ChiayiPlay Recommendations

Hui-yi Sen-huo Village at the corner of Gong-he Road and Lin-sen East Road in Chiayi's East District spans about 3.4 hectares and is Taiwan's first forest-themed creative park. The grounds preserve 29 Japanese-era cypress dormitories built between 1914 and 1943, forming Taiwan's largest and best-preserved group of wooden Japanese-style buildings - stepping in feels like traveling back to Japanese-era Alishan forestry life. Beyond historic buildings, the park offers wide lawns, ponds, and plantings, plus indoor workshops and exhibition spaces for family activities and woodworking DIY. Pet-friendly with flat lawns and paths, it suits walking dogs. Open year-round and free (10:00-18:00, no admission), it's one of Chiayi's most popular family summer-cooling and cultural-experience spots.

Xin-xin Cement Sen-huo-yuan Tourist Factory in Fan-lu Township, Chiayi County, was an abandoned cement plant transformed in 2020 into Taiwan's first cement-themed tourist factory. The park blends factory tours, indoor and outdoor family play zones, and creative DIY, with concrete succulent pots, Moai planters, digital interactions, ball pits, slides, and concrete-flavored soft serve plus a cafe. Admission is NT$50; free for under-2s, over-65s, and people with disabilities, and the ticket can offset some merchandise. Free parking; open Wednesday to Sunday 09:30-16:00, closed Monday and Tuesday. Great for kids to learn industrial history with creative hands-on activities - both educational and entertaining.

Du-jiao-xian (Rhinoceros Beetle) Leisure Farm in Zhong-pu Township, Chiayi County, spans about 7 hectares and is one of Chiayi's most popular family farms. The grounds offer wide grasslands, a grass-sled slope, sandpit, electric-car track, archery, and an animal feeding zone, where kids can ride ponies, feed cows and sheep, observe various small animals, and tour the insect house. The farm runs a mini-train, offers free ecological guided tours, and serves tasty fresh-milk steamed buns and creamy milk soft serve (NT$80 minimum spend in the food area). Admission is NT$150 (free under 4), with free parking. Suited to ages 3 and up, the farm offers diverse interactive experiences for families to play in nature.

Zhu-meng Sen-ju (Dream-building Forest Dwelling) sits beside Yun-shui Stream in Shen-keng Village, Zhong-pu Township, Chiayi County. Originally an abandoned betel-nut orchard, years of restoration have turned it into a nature-ecology-themed family camping park. Clean, comfortable RV trailers come with air conditioning and separate wet/dry bathrooms, plus skylights for stargazing. Activities are diverse: ecological tours, DIY crafts, tree climbing, rock climbing, lazy-river water-gun battles, ai-yu jelly DIY, and small-animal feeding, for kids and adults to experience together. An open-air restaurant serves home-style dishes featuring mountain produce so families can enjoy good food in nature. The atmosphere is warm and educational, suiting travelers seeking easy camping, family interaction, and environmental learning.

Red-tile Cat in Shi-long Village, Zhong-pu Township, Chiayi County, is an upcycling-aesthetics experience space created by a retired couple and their three daughters. The grounds center on reuse of old objects and natural dyes made from betel-nut waste, offering plant-dyeing, eco-printing, and hand-made DIY family experiences, paired with coffee, desserts, and art exhibitions so visitors can feel eco-creative creativity and slow living in a mountain-forest setting.

Lu-ying Ranch in Zhong-pu Township, Chiayi County, is a leisure farm blending dairy experiences with family fun. The spacious grounds feature grasslands, a butterfly chapel, morning-glory slide, ring-engagement chapel, and other diverse facilities, where guests can milk cows by hand, feed geese and rabbits, sled on grass, or row boats, and enjoy brunch or Italian cuisine in the glass-house restaurant. Free parking makes it good for a full family day out.