Where to stay in Taiwan?

A friend shared a link in facebook on some recommended accommodation in Taiwan. Being kiasu and afraid I would lost the link (As you know facebook posts keep replacing with the new one, you couldn't find it after a while), I decided to place the link in my blog so that I can refer to it easily in the future. 

Well, it is not a bad choice if you wish to keep some links to avoid missing. Hahaha!!

http://tw.gigacircle.com/1305271-1

Love the design ... at least my whole family can stay in together :)

By the way, if you come across my post here, you may check out this website where to get decent and affordable accommodation in Taiwan. I am not sure how good are they but do write to me if you find anything nice.

Cheer!!

Shimen Wedding Plaza at Taiwan

Hey, while we are traveling using the Northern West link road between Jiufen and Dhangsui, Mark stopped over a place called Shimen Wedding Plaza. This place is famous for the locals to have their outdoor wedding photo session. We are impressed with the set up by the authority to have such a place. The place is facing north overseeing the East China Seas. They have build many structures that suitable for wedding photography. 

While we were there, there was a couple taking wedding photo. It was fun to see them taking photo, especially when the couple suppose to jump ....

Well, I don't think this shot is going to be fantastic, the bride is wearing a long wedding grown and can't jump high enough. When they jump, we can only see the groom legs leaving the ground but the long wedding grown covered the leg of the bride.

If I am the "Director" ... chair!!

Siok sendiri again ... hahaha ..

I would get only the groom to jump, the bride will look up showing her surprise and "hang fok" face seeing her hubby jumping for joy ....

or if I want them to jump together (like I jump you jump thing-i), the bride can hold her own grown high enough to see her feet better in barefoot ..... and then jump together loh ..... Sorry, I am not expert nor experience in wedding photography ... but I think I have a "tricky mind"... Wakakakakaka !!

Yes, how can I leave this place without photos ...

So I also play-play director role by getting my friends for some nice shots .... hahahaha ... It is kind of fun to do that.

Finally, I do my jump shot before we continue our journey ... hahahaha...

Visiting Shihfen Waterfall at Pengsi, Taiwan

In my last trip to Taiwan, I went to a place called Shihfen Bu Ku (Direct translations as 10 points waterfall) near Pengsi at Taiwan. We parked our car at the tourist info center and walked in.

We need to walk pass a hanging bridge and some upward staircases to reach the waterfall. The surrounding scene was very beautiful. It was drizzling at the time and I have no choice but to take an umbrella to protect my camera for becoming wet. So my right hand took umbrella and left hand took tripod and camera, kind of messy at the time. Nevertheless, all these did not boarder me  much as I was admiring the beauty of the place. I took my owned sweat time to capture a few shots and leisurely walked to the destination.

I bypassed a railway track and seeing train moving passed me. It gives me wonder why the local wasn't worry of accident because we Malaysians were brought up by parent that telling us not to get near the railway track because of dangerous. But surprisingly we could walk side by side with the railway track and if you are lucky, we might have train passing by. If you are daring, you may stand on the rail tack to take photo too.

I was thinking to stand on the track to take some photos, but I was kind of Kiasi at that time, so I dropped the ideas worrying who know the next day newspaper came out a Malaysian Photographer was killed by a train while taking photo …. hahahaha LOL. Choi!!  Anyway, what a missed of not doing that ….

After about one kilometer distance I reached there. My family members who reached there first, off course when I arrived, everyone seem to stair at me complaining with the message “What take you so long to come here …. “ hahaha ….

To go in need to buy ticket. The waterfall is large for my standard, because I never see bigger waterfall before… hahaha … if you seen the American Nigeria waterfall, you would thinking it is just a “kuci-rat”

Nevertheless, I took a few nice shots and the surrounding. It is pretty cool place; we all hang around there and admire the beautiful nature created by God.

I tried to take some jump shots by my owned while waiting for my two boys having some instant noodle mee there, there are a small eatery selling some snack food …. I was using the self timers to capture my jump shot. I tried many time, either I jumped too soon or too late. hahah … luckily I found a quiet corner and no body see a crazy man jumping like a kid in front of a camera …. so old already !!! hahaha ..

This is I called self-siok sendiri … (enjoying myself) …

We continue our journey to nearby Pengi township, this place is famous with Kong Ming Teng. a small lantern that can flow up to the sky by placing fire underneath the lantern, just like a hot air balloon. People would like to write some of their wishes on the lantern. The color of the lantern also has meaning  which represent health, wealth, luck and many more. Due to religious issue as this is a ritual of seek gods blessing by releasing the lantern to the sky, we decided not to do it. Time is limited too, so we moved on our journey to next destination. But the town is very unique and beautiful. You may see how close the railway track near the shop premises.

Visit Jiufen in Taiwan

After writing a few blog posts about my recent trip to Taiwan … I am feeling a bit “Sien” already!! Sien in Cantonese word meaning BORING!!. My trip to Taiwan was 6 days, it is kind of boring if I write day 1, follow by day 2 and 3 and so on …. like writing a trip report to my Boss!!! LOL!

So I decided to end everything about the trip by this blog. After all there are so many other issues to write about … I don’t want to be stuck in Taiwan forever ….. hehehehe

Jiufen is one of the best places I visited. In 1950, it was a Gold Mining town but after the closure of the mining, it became a tourist attraction. If you follow a normal tour, most likely you will end up visiting on day time. It is nothing wrong on the day time but you will loss the opportunity to see the beautiful night scenes of Jiufen.

We reached there quite late, since we have been eating a lot of food along the way (what a mistake!). We are too full to add any piece of food into our stomach … what a lost to us!! Nevertheless, the place is famous with many others things, so the ladies are busy shopping.

So I took some time off from them and walked alone trying to capture some night scene photo. Jiufen is indeed a beautiful place and famous with many historical scenes. Like travel by a time machine back to the pass. This place is truly re-live the scenes from the pass. No wonder this place was used for a few famous movie. The buildings were built at the side of the coastal hills therefore you could find many small alleys and staircases. However, not to be worry as the place is lighted brightly with many red lanterns and street lights, they had brighten up the place and make it so romantic and cozy…

Many eateries and teahouse can be found there. We picked one of a teahouse. We stayed at their roof top to enjoy some hot tea. What a great view when you look at the magnificent view of the Pacific Ocean, although is dark but we can see light from the port.

The temperature was very cold but it work perfectly with the cup of hot tea… really feel like on the top of the world.

As Mark not only our driver, he is a tea master too, he knew every details and steps about making a traditional tea ceremonies. I have learned a few tips from him … next time I can use it to impress other friends who don’t know about it …hahahaha..

Oh … there are so many thing to talk about in Taiwan … In the beginning of this blog, I said I want to finish everything about Taiwan trip in this blog, but judging the way I write, just one place, I have written so many words….

Anyway, so let it beeeeee … if I have the mood, I blog somemore in my next or maybe next next post … most important is not to give myself the pressure of writing. After all, blogging supposes to be fun and for distress therapy …. don’t-lah make it a nightmare !!!

Hahaha … okay, will blog somemore in the future if you are interested !! (Emm…wonder anyone really read my blog !!? :)……. hehehehe,

I think I am self-siok sendiri-lah

hahahah

LOL….

 

Part 4 - Visiting Yehliu and the journey @ northern west link road

I have been to Yehliu Geopark many years back. For me, this place did not get much of my attentions, only a few funny sharp rocks, especially the queen head rock, what so big deal about it!? LOL …

However, this round, I don't know what had happen to me, I suddenly see the beauty of this place. Looking at all kind of sharp and sizes of rocks, they are so beautiful. It looked like art galleries that display the wonder of God's creation. The geopark is very beautiful and even the rough wave hitting on the rock seen to be so magnificent.

After Yehliu, we decided to take the northern west link road from Yehliu drive all the way to the west coach to Dhangsui.

On the way, we stopped at Gingshan, Mark leaded us to a Chinese temple and there was a restaurant operating in front of the temple. They are famous with duck dishes, according to Mark. This place was very much different from other restaurant. There were no waiters to serve us. We found big table on own owned; then we were asked to send a few macho guys to carry back the food on our own.

 

No one will take order from us. We queue up at the counter, and saw few plates of food cooked in advance, we can take any dishes that we like on the table. If we want some more food, we need to wait. Some of the popular dishes being taken away quickly by other customers, so we need to act fast too …  

So, few of us worked together, I went and queue up for the ducks. I took half portion of ducks and the rest, took some other foods. 

According to Mark, this place is well known to the locals and usually crowded on the weekend. Luckily, it was a Wednesday, the crowded wasn't too bad. But we saw full house in the restaurant.

After lunch, we walked around the nearby street market in front at the temple. There are many stores selling famous pineapple cookies and cakes, they offered many varieties, some made by walnut, red bean and many more. I even saw pork cookies …  

The best part is that they allowed us to taste … But, after trying a few pieces, we all "kenal" poison and tempted to buy. We all started buy buy buy until we worried that we may overload our luggage …. hahahaha 

 

We continue our journey and enjoy the coaster road. The only thing that affect us is the Han Liew, chilled-wing blowing from the northern region which made us feel so so so so cold ….. I believe it hits less than 10 degrees Celsius when we reached Dhangsui.

Part 3 - First night in Taiwan

Many friends asked how my trip to Taiwan. I would said good but can be better. The idea of DIY Taiwan trip is a good idea. No doubt joining tour package would ease your worry as the whole trip itinerary is pre-planned in advance and just need to follow. But hearing from many friends and my personal experienced, package tour is very rush and they are trying to achieve too many things with limited times.

A friend jokes with me, there is one saying in Chinese but I translated in English, hope it doesn’t deviate from the original meaning. It is how they describe a package tour:-

“Move faster than the horse,

Wake up earlier than the rooster

Eat worst than the pig,

Sleep late than the ghost”

LOL … It means, tour package is very hassle as you need to move around very fast, True!! A friend joined a Taiwan package tour last year and he told me that every single place, they won’t stay more than one hour. They woke up very early in the morning everyday, True!! His trip is the round island tour whereby every night he is sleeping in different hotel, need to packed and unpacked daily. Food is something you canot control, if you are lucky, you would have offered tasty food. Everyone would be exhausted with hectic moving around, sleep late and wake up early on the next day…. hahahaha …

Doing DIY trip yourselves, meaning you dictate what to do next. Time is in your hand and you decide how long you would stay in one place before move on to another place. I notice there is limitation too. Like I said in the beginning, our trip is good but can be better. What I means we may lost track of the time. As we have a free flow itinerary but when we were too enjoy, we have forgotten of the time and run out of time to visit a few important places.

A good example was the viewing of Sakura Flower at Yong Ming Shan, we some more got time to buy hot coffee and snacks at 7 Eleven and doing a picnic at Yong Ming Shan, without noticing the time, by the time we want to take some nice photo, the sky becoming dark. We missed the golden time to captures those beautiful flowers…. doom!! We left with limited times to capture those nice flowers before the sunset. Nevertheless, let me share with you some of the beautiful flower shots.

One of a pre-requisite of a DIY tour is that you must have a local to bring you around. Basing on public transport is not impossible but time consuming. As I go with my whole family and friends, 8 of us, the best way is to hire someone to drive us around. Luckily, I was introduced a local friend, Mark, a driver in Taipei, he is doing “baucer” services, which means chauffeurs.

After we arrived to airport, Mark sent us to a 3 bedroom apartment in downtown Taipei. It is located at Linson Road which is in the heart of the city, few minutes walk to the MRT. I would consider the rental rates are quite reasonable and economical, we stayed there for 5 nights and it only cost us approximately NT475 per person per night.

After check-in, we immediate went out for some nice dinner. That night, the weather at Teipie was so so so cold, it is about 12 degrees Celsius and very windy. We went straight for hot soap dumpling, a place called Ming Nyat, according to Mark, the chef is from the famous Din Tai Fung Dumpling Restaurant, but the price is half of it. So we decided our first dinner in Taipei.

Indeed, the food is so yummy, look at these photos, they are simply delicious.

 

 

Before I went to Taiwan, I'm prepare to enjoy all sort of food there. Partly blame the famous Food T.V programs in Astro, highlighted so much of good food in Taiwan. So, after dinner, (we purposely ate lesser), we then wanted to visit the Shilin Night Market which is famous with all sort of local hawkers food. But Mark suggested the Shilin Night Market is too commercial and really for tourists, it is going to be too crowded. He then brought us to another Night Market that most locals would go, near the TongFa Road, called Lien Jien Night Market. I guess need not to tell, we continue our dinner at the Night Market …… wow!!

One food that we heard so much but hesitate to take is the fermented taufoo, Chow taufoo, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stinky_tofu. As a food adventure, nothing fighting me off, so, the first buy in the market was the chow taufoo. I had eat this before in other place, I remember I can take it, but this round, the odor / chow is very strong, the smell can be sense miles away. Wow … let me eat ,,,,,,,,,, em…. eMMM~!! … ERRR!!

I rushed to one corner, lucky that is a quiet corners and I throw out the taufoo from my month. Walau-eh, so “chow”, the toufoo tasted like longkang (drainage) water. After that, I try again with some of its sour vegies … so beh tahan. I share some with my friend, Ho who later he did the same, oh goosh!!… hahahaha ….. Both of us had a good laugh .. Despite that, we still continue eatting a bit more. Looking at the big bowl of chow taufee, deep inside my heart said, “SeiLoo!! How to finish it”, I wanted to try other food, how can I holding something so chow in my hand and eat other food!!..

So, very rudely, I returned back to the same store owner, tell him that we are foreigner and can’t take the smell, so get his to throw the whole bowl away for us …. What a release!! Get ride this disgusted food … Hahahaha … Nevertheless, I still want to recommend to you, you never try, and you never know … at least I know now how “chow” is it. hahahahaha.