The river mouth at Tamsui

The Spanish built a wooden fort at Tamsui in 1628 and named it Santo Domingo. The Dutch took the site in 1642 and rebuilt it in stone two years later as Fort Antonio. Because the Han residents called the Dutch red-haired, the building became known as Hongmao Cheng, the red-haired fort. The Qing repaired it in the eighteenth century, and from 1867 the British leased it as a consulate, adding a two-storey residence beside the walls. The fort stayed in British hands until 1972. It is now a national historic site, with the main keep, the consulate residence and a southern gate in one compound. The walls are thick, the site is small, and the view from the parapet takes in the river mouth and the sea beyond.

George Leslie Mackay, a Canadian Presbyterian missionary, arrived in Tamsui in 1872 and stayed for the rest of his life. He opened a school for preachers in 1882, which grew into Oxford College, and founded a school for girls and a hospital. The college building still stands on the hill above the old street, a brick arcade with a bell tower. Mackay wrote From Far Formosa, a book recording his experiences in Taiwan, and he travelled through northern Taiwan preaching and pulling teeth. His work is remembered less for doctrine than for the institutions he left: schools, a hospital and a church that are still part of the town. The college and the nearby Presbyterian church are open to visitors at set hours.

Tamsui Old Street runs from the MRT station down to the river. Its shops sell iron eggs, fish balls, shaved ice and cakes, and it is crowded at sunset, when the light comes across the water from the Taiwan Strait. At the bottom, the ferry crosses to Bali on the far bank, and fishing boats tie up along the quay. Further north, the Fisherman's Wharf and its Lover's Bridge are a tram or bus ride away. The old street is not a preserved set: it is a working commercial street with a temple at one end and a market at the other. The past is in the side lanes, where the consulate, the college and the fort sit above the shops, each on its own small hill.