Trip - Taiwan Day 4 - Jiufen and Shifen (video)

This is our last full day in Taiwan so I jam packed the schedule to fit everything in.  I asked William, our driver, to visit all of the places below:

Yeliu Geopark (野柳地質公園) - sedimentary rocks that was formed from thousands of years of geological movement and sea erosion.  We spent 2.5 hours in the morning to explore.

Below is a famous mushroom rock called the Queen's Head.  It got the name because after the top of the rock fell off in 1963, the rock looks like the side-view of Queen Elizabeth's face.

We drove by the Nanya Rock formation (南雅奇岩) - we actually thought it was something else and took the wrong pic. Oops.

Yin Yang Sea (陰陽海) - could not get a good pic

Golden waterfall (黃金瀑布) - the water is a gold color due to sulphur, rainfall and mining in the nearby areas.  Toxic water but beautiful.  We were here for 2 mins for the pic.

Jiufen old street (九份老街) - pretty much a night market on a mountain in the middle of nowhere. There was only 1 steep bendy road up the mountain to get here so it had massive traffic jam. No where to park. Do not attempt to rent a car and drive here yourself. Just take a cab. The kids bought shells and little gifts, and we tried different types of food. 

Shifen waterfall (十分大瀑布) - This is a popular waterfall that is 20-meters tall and 40-meters wide.  By the time we got to this location, we found out that the tourist area will close in 15mins.  And there is a 15min walk to get to this waterfall too so if we wanted to see this place, R and I would have to do it alone.  

The two of us ran our butts off to get to the tourist area and made it through the gates, with 30secs to spare.  We took a nice pic of the waterfall and headed for the exit.  Problem was, there is only 1 exit which led us to some other entrance.  Aiya! 

We walked through this bridge "on the other side" and then started to freak out.  Our driver was waiting at the other entrance which we couldn't get to and we didn't know where the heck we were.  We had a TW cellphone and it was low on battery, but thank god it had just enough battery to dial him to tell him we were on the other side of the mountain.  William figured it out and picked us up.  

Shifen train station (十分老街) - This was our last destination of the day.  The Shifen train station is well known for releasing lanterns, which supposedly brings wishes to come true.  It was already dark outside so we had to decide on a lantern to decorate quickly.  We chose one that had multi colors just because it was pretty.  Immediately after we paid, the store owners brought out mosquito repellent for all of us to use (almost eaten alive!).  

Here we show off the 4 sides of the lantern which the girls worked hard to decorate (with the help of Mommy in Chinese).  The pic below show the train tracks behind us.  

And the train did pass by while we were still there.  Be careful not to stand too far out!

Trip - Taiwan Day 3 - Yilan

We left the house at our normal pick up time, 9am.  Today we visited a nearby city called Yilan.  It's about a 1.5 hour drive from Taipei depending on traffic (sometimes takes 4 hours if it's busy).  To get to Yilan, we traveled through the snow Mountain tunnel (雪山隧道), which is Taiwan's longest tunnel with a length of 12.9km.  Pretty neat.  After a while, it feels like the tunnel just never ends...but it does.

We went to see the following places in Yilan:

- Wufengshi waterfall 五峰旗瀑布, an easy 20 minute walk up the stairs.  Only MIL, Rich, Julia and I went to see this.  Daidail fell asleep in the car so Lo Ye stayed behind.  Jas had a bit of a fever and wasn't feeling very well.  There are 3 stages to the waterfall but we only walked to the 2nd one.  It would have taken another 20 minutes up to see the final one.

After this, we went to Yilan Hot Spring Fish spa where you dip your feet into the pool and there are all these little fishies swimming around that eats your dead skin!  Cost was $4 CDN per person so it was a cheap and fun outing.  It was the weirdest feeling, truly.

There was a bakery right next to the spa fish place so we bought a Minion bread.  It's all just for looks, sadly no taste.  

- Not sure why we went to the Fish market 南方澳南宁鱼市场  but the driver took us there for lunch.  There were little stands with dried seafood products.  You can even buy them fresh and take it to be cooked at the restaurants upstairs.  We ate lunch upstairs and ordered seafood but unfortunately, the food was quite disappointing.  Before we left, we bought several bags of the fried crab.  All 3 kids LOVED eating them.

- Because of time, we weren't able to see the Lanyang museum (蘭陽博物館), on architecture and landscape so we took a pic of it.

- the final stop is the King car Kavalan Distillery (噶瑪蘭酒廠) which makes whisky.  As alcohol drinkers, we just had to come for a visit.  It was a huge plant and they had free tours hourly.  Look at MIL and FIL so deep in thought during the session.  At the end of the tour, they gave out free testers of whisky.  There were benches with different years of whisky laid out that you can taste test.  Pretty neat.

Trip - Taiwan Day 2 - Taipei (video)

Today, we visited the northern part of Taipei city and saw the following places:

The Grand Hotel - one of the world's tallest Chinese classical buildings

 National Palace Museum (國立故宮博物院) - we spent about 2.5 hours here.  There were 3 main pieces that's quite famous:  cauldron of Duke Mao, jadeite cabbage and meat shaped stone.  Too bad we didn't get a pic of the last one.

Yangminshan National Park (陽明山國家公園) - there is supposedly an awesome view of Taipei at this park but it was really cloudy so the view was only so-so

The Top Restaurant - the driver took us to this restaurant for lunch.  It's supposedly a really popular romantic dining place on the mountain. We had to eat inside a hut which cost $3000 NTD (or eat outside in the rain with no minimum charge).  In order to reach the minimum charge, we ordered way so much food it filled the entire table and had to order even more to take home.

Beitou Thermal Valley (地熱谷) - a volcanic crater filled with steaming natural sulfuric hot spring water.  The temperatures of the water can reach up to 100 deg C, so it's not suitable for bathing.  Lots of steam around the area.

Beitou Quanyan Park foot bath park - this is popular spot where locals hang out dipping their feet into natural spring water...for free!  There's an area to wash your feet before you get in and rinse after you are done.  It was pretty busy when we got there but managed to squeeze ourselves in.