would be. Alan’s English was excellent and gave us a brief history of Taiwan on our short drive to the park. Since we got an early start we arrived ahead of the big bus tours and we really didn’t see too many other people on our adventures. We never felt rushed and were left on our own to wander the gorge at our leisure. The lunch at a Taroko lodge was very nice with a nice choice of main dishes. Alan took many group shots and even took the time to take shots of the four individual couples on our tour. We are looking forward to receiving them. All in all a very enjoyable experience and a spectacular park. We would highly recommend a trip to Hualien to take in the park. It’s an easy 2 hour train ride from Taipei and if you arrive the night before you can catch a train back the same day as the tour.

Interesting! The Park is very beatiful and Iris took care of us. We explored the area trying to avoid tourist buses and leaving pretty early in the morning we were almost alone in some of the places. It has been a great pleasure to talk with our guide of the history of the park, but also of Taiwan.

Totally exceeded expectations! First of all, Taroko Gorge is a must see for any visitors to the wonderfully charming island of Taiwan. Truly stunning.

Knowing that, deciding how to experience it best becomes a bit more challenging. Rent a scooter? Take a local bus? Bike it? Tour group?

Weighing all the options we decided on the latter, and couldn’t be more pleased. Island Life has a great full day planned and our guide, Alan, was incredible. We checked off every box of must-sees in the park, hiked, swam, ate local cuisine. Well worth the extra couple of bucks to ensure a day well spent! Highly recommended.

If you decide to go with Island Life, ask for Alan! He’s an enthusiastic local, one of the best tour guides we’ve ever had and his English was superb, arguably better than mine!

Good trip~We take this trip for our 20th anniversary. I’ve always wanted to show my husband Qing Shui Cliff. But we didn’t know that it isn’t including in this trip’s itinerary. So at the end of the trip, I asked our guide Allen to take us there, he happily did it. We are very satisfied. We thank his warm consideration. The company also prepared for us to share and celebrate the paralyzed traveler. Allen is very knowledgeable about the local situation, so the entire itinerary is very smooth. On the return journey, he took the group on the country road and introduced many local animals, plants and history. Other tourists in the same group were also very friendly. The price of Tripadvisor was different from the price shown when booking, and the latter was higher. Overall, this is a great trip. We will definitely recommend other friends.

Great trip! There were altogether 5 of us in the minibus on this trip with Allen. The early start is definitely a good idea to beat the crowds at least on the first walk. Allen had good English and was keen to share his great knowledge of the region. We definitely saw more sights than would have been possible using public transport.
Perhaps at some of the sights less time would have been sufficient.
Would recommend this tour.

Worth the early start and tour guide. Although it was an extremely early start to the tour, but absolutely worth it just to avoid the crowds and enjoy the park at it’s best. Allen was a knowledgable and funny guide! He tried to make everyone feel included, and even brought us on a different more scenic route when headed back to Hualien.

Definitely recommend taking this tour and having Allen as a guide! Thanks for the day trip!

Some small details will make Tour even better. Our guide barely share about the history and cultural information in relation to the Taroko Gorge. In addition, when we asked a few questions relating to the Gorge, she was not too certain. For e.g. When asked Taroko was an Unesco site, she did not know what Unesco means.

During the first part of the tour when we need to cover 4km by foot, the guide also did not inform us clearly the terrain and the condition of the trail in view we have a 2 years old son travelling with us. This turn out to be a very difficult walking trail for us, as we would have not leave out baby carrier, and water in the car. Furthermore, the guide covered the trail speedily and it was not easy having to chase her with my son in tow.

Its website reflected many highlights but it definitely could be better brought to life by the sharing of history, and background of all the different sites. Without that, there is no reason for me paying a premium for your tour. Getting a driver will work for me since I could understand Mandarin.

Great Taroko Gorge Experience. We’re a couple from Australia in our early 30s visiting Taiwan for the first time. Taroko Gorge is definitely worth seeing if you have some time; the landscape is beautiful and unique, really awesome. After researching, I concluded that a guided tour was the best way to see the Gorge, even though we usually avoid tours because of the group format and timetable. The other ways to get around the Gorge were by rented car or shuttles; from what I had read, the shuttles seemed unreliable and restrictive in terms of stops, and renting a car was too troublesome for us, not to mention the narrow roads we would have had to navigate (seeing the tour buses take corners on the day – it was pretty intimidating). We opted for a private tour, as the price was not significantly different to the group tour option. We had Iris as our guide, picking us up at our accommodation punctually at 7.30am. She was personable and knowledgable, and we felt comfortable and well looked after by her throughout the day. She guided us through the crowds when present, otherwise avoided them as much as possible. She had lots of insights to share about the landscape and Aboriginal culture, and it was delivered very naturally without sounding rehearsed. The tour felt very comprehensive and included snacks, lunch and a secret swim! We were dropped off at our accommodation at about 3.30pm. This tour was easy to organise, and was a great experience from start to finish. We are really glad we chose to experience Toroko Gorge in this way. If you can afford it, we would recommend this tour company to all our friends.

Great day, saw all the highlights, recommend. Unless you plan on self-driving, taking a small tour like this is the best way of getting around this huge park and seeing the highlights. I returned to the park the day after this tour to attempt some longer hikes, and the public busses are unreliable and only hit a few big spots, and the longer hiking trails were closed anyway (something the tour group would have known). Anyway, about this tour… super easy to book, great communication, and a funny and knowledgable guide, Alan. Alan had great english and a fantastic sense of humor. He made sure to always communicate where we were going and what we’d be seeing, and always knew where to go to help take great photos for us. Lunch was very very good and filling. Price is fair for a full day guided tour, and don’t think there is any other way of seeing all of the highlights in one day. Great trip!

Truly the “Better” Taroko Gorge Tour. Taroko Gorge is a maze of rock and water. You can try to tackle it alone but you’ll probably end up confused and exhausted. Plus it’s a national park, not a playground park, meaning it spans many kilometers in all directions. Best to sit back in a car with AC and let someone chauffeur you to all the right destinations.

That’s where Island Life steps in. They specialize in adventure tours all around the beautiful and naturally wondrous Hualien as well as other parts of Taiwan. They’ve got day trips that have you literally chasing waterfalls…as well as swimming in clear rivers, hiking up mountains. We took part in the aptly named “The BETTER Taroko Gorge Tour”. I’ve never taken another Taroko Gorge Tour, but this one was pretty damn good.

What makes it better? Firstly, completely fluent English guide, which is pretty important for a foreigner like myself. It’s a full-day tour after all, with lots of rich history and information. Alan was our guide, and he was absolutely fantastic, balancing knowledge and fun. He was the driver, tour guide, and photographer for our little group.

Secondly, they’ve got their timing down to a science. We had just enough time to complete the hikes we set out to complete, with no extra wasted time. On top of that, we left early enough to avoid huge crowds. We still bumped into them throughout the day, but it definitely wasn’t as crowded as it could be.

Thirdly, the itinerary was the perfect first taste of Taroko Gorge and what beautiful Hualien had to offer. The hikes included Swallow Grotto and Shakadong Trail, both very famous and absolutely breathtaking. We crossed suspension bridges and had water crash down on us in a waterfall. The indigenous meal that’s included was at the lovely Buluowan Hotel, run by native Taiwanese. It was an absolutely fantastic experience and a unique learning opportunity on the aboriginal history of the country (with awesome food to boot). After visiting the perpetually trickling waterfall at Eternal Spring Shine, we even had time to grab lemonade at a famous stall in Hualien.

Sure, you can probably spend half the money and take a tour bus out to Taroko Gorge. You’ll also be getting only half the experience with twice the number of people. Treat yourself. Pick Island Life and truly experience “The Better” Taroko Gorge Tour.

Loved the tour!!. The tour is a bit more expensive than the other tours but worth the money!! We were able to get an early start and visit the trails without the huge crowds from the tour buses. The lunch was also very good and it was enjoyable to learn about the aboriginal culture. It’s worth the money and was a highlight of our trip in Taiwan!!!

Taroko Gorge adventure! Me and my fiancé really had a blast with the tour with Alan.
I must give credits to our guide Alan for making the whole day tour such an enjoyable and interesting one.
Transport is covered and you’re being picked up right from where you stay in early in the morning. The journey to the gorge starts at 7.30 ish. An early day start to allow us to catch in my sights of the gorge at different places.
My group was with 6 other people from all over the world making us a total of 8.
Alan made the effort to get to know everyone of us and I must say his English is incredible.
During the time with the tour Alan also helped us take several beautiful photos. Follow Alan and he will show you the best spots and sights to take a shot together.
Ride up front with him in the van to get a more “personal” tour.
Personally was my second time at the gorge but I must say I enjoyed this one much better than before. I’ve learn so much about the history behind the gorge and the taroko tribes thanks to informative Alan.
Strongly encourage everyone to join this tour you won’t regret it.

On the journey back Alan still showed us some local delights. Tried it and it sure was great!

Thanks Alan!

Majestic Taroko Gorge. We had a such a great day at Taroko Gorge with Allen and the rest of the travel mates on the first day of our tour. Allen is kind and have a sense of humour to keep us engaged with the story and history of Taroko Gorge and aboriginal tribe. We wish we had a few more days at Hualien to join more Island Life tour.

PS. The last photo was not Taroko Gorge but 七星潭beach, which Allen took for us admiring the Pacific Ocean.

Very fun Taroko tour with Santa. We were disorganised and only booked our tour with Island Life Taiwan the night before our tour. Jamella was very helpful getting us sorted out for the tour.

Our guide Santa met us at our hotel perfectly on time and was an absolute star throughout. He is helpful, friendly, and full of fascinating and entertaining stories, his English is very good too. He also struck a perfect balance of keeping us amused in the car but also letting the group take the trails at their own pace, which meant we were able to appreciate them properly.

The tour itself was well planned. We were a group of four in a comfortable vehicle. Our early start meant we avoided being in the same place as most of the crowds, so we were able to see lots of things in the day (I think exact itenerary varies due to accessibility of each trial). The lunch was surprisingly good and overall we were very happy to have paid more to avoid the masses on buses.

FANTASTIC birthday trip!. The BETTER TAROKO GORGE TOUR is so much more than just sightseeing. Our tour guide IRIS was super informative and engaged. She talked to us about the history and significance of each place, even relating to it as a local. I especially liked her steering us away from the usual crowds and change up the itinerary to make it comfortable for us to see everything we wanted to see. You might be tempted to go with the more affordable tour, but trust me, this is WORTH IT.

The tour had sightseeing, some hiking and walking, some refreshing treats (water curtain!), MUST NOT MISS amazing indigenous food for lunch (surprise birthday cake for my daughter), and fantastic afternoon at the beach. We won’t soon forget this trip.

A wonderful day with Mother Nature!! Planned our trip to taiwan a couple of months ago and Taroko Gorge was the first place we wanted to visit and was really glad that we did it,our guide Allen was really good,he spoke English fluently and knew the place very well ,a true expert in his trade
Loved the nice and juicy sausage,aboriginal lunch was really good,everything went well from hotel pickup to drop off and a Special thanks to Allen for making sure that I got back our bag of medications which I dropped unknowingly in the van.

The Better Taroko Gorge Tour from Hualien. We had a really enjoyable day with Alan in the Taroko Gorge tour. He was very knowledgeable and great at getting us around all of the crowds to the beautiful sights. Highly recommend!

Very good day on a custom Taroko Gorge tour. There were six of us taking this tour and we met our driver and guide Daniel, at the cruise terminal and were soon on our way in a comfortable minivan.

The trip is a about an hour or so from the port but it was so worthwhile. We were kept informed as we made our way there and then had a good amount of time to enjoy all the attractions that we were taken to. Fortunately as we’d been able to set off before most of the cruise ship tours we were able to enjoy the attractions without there being crowds of people around us.
We also visited the Xiangde Temple, which was a fair climb to get up to and then went across the Yue Wang Ting suspension bridge and hiked up to the top to ring the bell (quite a hike).

We had a really good time on this tour with a great guide and we would certainly recommend this company.

A carefree and comfortable way to explore the Park. I was well taken care of by our guide Alan and had a good time with fellow tour mates. With logistics (transportation, food and bathroom breaks) taken care of, I was able to relax and just enjoy the Park.
Highly recommended for solo or small groups of travelers who wish to avoid the hassle and uncertainty of visiting the park yourself or being lost in a huge tour bus group.

Best tour ever! Island Life tours was recommended on a Taiwan blog I read. Allen guided me and my boyfriend around Taroko National Park for the day in a small group of 8. He was funny, had lots of stories to tell , had a vast knowledge of the local culture as he is a Hualien native, and took us to many places off the beaten track away from the crowds. His English & Japanese is as good as his native Chinese and I think he speaks other languages too. Such a great experience, well worth the money and would highly recommend.