Taiwan - Taipei and Island tour

We flew in to Taipei from Tokyo with Scoot Business. I purchased the business class since the price was the same as a non-budget economy class airlines; but with the added bonus of 30 kg weight allowance and priority check in and boarding. And it was worth the upgrade. So far it was the best flight experience on our trip; passing through all the economy class passengers when we dropped our baggage and check in plus the extra leg rooms made us feel so posh.

We also met Fabs’s parents in Taipei. They were born in Taipei but migrated to Brazil 50 years ago and never been back until now!

Accommodation

We stayed in two accommodations in Taipei, the first one was in Hotel Relax I. There are five Hotel Relax around the same area - ours located on the top level (Level 11) of an office building, with a McDonalds on the ground level acting as a quasi reception and a school on another level. It was a really odd place for a hotel and felt weirder when we shared the lift with all other people working/studying in the building. We had to go Hotel Relax II for breakfast and coffee at Hotel Relax III – uncanny configuration but works (I guess). The room itself actually was really nice and it was so good to sleep on a bed again after been sleeping on the floor for the last 3 weeks!

The second accommodation we stayed in was called iTaipei service apartment.  It was clean, spacious and comfortable. Both of the accommodations were very close to Taipei Main station, which made it very convenient in terms of transports and entertainment as there were numerous shopping malls around the station.

Freaky robot in one of the station malls

The waiting area in Taipei Main Station. It's an open space where A LOT of people were just sitting around and having a picnic on the floor. I found this extremely weird.

Sights

Shilin Night Market

Considered to be the largest and most famous night market in the city, this market was very crowded with shops selling random knickknacks and countless food stalls. Some housed in its dedicated food court area where we went first to grab a bite.

The food court in the basement of the market - lucky Fabs's parents can speak/read Mandarin, else we wouldn't have found it! 

Chicken feet - I got told off for taking this picture! I thought she was going to chase me down the road

Favourite bao - Hújiāo bǐng or Pepper bun. It is baked in a tandoori oven and it was so yum!

It was where I first had the experience of sniffing AND tasting the “stinky tofu”; Taiwanese delicacy which is a form of fermented tofu that has a very strong odour. At times, I would wonder whether I was smelling the tofu or sewage.

Taipei 101

Formerly known as the Taipei World Financial Center, it is a landmark supertall skyscraper and is ranked 6th tallest building in the world. We had to pass through a clever pathway through numerous stores before we got to the lift that took us to its observatory on level 89.

Quite impressive

Somehow flat city

Yongkang Street

Hailed as a dining destination in Taipei, it was crowded and humid when we were there. After chilly days in Tokyo, I never expected Taiwan to be so HOT.  We headed straight to the first ever Din Tai Fung restaurant and put our name down. The lady said we needed to wait for an hour, so we just went for a walk on the street.

I was starving and I saw a line at the cong zhua bing 蔥油餅 or onion pinched pancake stall; I went and joined the queue. It was crunchy, chewy and delicious! We also eyed the shaved ice mountain, though we didn't end up getting it because we were too full after lunch!

Delicious pancakes

At Din Tai Fung, we ordered beef noodles and countless xia long bao - dumplings with soup inside the steamed bun. I think it was nicer than the ones we had in Sydney. Maybe it was because of the pork or slightly thinner dumpling's skin or it was just all in my head.

Looked like the ones in Sydney

OK beef noodle - the menu here is slightly different than the one back home

The National Palace Museum

The museum has a permanent collection of nearly 700,000 pieces of ancient Chinese imperial artifacts and artworks - which I somehow couldn't appreciate the extent of it. If you are into Chinese arts this is for you. It was wasted on me. On the brighter note, Fabs's dad seemed to enjoy it immensely.

This is the famous cabbage masterpiece made out of Jade - basically the Taiwanese version of the Mona Lisa! Can you spot the preying mantis? Pardon the quality, we had to fight other tourists to take this photo

Ximending

Fabs's mum wanted to check out this place since it was close to where her mum (Fabs' grandma) used to work. It was a lively area and where the Ay Chung Flour Rice Noodle located. It was a takeaway shop - after we queued and ordered (large or small - they only sell one type of noodle), we joined others that sat/stood around eating their noodles. It was simple, cheap and delicious!

Crowded for a good reason

The shaved ice mountain are everywhere in Taiwan - not only in Yongkang Street. We saw one shop here and settled in. It was massive! We had one between all of us - locals next to our table were having one each 😲

Mango goodness. It was a refreshing end to our hot and humid night

TOUR TIME!!

It is easier to travel with parents in a tour. At least everything was booked, organised and sorted for us. We booked the five days round Taiwan tour directly with Edison Tour via email, for a detailed itinerary go here. We didn't know what was the size of the tour going to be; just to found out that there were 32 of us in total. Quite a large group!

There was a lot of sitting in the (air conditioned comfortable) bus, with stops every 1.5 hours or so for toilet breaks. Many stops that were spectacular. Some weren't as much but we still needed to get out of the bus to had a look briefly in 35℃ heat. Here are the highlights:

Ci En Pagoda - it was a bit of a hike to get up there. It was deserted when we were there

Netted stairs - just in case

Wenwu temple - apparently it is a really rich temple. Almost completely destroyed by the latest earthquake, it was rebuilt to look how it is today

You can print your own divine poem! The divine is very modern now.

The beautiful reflective Sun Moon Lake

One of the temple after the earthquake - left as is. I wonder whether there were any corpses under the rubble still 

Does anyone know what is this fruit? Found in one of the markets in our tour

Fo Guang Shuan Buddhist Monastery - looked pretty new with its many Buddhas 

Where I got lost and Fabs came to find me in a (air conditioned of course) book shop next door. He was seething, Oops 😅

Sister temple to Wollongong temple in Australia

Our brief boat tour of the 'Love River' in Kaohsiung

Kaohsiung night market, Liuhe - reeked of stinky tofu

Eluanbi light house - we were all melting in the heat. How photos can be deceiving! 

Maobitou coastal scenic area - we were here for 5 minutes for pictures then ran back into the air-conditioned bus

Another beautiful deserted calm beach

Delicious Taiwanese staple - beef noodle

We stayed in five stars hotels all the way and they were splendid. All of them offered an awesome massive buffet breakfast and really good selection of restaurants for dinner. Some hotels even have hot springs though it was quite warm to be in one. Our guide; Alan was great, helpful, quite funny and entertaining.

One of the hotels - there's Fabs hanging out with all his friends

From all the sights, my favourite was Toroko Gorge. We were already thinking to come back and hike it as it was quite something!

Masterpiece cheesy picture. All of these cliffs are made of marbles!

Transport

We used the subway in Taipei to get around. There's a direct line from Taipei Main Station all the way to the airport as well!

Subway token - scan to get in and insert into the gate upon exiting. We found the single journey tokens were better value than getting the day pass.

Extra

After the tour we went back to Taipei to visit where Fabs' parents used to live and where his Grandma used to work, I think it was an awesome thing to do. Considering they haven't been back for many years it was amazing they still remember where the places were. They said a lot have changed, but there were places that still looked exactly the same 50 years on.

Where Grandma used to work

We spent a total of 10 days in Taiwan. I felt it was enough; it was a nice, cheap country (relative to Japan, probably a little cheaper than South Korea) with super fast internet, yummy food and really efficient people - everything was done real quick! Shanghai next - our first stop in China!

Saw this in Taipei airport before security. What a brilliant idea! Least everyone gets to keep their water bottle