Taiwan 2007 - 2nd March([part 3)

Taiwan 2007 - 2nd March(part 2)

The scenery on the way up to Yangmingshan.


Illegal manoeuvre.



Siaoyoukeng.


Yangmingshan, Flower Clock Festival.


Yangmingshan.


Top pic: I thought my gun was big but there were bazooka's.
Center pic: It speaks for itself.
Bottom pic: This is where i ran for my dear life, holding my pee to catch Bus 26.


Yangmingshan.

Taiwan 2007 - 2nd March

The night before, we were deciding on which destination to go to first. Since our legs were three quarter dead we decided to opt for the less tiring trip.

Our choices were:

1. Yangmingshan-Beitou Hot Spring-Danshui fishermans wharf/sunset.
2. Yeliou-Jinguashi(GOld Ecological Park)-Jioufen(Old mining town)-Keelung.
3. Taroko Gorge National Park-not decide yet.

We choose option number one. Since we needed to take an hours bus ride up to the mountain it would be the more relaxing choice.

We got up early as usual, had breakfast around 730am at the hotels restaurant. Was out of the hotel by 8am. There is a park along the way to the MRT station and there is this workout machine(elliptical machine, i think this is what its called). We saw a man using this machine and was very curious to see one in a PUBLIC PARK(more about this later)!

Itinerary for Day 2

Hotel -(MRT)> Jiantan MRT station -(Red bus No.5)-> Yangmingshan -(Internal bus No.108)-> Siaoyoukeng -(Internal bus No.108)-> Clock flower festival -(Taxi)-> Yangmingshan Bus station -(Bus No.26)-> Xinbeitou Mrt station -(walk)-> Lung Nai Tang Hot Spring -(MRT)-> Danshui -(MRT)-> Shilin Night Market -(MRT)-> Hotel


We took the MRT to Jiantan MRT station and took the Red No.5 bus to Yangmingshan.

Traveling tips: At Jiantan MRT station take exit 1, turn left and left again and look for the Red 5 bus stand sign. There are two queueing lines, those that line up gets priority to the seats and those who stand by the side need to wait for the bus driver to ring a bell telling you that all the seats are taken and you can go into the bus to stand and wait for a seat.

So as i was saying turn left and wait for the bus on the left side of the station. I did the opposite and took Bus 26(this bus also goes to Yangmingshan) on the right of the station and was heading back towards town and we got off at the next stop and walked all the way back to the MRT station and took the correct bus.

Standing in the bus is not fun when your feet are aching but it was alright, we didn't stand long before seats were available. The bus ride took about one and a half hours to reach the bus depot where you can take the internal bus to travel around the mountain.

Traveling tips: When you reach Yangmingshan you can take bus no:108, it does a round trip around the mountain and back to the bus depot if you just want to see the mountain and not explore individual spots. They have a package for the bus fares but i didn't find out what the package was cause i used my EasyCard.

We didn't want to spend much time on Yangmingshan fearing we would not have enough time for the other places we wanted to see. We only visited one place on Yangmingshan and that is Siaoyukeng. Siaoyukeng is at an elevation of 800 meters and contains a host of volcanically-created fumaroles, sulfur crystals, hot springs, and landslides. Sulfur vents noisily spew forth gases, and hot springs discharge endless streams of boiling water. We walked around to see the sulfur gases coming out of the mountain walls and the grounds as well. There is a small convenient stall at the back of the visitor center and we had a cup of coffee and some candy. These is nothing much there to see except for the sulfur gases. The real action is hitting the trails and going hiking.

After staying there for about an hour we took the bus back to the depot. We passed the rest of the scenic spots on the way back. It was a good way to do some sight seeing without getting down. There are hot springs at Yangmingshan as well but we didn't try any cause we were going to try the hot springs at Beitou. When we reached the bus depot we found out about a Clock Flower festival. Walking there takes about 20mins and taking the bus is only 5-10 mins. Took the bus to the Clock Flower festival instead of walking and killing my feet further.

Lots of flowers and a huge clock flower. There is a Temple and cafe on top a long flight of stairs at this location. We decided to leave as it was already 1130am. We had some grilled stinky tofu on the way to the bus stand. We asked a staff working there, when the next bus would arrive and she told us that it would arrive half and hour later. So we decided to take a taxi(NT$150) back to the bus depot. We then quickly located the bus stop to catch Bus 26 which goes to Beitou. While waiting i suddenly felt an urge to go pee! So i quickly walked back towards the bus depot to look for the toilet but i always kept looking to my back to see if the bus was coming. Just as i found the toilet, i suddenly heard my name being called! Lynn was shouting for me, cause the bus had arrive and you would need to wait half an hour for the next one. I quickly turned around and ran down the hill, holding tightly onto my camera with my 70-200mm lens.

Needless to say, we caught the bus and was on our way to Xinbeitou MRT station. We did not know where to stop and was on the look out for any signs or landmarks that would indicate that we have reached our destination. Finally i spotted the MRT station and we got off at a traffic light, not exactly a bus stop but the driver allowed us to get off. Not knowing where we were or where the Hot Springs are, i took out my map and soon found out that it was just 5 minutes walk from where we got off. While walking along the side of the MRT station, there are many signs and road maps and information boards telling you about Beitou and its hot springs and tourist information guides.

Traveling tips: When you exit the station walk straight towards the traffic light and walk towards your right. Once you cross the road towards the park, you should be able to see a 2 storey KFC opposite. Walk towards Starbucks and Wellcome to get to Guangming Road. From there onwards you should be able to find the tourist spots.

Our purpose for visiting Beitou was to try out its Hot Spring. We decided to try "Lung Nang Tai". In 1896, a Japanese man named Mr. Hirata came to Beitou to recover from illness. Impressed by the area's combination of lovely scenery and hot springs, he built Beitou's first bath-house, the Tengu Cabin, on the opposite bank of the Beitou Creek from the site now occupied by the Beitou Hot Springs Museum. Tengu Cabin was the precursor of today's Lung Nai Tang Hot Springs.

One hundred years later Beitou Creek is lined with hot spring establishments, but this undistinguished-looking building, which houses men's and women's public pools, is still in business. For many of its regular bathers, Lung Nai Tang has been used by the family for three generations.

They were not kidding when they said its Beitou's first bath-house. The entrance is the size of two doors length. You are greeted by the owner sitting at his desk facing the entrance. Behind him is the public bath area which is three quarters size of a badminton court and on his left is the corridor leading to the private rooms. Let me tell you how big these private rooms are, they are the size of maybe two or three cubicle toilets. These rooms are really small and ancient looking. The rooms are long but narrow, there is a cement tub filled with cold water for cooling down and at the end of the room is the hot spring bath tub on the ground. Just as you enter the room, is a sort of dry area for you to change and clean up.(pictures on this later)

After soaking for 10-15 minutes, we were sort of rejuvenated and left soon after. We took our time walking back to the MRT station and decided to take a break and chillout at Starbucks. The Hot Spring bath proved too good cause you sort of get lazy and are too relaxed and feel sleepy after the bath. We chilled out at Starbucks for quite sometime.


To be continued...

Taiwan 2007 - 1st March(part 3)

Passport, tickets & breakfast.


In-flight meal and entertainment.


HK International Airport.


TTY(Taipei Tao Yuan International Airport) / CKS International Airport.


On the way to the hotel.


Minquan W. Rd MRT station.


Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall Station.


National Theater & Concert Hall.


CKS Memorial Hall main entrance.


CKS Main Hall.


Students Lantern Contest Exhibition.












This is the "Visit Your Country" display at the front of the memorial hall i was talking about. You can see "Visit Malaysia' display there as well.


Quick snack, this shop is situated inside the CKS Memorial Hall station just before the entry gates.


Ximending.




Fried dumplings(NT$5 each)


Game machines in the shop lots as well as along the streets.


This is the basketball machine i was talking about(pic:top left)


More game machines.


Outside Longshan temple.


Inside Longshan temple.


Some lanterns being hung on the ceiling.


Red Playhouse and Huashi Street Night Market.


Some products from Hi-Life convenient store. Yummy instant noodles.

Taiwan 2007 - 1st March(part 2)

Itinerary for Day 1

KLIA -> HK International Airport -(transit)-> CKS International Airport(TTY) -(airBus 33)-> Hotel -(MRT)-> CKS Memorial Hall -(MRT)-> Ximending -(MRT)-> Longshan Temple -(walk)-> Huaxi Street Night Market -(MRT)-> Ximending -(MRT)-> Hotel

Upon arrival at CKS International Airport(TTY) we were ready to shoot rite out of the airport. We got our passports stamped and grabbed our bags as soon as they came out. Taipei's airport is like Melbourne Airport except smaller, nothing much to see/shop there.

We headed out of the airport, turned left heading towards the bus companies and quickly purchased a ticket(airBus, bus No.33) that drops us rite in front of our hotel(NT$110 per person). We stayed at Taipei Fortuna Hotel. It took us around 1hr30min to reach the hotel. We checked-in and got our keys as well as a 3pin adapter for our camera chargers. Without wasting any time, we dumped our baggage, washed up a bit and headed out the hotel.

We walked to the MRT station which is like 2 blocks behind our hotel, its not that far. Taiwan has a smart card system - EasyCard, you can use it on the MRT, on the bus and even in convenient stores, wherever you see this logo.
The cards cost NT$500(each) with NT$100 refundable and NT$400 usable credit, with minimum NT$100 top-ups. You also get a 20% discount per trip on the MRT.

Taipei's MRT is very easy to use with good signage both in Chinese and English, spacious and a queuing system which people actually USE! There are MRT attendants standing in front of the MRT directing people from exiting and entering the MRT, to prevent accidents from happening. At the main stations where you switch trains there are MRT staff everywhere, controlling the traffic flow and to be of any assistance to passenger who have questions.

Okay enough about the MRT. Back to my TRIP.

The station behind the hotel is Minquan W. Rd station. Our next stop was CKS Memorial Hall station to see the Memorial Hall night scene. When you exit the MRT station turn to your right and you will see the "National Concert Hall". Opposite it is the "National Opera House". And rite at the far end at 70 meters in height the "Memorial Hall. Because the Memorial is encircled by a garden of 25 hectares, everything has been executed in grand dimensions. Opposite the "Memorial Hall" is " The Gate of Great Centrality and Perfect Uprightness",this is the main entranceway to the memorial.

I went there with the purpose of capturing the night scene but the main hall was not exactly brightly lit. I was dissapointed that i could not get nice shots. There was a sort of an exhibition of Lanterns made by primary and secondary school children. This is not your ordinary lanterns you carry around, these are huge lanterns which have music and moving parts as well.

There was a mini "visit your country"(Macau, HK, Philippines, Malaysia...) sort of setup at the front of the gates. It looked odd to me to be displaying these there but it was there. We soon set off to go visit the "Longshan Temple". Went back to the CKS Memorial Hall station and got off at Longshan Temple station. Now how easy is it to get to your next tourist spot, they are named after it, hehehe.

When you exit the station turn right again, walk all the way until you reach the crossroad, its on your right(you won't miss it). Manka, now known as the Wanhua district, is the first part of Taipei to be developed. Longshan Temple is a famous old temple in Taiwan. It is for worshiping Guanshiyin Buddha and other divine spirits. Longshan Temple is facing the South. Its architecture is a three-section design in shape. There are the front hall, the rear hall and the right/left dragons protecting the middle hall. The layout is square and serene. The temple was built in Chianlung 5th year in Ching Dynasty. Due to natural disaster and damages caused by men, the temple was restored for several times.

Again i was disappointed not to get good photos again, cause this time i did not bring a tripod and it was very dark without good lighting. Admission is free by the way.

Exiting the temple we turned right and turn right again at the crossroad to reach Huaxi Street Night Market. The night market, together with night markets on Guangjou Street, Wujou Street and Shichen Street have formed a large unique market. Various commodities are sold here and it is one of the favored sites of tourists. In the early years, Huashi street is famous for congregated porno shops. After prostitution is banned by Taipei City Government, the sightseeing quality is greatly uplifted and the place becomes safer. Huaxi Street Night Market is famous for snake shops. There are about 2 to 3 snake shops that demonstrate snake processing and snake fights at nights. The shows usually attract a large crowd.

We did see the snake shop but it wasn't that interesting as said and there was definitely no crowd. Maybe due to the fact that it was a thursday night. We didn't spend much time there and headed for the MRT station again. We didn't want to spend much time there cause we wanted to go to Ximending. We took the MRT to Ximen station and came out at exit 2. Ximending pedestrian mall has been the fashion Vatican for young people since its establishment.

By the time we got there we were pretty hungry, so we went scouting for food. Food is not an issue in Taipei, its everywhere and inexpensive. Along the roads there are stalls and eateries in the small shop lots. We soon found a shop selling fried dumpling, ordered 5 of their specialty dumplings(NT$5 each). Reverse a bit, upon reaching Ximending, you will notice the way people dress are different. Ximending is famous for Harajuku fashion(Gothic Lolita). You`ll also notice the crowd here are younger and more for the teenagers to hangout. You`ll see a lot of entertainment outlets as well, not with arcade games but with those toy machine games and basketball machine games(a very popular and favourite game machine in Taiwan, its everywhere).

After shopping around for a while and our stomachs filled, i too hit the entertainment shops with those basketball machines(one of my favourite i must admit). We ended the night just walking around and also visiting the Red Playhouse, which is exactly opposite the exit from the MRT station. We were quite tired by that time and didn't go in the red playhouse to explore and just stood outside to take some pictures. We left Ximending close to 11pm. Took the MRT back to our hotel and called it a night. While we're walking back to our hotel from the MRT station we passed by a convenient store, Hi-Life. We bought some drinks and instant noodles which we can't get back home and the variety they have just makes 7-eleven back home look understocked.

That's all for Day 1. Will post up the pictures from day one soon.

To be continued...

Taiwan 2007 - 1st March

- This is where the drama begins. -

Our alarm rang at 6am and i was so tired and blur i didn't want to wake up :)

It took me 10 minutes to get up and hit the showers and got ready. After we got ready we did last minute checks and took our luggage's downstairs and waited for the airport taxi to arrive.

Usually these airport taxis would come earlier and wait for you outside your house like 5 - 10 minutes before your pickup time. But to no avail, the taxi was no where to be seen and it was already 705am. We were beginning to get worried and called the airport taxi company and got hold of the taxi drivers mobile number. We gave him a call and he told us that "HE COULD NOT MAKE IT" and his friend would be coming to fetch us. After waiting until 725am, i called the taxi drivers friend and told him to "Fly Kite" and that i`m on my way to KL Sentral.

I got my dad to send us to KL Sentral in record time cause the morning traffic jam was picking up. We reached the station by 740am. Fortunately Lynn had a KLExpress ticket, so we only needed to purchase one additional ticket. We were fortunate again as we caught the train that was leaving. The moment we got into the train the doors closed. We put our luggage's aside and sat on the cramped seat on this supposedly 1st class train to KLIA which cost RM35 one way!!!! but it only takes you 28 minutes to reach KLIA.

The plan was to reach the airport before 740am-800am but we arrived at the check-in counters at 815am-820am and the queue was surprisingly very long! Apparently there were many others traveling to HK which was the same flight we were taking to go to Taipei. We were rite at the end of the line and some smart ass asked us if it was alright to let his friend(a girl) joined him in front of us. My face was like totally blur but super pissed off kinda look, i answered him "I don't know"! hehehe luckily Lynn was still sane enough to answer him "It's alright". I just kept quiet.(What was i suppose to say to the fella, my cab FFKed me, i did a TAR(The Amazing Race) to get to the airport and you wanna ask me if i can let your friend jump queue?)

In the end it all paid off for being humble, a Cathay Pacific attendant asked us if we could help them and go on an earlier flight to reach HK earlier. So we tooked the offer and was on the earlier flight out of KLIA to HK international airport. So all privileges of booking the front row seats with more leg space were gone.

- The Drama doesn't stop there! -

We were nicely seated in the airplane and got our lunch and drinks and flight entertainment and all. Knowing that we would reach HK international airport 30m ealier, we could go do some window shopping at their duty free shops.

Note: My feet can't stand too much walking or standing due to all the injuries i picked up from football

Upon arrival there was a major long queue to get our hand carries scanned and bodies search at the airport security before we're allowed into the airport. We got out quickly and headed for the transit terminal and checked the screens for our boarding gate number, it was gate number: 70.

That sounds far? No problemo, just take the airport internal train to get to Boarding Gate No : 70. We spent some time walking around the duty free shops knowing we had plenty of TIME!!!!!! When we reached the boarding deck of the internal train, we were told to walk to the boarding gate as the train is malfunctioning, the doors could not be opened or closed! Damn.

We did another TAR to run, skip, jump, hop, dash, sprint to the freaking GATE 70 which is all the MOFO way at the end of the freaking airport!!!!!!!! I just killed my legs before we even started our trip :(

Managed to reach the Gate 70 rite on time! and there were others still behind us running towards GATE 70. We were relieved to be seated in the airplane rite at the front row this time, hehehe. It was a 3 seater along the right side of the plane. We were seated beside a guy who didn't even know how to operate the in flight entertainment set(little monitor in front of you). So no conversation was made there.

To be continued...

Taiwan 2007 - the night before

It was a trip due to be taken for a long time... Booked this free & easy flight + accommodation package from Cathay Pacific like 3 months ago and the wait was agonizing.

When February the 28th finally arrived i was so excited i couldn't sleep well the night before. Everything was checked and in order - travel and flight document all printed out, passports with more than 6 months till it expires, NT$'s, clothing's and necessary stuff in the luggage and airport taxi booked to arrive at 715am the next morning.

So as i was saying, i couldn't really sleep. I was doing last minute finalizing on our itinerary and some issues were not solved cause i was unsure of travel conditions at certain locations. Trying to cramp too many places to visit was also an issue. I didn't know if our feet's would be able to take so much walking for such long periods of time.

In the end i just made a rough layout and left empty slots of places that we could visit depending on where we are, time and transportation to get to those places - a true free and easy trip, budget style with no chartered tours.

I eventually slept at 345am with 2hr25m left to go till the alarm rings.