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!