Beitou in Taiwan is a peaceful antidote to hectic city life

There’s a simple trick to meeting people in Taiwan – just look lost. Pull out a map on a street corner, or stare at your smartphone, and sure enough, someone will stop and ask if you need help.

It happened so many times during a recent week in Taiwan that it became a running joke. Our Good Samaritans were intrigued to know what we thought of their home, a place the Portuguese named “Isla Formosa” (beautiful island).

Beitou, an old village absorbed into Taipei, the country’s capital, is a fine place to experience Taiwan’s warmth. It bubbles straight out of the ground. A 30-minute subway ride from the centre of Taipei, Beitou is the epicentre of hot springs on an island steaming with geothermal activity. You can pay top dollar to visit a luxury resort, or just take off your shoes and soak your feet in one of the brooks that tumble down the hillsides.

In the first half of the 20th century, when Japan controlled Taiwan, the area around Beitou Park was one of the largest spas in Asia, filled with taverns, music halls and houses of ill repute. During the Vietnam war, American soldiers helped turn Beitou into a notorious red-light district. After Taiwan banned prostitution in the late 1970s, Beitou languished for a while, but now it is coming back, serving a different kind of clientele.

Visitors from China fill the resorts that ring Beitou Park. Yet in the maze of back alleys that radiate from the park, village life continues, with a bohemian twist.

Four years ago, a group of Taipei artists and travellers started to restore one of Beitou’s old inns, tucked away in an alley so narrow a car cannot pass. They decorated the rooms in different styles, using found objects from the building. Solo Singer Inn opened in 2012, an attempt to preserve the quaint lodgings.