Taiwan Suhua Highway — Pacific Cliff Road
202.91 €
The Suhua Highway along Taiwan’s eastern coast — the road carved from a 2,000-metre cliff face dropping vertically to the Pacific Ocean, the blue water visible hundreds of metres below through the guardrail, a highway maintenance vehicle the only traffic.
Description
The Suhua Highway on Taiwan’s northeastern coast is one of the world’s most dramatically positioned road routes — carved directly from the marble and serpentinite cliff faces of the Hualien coast where the Central Mountain Range drops 2,000 metres directly into the Pacific Ocean. The road requires frequent closures for typhoon damage and rockfall clearance, and its combination of extreme height exposure and Pacific Ocean views makes it one of Asia’s most photographed road sections. This image was made from a passenger bus window on the outer cliff section above Suao, the guardrail visible at the road edge and the Pacific Ocean several hundred metres below filling the frame beyond. A highway maintenance vehicle is parked at a rockfall clearing area. Shot handheld on a 35mm prime at 1/250 second through the bus window, the coastal geometry of cliff, road, and ocean is the image’s fundamental subject.
