NÁ THIANN NÁ KIÂNN has organized 10 themed walking tours that guide visitors through Tainan's historical sites. These tours invite participants to explore the convergence of Taiwan's tangible and intangible cultural assets, such as religious practices, traditional rites, artistic aesthetics, and culinary traditions. Starting from Tainan, this journey provides insights into the diverse facets of Taiwan's history post-1624, inspiring a deeper understanding of Taiwan’s cultural and historical landscape.
Curatorial Team：L-instyle Boutique Travel Services
Founded by You Zhi-wei, who has over a decade of experience in in-depth tour planning, L-instyle integrates resources across disciplines to offer the most effective solutions through event planning, curatorial consultancy, and spatial planning. With increasingly insightful field research, You Zhi-wei has uncovered this island’s touching stories and material abundance. He hopes for these stories to be preserved for people to experience.
10 Cultural Exploration Walking Tours
✷ Dates｜8/23 (Fri) - 9/1(Sun) ※The actual tour dates and times are subject to the details provided on the registration page.
✷ Participant Limit｜20 people per session
Overview of Cultural Exploration Routes
#1 | Industry | Full Sugar: Sweet Memories of Taisugar’s Budai Rail Line
Date & Time｜8/23（Fri）9:40-17:35
Meeting Time｜9:25-9:40
Meeting Point｜Xinying Station
Drop-off Point｜Xinying Station、Tainan Station
Xinying Sugar Refinery – Salt Transfer Platform, East Taitzu Temple Station – Annei Sugar Refinery, Yanshuei
Taiwan Sugar Corporation, or Taisugar, had a complex railway system crisscrossing the central and south parts of Taiwan. The endless sugarcane fields and the towering chimneys of sugar refineries were once dominated of the landscape on the Chiayi-Tainan Plain. This tour focuses on the Budai Line – the first operational railway line of Taiwan’s sugar industry. Starting at one of Taisugar’s three major refineries, Xinying Sugar Refinery, stopping at the Salt Transfer Platform of East Taitzu Temple Station, and finally reaching the century-old Yanshuei Sugar Refinery, this will be a sweet journey of exploration.
#2 | Life of the Common Folk | A Stroll Through History: The Commercial Hub of Wutiaogang
Date & Time｜8/24（Sat）9:30-12:30
Meeting Time｜9:15-9:30
Meeting Point｜Tainan Shuixian Temple
Drop-off Point｜Sugozen Guest House
Tainan Shuixian Temple – Shennong Street – The Stores and Temples of Wutiaogang – Sugozen Guest House
Wutiaogang refers to the five main channels that formed in the sedimentation of the Taijiang lagoon. Extending outward like five fingers, these channels gripped Tainan’s transportation and commerce and made the city Taiwan’s commercial hub of the time, cementing the prosperity echelon known as “Tainan first, Lugang second, and Bangka third.” The different types of goods going through each channel also helped form the five major families as well as a wide variety of businesses and faiths. The concentration of businesses and workers in the area, in turn, supported an array of stores and food providers, enriching Tainan’s history of folk culture.
#3 | Art | The Historic Chun-Yuan Art Studio and Tainan’s Majestic Pantheon
Date & Time｜8/24（Sat）13:30-17:00
Meeting Time｜13:15-13:30
Meeting Point｜Chen De-Jiu Family Hall
Drop-off Point｜Cogood Space
Chen De-Jiu Family Hall – Bajijing Guan-Di Temple – Bajijing Wudi Temple – Bajijing Nanfang Chongqing Temple – Jiuling Beiji Xuantian Shangdi Temple – Painting Experience
Tainan is Taiwan’s religious capital, with its countless temples and a pantheon of deities. Built on the people’s piety, the temples have become vessels of culture and aesthetics. This tour focuses on one of Tainan’s renowned family of painters, Pan Chun-yuan, Pan Li-shuei, Pan Yue-hsiung, and their Chun-Yuan Art Studio. The three generations spanning over a century have achieved great artistic heights. The tour takes you to temples the Pan family worked on, including Bajijing Guan-Di Temple, Bajijing Wudi Temple, and Chen De-Jiu Family Hall. Master painter Pan Yue-hsiung and his apprentice Huang Zhi-yuan will demonstrate gilded painting, and you will have hands-on experience in the art.
#4 | Food | Hidden Delicacies at Niuhsu Market, Only Open on Dates Ending in 2, 5, or 8
Date & Time｜8/25（日）9:00-13:30
Meeting Time｜➊ 08:00-08:15 ➋ 08:50-09:00
Meeting Point｜➊ Tainan Station、➋ Shanhua Station
Drop-off Point｜Shanhua Station、Tainan Station
Shanhua Niuhsu – Shanhua Old Street – Shanhua Qing'an Temple – Taste Beef Soup
In the early days, a niuhsu was an open-air market where cattle were traded. After the cattle trade ceased, it became a marketplace for farming equipment, household supplies, fresh food, and traditional snacks. A niuhsu is not open every day. Early in the morning, we take you to Shanhua Niuhsu, one of the remaining three niuhsu in Taiwan, open only nine days a month. Witness the endless surprises in local shops and follow a gourmet into an old beef soup restaurant to experience Tainan’s food culture.
#5 | The City | Return to 1624: The Birth of Fort Zeelandia
Date & Time｜8/25（Sun）14:30-17:00
Meeting Time｜14:15-14:30
Meeting Point｜Anping Old Fort Entrance Area
Drop-off Point｜Ln. 850, Anping Rd., Anping Dist., Tainan City
Fort Zeelandia – Zeelandia Museum – The Streets of Dayuan
In 1624, men of the Dutch East India Company came ashore in Dayuan and built Fort Zeelandia and the town of Dayuan. It was Tainan’s introduction onto the world stage. This tour hopes to return to the starting point 400 years ago to understand the background and purposes for which the Dutch came to Taiwan. The tour will also take you through the urban planning, road designs, and architectural techniques left here by the Dutch and allow you to experience the four centuries of turbulent history during which different ethnicities came together and shaped the town of Anping.
#6 | Railway | The Tainan Section of the Western Trunk Line: A Journey of Rural Nostalgia
Date & Time｜8/28（Wed）9:45-17:10
Meeting Time｜09:30-09:45
Meeting Point｜Bao’an Station
Drop-off Point｜Tainan Station、Bao’an Station
Bao’an Station – Balin Station – Longtian Station – The Sugar Train Shengli – Houbi Station
Tainan is home to three different rail gauge systems – the 1,435mm standard gauge, the 1,067mm narrow gauge, and the 762mm gauge for the sugar train. The high-speed rail, Taiwan Railways, the Taisugar railways, and the salt transport railways together gave Tainan a rich railway culture. Starting at the best-preserved wood train station from the Japanese era – Bao’an Station, we head north along the Western Trunk Line, appreciate the scenery racing past us, visit vintage train stations, and ride on the newly restored Shengli sugar train. This will be a day of railway nostalgia.
#7 | Education | Thomas Barclay in Formosa: Building Education in Tainan
Date & Time｜8/31（Sat）13:00-17:00
Meeting Time｜12:45-13:00
Meeting Point｜Tainan Station
Drop-off Point｜Taiwan Church Press
Chang Jung Senior High School History Museum – Thomas Barclay Presbyterian Church, Dongmen, Tainan – Tainan Theological College and Seminary – Taiwan Church Press – Printing Press Experience
Minister Thomas Barclay came to Taiwan in 1875, pioneering modern education on the island as he worked in Tainan. Barclay founded not only Taiwan’s first Western college (present-day Tainan Theological College and Seminary) but also Taiwan’s first newspaper (present-day Taiwan Church News), which was published in plain Mandarin to spread knowledge to the general public. He dedicated his life to modernizing education and was a culturist and educator who had profound impact on cultural development in both Tainan and Taiwan at large.
#8 | Music | A Round of Applause: A Bus Ride with the Music of Hsu Shih
Date & Time｜8/31（Sat）9:30-13:00
Meeting Time｜9:15-9:30
Meeting Point｜Tainan Station
Drop-off Point｜Tainan Station
Nostalgic Music Bus Tour: Tainan Film Centre – Wenting Phonograph Museum – The Spring – Hsu Shih Music Library
Throughout his life, the talented musician Hsu Shih created many catchy tunes inspired by his hometown Tainan. These touching songs intimately captured the sentiment of the times. Climb onboard this nostalgic music bus and visit the places that inspired Hsu’s music. The bus will take you from Tainan Train Station, where the lovers in “Midnight Street Lamp” meet, to Yanping Theater (present-day Tainan Wonderful Theatre), where “A Night in Tainan” debuted, and Baomei Building (currently a Donutes coffee shop), where Hsu wrote “Remembering Anping.” You also get to explore the historical Tainan Broadcast Station (present-day Tainan Film Centre) and experience phonographs and vinyl records that immerse you in this golden age of music.
#9 | Hydrology | The Great Canal: The Lifeblood of Chianan Plain
Date & Time｜9/1（Sun）10:00-18:00
Meeting Time｜9:45-10:00
Meeting Point｜Tainan Station
Drop-off Point｜Tainan Station
Tainan Shan-Shang Garden and Old Waterworks Museum – Zengwun River Aqueduct – North-South Branched Check Gate Station – Boat Tour on Wushantou Reservoir
To supply the population with clean water and improve sanitation, William Kinnimond Burton – the father of tap water in Taiwan – and his student Hamano Yashiro began building water channels in Tainan. Using gravity drainage, their system reliably provided domestic water for the city of Tainan. Hatta Yoichi, who was involved in planning the channels, later dedicated himself to building the Chianan Irrigation System, which has nourished the fertile soil of the entire Chianan Plain for over a century. It has become the lifeblood of all who live in southern Taiwan. This tour follows the water and explores the history of hydraulic engineering in the Japanese era and how waterworks modernized a century ago.
#10 | Literature | Yeh Shyr-Tau’s Romance and Nostalgia
Date & Time｜9/1（Sun）13:30-17:00
Meeting Time｜13:15-13:30
Meeting Point｜National Museum of Taiwan Literature.
Drop-off Point｜Yeh Shyr-Tau Literary Memorial Museum
Yeh Shyr-Tau Literary Memorial Museum – Hayashi Department Store – Chen Shih-Hsing Family Residence – Gourd Alley – Snail Alley
“This is a perfect place for people to dream, work, fall in love, be married, and live their lives in ease.” Succinctly, Yeh captured the essence of life in Tainan in his time. Of his eight decades on this earth, more than half was spent in Tainan. His profound affection for his hometown is reflected in his work, with more than a hundred mentions of place names in Tainan. This tour features literature-related locations. Starting from Yeh Shyr-Tau Literary Memorial Museum, we follow Yeh’s literary footsteps and appreciate his casual days in Tainan at a leisurely yet meticulous pace.