Also, their priority seats are always reserved for the needy. No abled man or woman actually sits on it even when the train is super packed.
So I'm pretty impressed by the way the Taiwanese work. If not for the BIG city that requires much travelling, I would love to stay in Taiwan forever. Ok. So here's the details to what I did for the 5 days in Taipei.
Day 1:
We reached Taoyuan International Airport in the evening and was greeted by someone shouting. She was trying to get our attention to use their bus service to the hotel. After hearing that it's Fei Gou (Free Go) which Shi's friend had recommended, we decided to go ahead and bought bus tickets from them. The to-and-fro ticket costs only TWD260. Pretty cheap as they sent us to the doorstep of our hotel.
It was a 45 minutes ride before we reached our Royal Castle Hotel (成都酒店). Our room was pretty decent and the comforter was super cosy and soft! I had difficulty waking up every morning.
And we found a funny translation on the floor in the bathroom.
I was really happy to know that there's a bathtub here as well! I managed to buy a bottle of foam bath to use. And Shi and I posed for a picture in front of the big mirror.
After that we went downstairs to search for nice dinner and walked around Xi Men Ding. The hotel attendant gave us recommendations for good food and directions to get there. He recommended us to 阿忠面线. And it was really good!!! I really miss the 面线 there. It's the spicyness of the chilli and the hot 面线 that makes the whole bowl of 面线 fantastic.
While walking around, we saw a long queue of people near the mrt station.
There were queueing for this ice cream. We didn't get to eat it because we were always full when we walked here. Maybe also because we don't have a sweet tooth for ice cream.
There's so many shops at Xi Men Ding as well. We didn't really walked around thoroughly. As some shops were already closing. I bought 2 rings which costs a bomb. I really like them alot and was mesmerized by them to pay so much for 2 rings. Anyway, that marks the end of our 1st day in Taipei.
Day 2:
We went to a small breakfast shop right next to our hotel. The person introduced us to 蛋饼 , pork burger and carrot cake. So we tried all three. Our favorite is still the 蛋饼 which tastes simply awesome!
蛋饼!
Pork Burger.
Carrot cake - Tasted the same as what we have in Singapore.
Then we set off to find a bank to exchange money. Only certain Bank of Taiwan offers money exchange services. So we walked a long distance before getting our money exchanged. Then we walked to the nearest mrt station. And we bypass this park.
The only monument in this park.
And we bought those sweet, salty or sour stuff which was ULTIMATE HEAVY which I regretted getting them because they really made my bag heavy.
Finally we reached the mrt station to take our 1st mrt ride to Hou Shan Pi to get to 五分埔.
I was amazed by the mrt train ticket which was in a form of a coin.
And the complexity of the train system.
Actually it wasn't very complex if we just follow the colour of the line.
And we reached 五分埔! It's a wholesale place where we can get cheap and nice clothes.
Doesn't this look like Bugis Street? It's MANY MANY times bigger than Bugis street.
And every stall places their goods in plastic bags in a very organised way. Like this shop below.
Then it started to rain and we were stranded at one corner. After being stranded for a while, we decided to venture to eating places rather than wasting our time standing there and waiting for the rain to stop.
And we found this shop that sells 贡丸 and 四神汤. This is how 贡丸 looks like. It's just minced pork wrapped in flour. Pretty nice.
And 四神汤 was pretty nice during a cold and wet weather. Look out for the ingredients.
Thank God the rain stopped after we had finished eating. We were very blessed! We went to the nearest railway train station for the toilet and found these lockers that deposit stuff in blocks of 3 hours! Just in time for us to deposit all our heavy stuff and continue shopping at ease!
A few hours later, I suddenly felt a strong urge to go check on our things in the locker. We went and realised that our locker wasn't locked at all!!! Thank God all our stuff were still inside the locker. Phew! What a relief! Then we transfer all our things to another locker for the next few hours as we moved on to Rao He Night market which is within walking distance.
Then we stopped at a shop that sells mini pot steamboat for TWD100 and 2nd pot had 50% discount. We had a Kim Chi steamboat and a Ma La steamboat. One thing I realised in all eateries here. They all provide free flow of drinks.
And the rice was in a very nice paper bowl.
After shopping around till very late, we wanted to take a mrt back to the hotel. We walked a long distance before deciding it's better to take a taxi back. We were both too tired to walk further.
Day 3:
Had an American breakfast which I wasn't really pleased with because it's too expensive and the bread was hard.
After that we moved on to take a train to Beitou for Hot Spring!
And we went into the Hot Spring Museum. Yes! The sun was scorching hot! I wonder if it's only in that place or just that day.
To make matters worse, the public hot spring which costs only TWD20 was closed for maintenance! So we had to walk around to look for the next best alternative. And we settled for a Hot Spring Hotel which has its hot spring at the rooftop for TWD900 for 2 inclusive of afternoon tea which consists of a drink and a pastry.
And the weather was so hot that we couldn't even stand on the ground for too long. There were 3 pools and we only managed to conquer 2. The 3rd one was just too hot for us to take.
After a nice shower, we had our afternoon tea and took the shuttle bus to Beitou mrt station where we took a mrt to Dan Shui. Here's the nice view from the mrt platform at Dan Shui.
Shi's friend told her that we must visit the 渔人码头 at night as it's VERY BEAUTIFUL! So when we reached Dan Shui, we searched around for directions. Since it's still early, we decided to follow the road sign and walked to the 渔人码头. So we followed the sign and walked around the old street. It was a busy street with many things for us to buy as well. We hit an end and asked someone for directions. The aunty told us to walk all the way back to where we had started and take a bus. I almost fainted!!! She told us the road sign was wrong. So wearily, we walked back to the station and took a bus. We were disappointed by what we see...
That's how "beautiful" it was. 渔人码头 really became 愚人码头 to us! Most of the shops were closed except the Hao Da Chicken and a shop selling ice kachang.
Disappointed as we were, we had a Hao Da Chicken cutlet.
And a mango ice.
And we went back tired.
Day 4:
We had our breakfast at this Taipei Milk King as most shops were not opened yet.
I had a mushroom and chicken baked rice.
And we took a mrt to the railway station and took a railway train to Ji Long (Kee Lung). Disappointed by what we saw yesterday, we decided not to go to Jiu Fen which is very far away.
The train was very spacious and clean. Eating and drinking is allowed. The toilet door is automatic!
And the railway train ticket is made of paper.
We reached Kee Lung in about 45 minutes.
And we took a bus to Bi Sha Fish Port. Another disappointment. It's really over-rated in tour guides and television programmes. Anyway, we settled for a stall.
The aunty even allowed me to take a picture with the big and fat Xiang Ba Bang!
We had steamed prawns, a plate of noodles, escargots and a crab! Didn't take a picture of the crab because our hands were already dirty when it came out.
We actually planned to go Taipei 101 next. However, it was already pretty late. So we went to Shilin Night Market instead. The illegal stall owners were raided a couple of times that night. We saw them running away with their merchandise and then moving back again when the coast was clear.
We had a great time shopping again and we ate a Hao Da Chicken cutlet, a packet of fried mushrooms, a milk tea, duck tongue and an ice mocha red bean.
Look at the ice in depth. It looks like cabbage from the picture. The ice was so... Nice and soft!!!! Only TWD70!
It's from this shop in an alley within Shilin Night market. Lots of people were queueing to get in.
I bought a big, red suitcase at TWD1900.
Day 5:
Last day at Taipei. We went to have 蛋饼 and 阿忠面线 for breakfast for the last time. Then we went to Taipei 101.
It's like Paragon in Singapore which has lots of famous and expensive brands. I only went to Prada to check out the products which my friend wanted me to check.
Then we went to Zhong Xiao Xin Sheng to look for Din Tai Feng. In the map it looks very near. However, we walked for many many streets before reaching Din Tai Feng. There were lots of people queueing outside. We waited for about 15 to 20 minutes before it was our turn.
We had half a portion of Xia Jiao..
Half a portion of Xiao Long Bao...
And a portion of spicy dumplings..
And I had a bowl of Ma Jiang Mian (Sesame sauce noodles)
After eating, we made our way back to Xi Men Ding on bus and went to Daiso to shop. Everything costs only TWD39 in Daiso, which is only S$1.80!!! And then we ran off to hotel to wait for our bus to the airport. Had our dinner at the airport just in case we grow hungry during our long flight in Jetstar. So this was my last meal before we left Taiwan.
They had this thing which will vibrate when our food is ready for collection. Quite interesting!
Oh.. Did I mention I came back exceeding my permitted weight on luggage. My red suitcase was 20kg and my haversack was about 7 to 8kg. So I had to check in my suitcase and carry my haversack into the plane. It was a really enjoyable trip! Thank God for a safe trip! And thank Shi for such a great time together! We had quite similar likes. So it was great shopping with her.
Where should our next stop be?? I miss Taiwan food!
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