Lost and Found in Taipei

My heart is full.

That was how I felt as my semi-solo trip in Taiwan continued. Aside from meeting new friends, I coincidentally travelled with Girlie, a friend whom I met in Batanes last April. Amazingly, we had the same birthday which we celebrated together in the beautiful island of Sabtang. She happened to see a comment in one of my Facebook posts about my Taiwan trip. I arrived on the 20th of August, and she, on the 21st. We agreed to meet, but I thought that agreement wasn’t serious because she might have a different itinerary. Luckily, she didn’t prepare any.

In my previous blog entry, I mentioned that I had to be in Taipei at 7 PM which was one of the terms and conditions of the AirBnB host. Unfortunately, I got lost and arrived past 8 PM. You may want to consider my unsolicited advice to prepare to be lost while exploring the city. I was blessed that my host didn’t say any nor provide a negative response when I informed her of my situation. I thought I’d be meeting her, but someone was there on her behalf. Should I tell you that her assistant can pass the Meteor Garden cast audition? He was an oppa!

I found my accommodation very convenient and amenable for solo travellers. Mine was a small room that could accommodate one (1) person. It has a TV, air conditioner, wi-fi, a mini table, and a lamp. The comfort room was for sharing, but I didn’t have any problems during my stay. More so, it was clean. Yes, it was very accessible to the main road and was near to the train station. I brought my things down in my room, rested for a while, and prepared to leave to meet Girlie.

We hugged upon seeing each other. Do not be surprised if I tell you that the first thing we did was to buy milk tea (and a light snack) before roaming around the Ximending Night Market. We roamed around and spotted the possible pasalubong that we could buy on our last day. It was a short window shopping though, because we had to be early the next day to hike at the Elephant Mountain.

We agreed to meet at 6 AM, but again, I got lost while riding a bus. I didn’t know that Taipei buses will not halt at every bus stop! So be mindful if you happen to take the bus in Taipei. That is why we went to hike later than what was originally planned.

Be sure to wear comfortable clothes and shoes when you hike because the trail is steep! Do not forget to bring water and extra clothes plus prepare for the buwis-buhay na pag-akyat on the large stones at one of its peaks to have a good view of Taipei 101. Also, please don’t wear skirts! The good thing was that a foreigner offered us to take a picture. We posed gracefully even if our knees were shaking. After that, we rested for a while and strategized on how to get to the next place which was the Taipei Zoo.

It was a big zoo, and I felt like I was back in my childhood days – the same feeling I had in Hong Kong Disneyland. I felt a certain astonishment upon seeing animals that I had not seen in my entire life like pandas. Be sure to bring sunblock and your Easy Card. Entrance fee, if you will be using Easy Card, is 60 TWD only. We also experienced riding in Maokong Gondola for 70 TWD using the Easy Card as well. There’s a shuttle that will bring you to Maokong Gondola station from the zoo. The fare was very cheap (if I may comment) as the duration of the ride was 15-20 minutes. It was a fun ride, but we found it difficult to go back to the train station because of limited transportation. It will be better if you ride the Maokong Gondola first then to the Taipei Zoo and back to the train station. After that, we ate lunch and tried the fried noodles and stinky tofu – its taste was not bad at all.

Next, we went to Chiang Kai-Sek Memorial Hall for a photo-op with its famous gate in the background before we headed to Taipei 101. We got our ticket for Taipei 101 from Klook which was indeed convenient since we redeemed our ticket via kiosk only. It was the tallest building in the world until the Burj Khalifa in Dubai was inaugurated. We took the fastest elevator (in the world) that lifted us from the 5th to 89th floor in 27-31 seconds (37 seconds at the maximum). On the 87th floor was the 728-ton tuned mass damper that looked like a giant pendulum. It sways to counteract the building’s movement during strong gusts of wind and earthquake. We waited for the sunset at its peak and planned to have dinner at Din Tai Fung but it was crowded so we decided to go home instead for a quick rest before exploring Shilin Night Market. Again, it was another short visit at the Shilin Night Market though it was the biggest night market in Taipei.

The next day, we went to the northern part of Taipei namely Yehliu Geopark, Jiufen and Shifen, where we experienced the old Taiwan. Make sure you leave the city early, and again, go to the farthest place first. For us, it was Yehliu Geopark. You may bring raincoats and other waterproof stuff because it always rains in those areas. Since we’re with another group of friends, I was not attentive and therefore was not able to list down directions. My bad! Hehe. But you have an option to join a group tour via Klook and KKDay.

These were the sceneries that you can see and explore on the aforementioned tourist destinations as well as some tips:

Yehliu Geopark

Honeycomb and mushroom rocks filled the place. One of the famous rock formations is the queen and the dragon’s head. By the way, I felt like I was in Batanes when we were heading to this place. We passed by fishermen’s wharfs.

Tip:

Don’t wear white shoes. Bring extra clothes and your toiletries because it’s very windy and the sand will surely cover your body and can make you haggard like us.

Shifen

We went to Shifen via Pingxi Small Railway Train where we released sky lanterns and visited the Niagara-like Waterfalls.

Tip:

There were lots of delicious street foods there. My favorite was the peanut ice cream roll.

Jiufen

The place is known for its narrow alleyways of its old town. There were lots of stalls but we were not able to see it because it was already closed when we got there.

When we were about to go back to the city, we saw the stall of COCO! It definitely removed our exhaustion from the whole-day trip. The time and place was right because I had not tried the Manila version due to the long queue in all of its stores. In all fairness, it really tasted good!

On the other hand, I would suggest that you allot one (1) day for the shopping or at least book a night flight back to Manila for you to have more time to buy stuff. I bought pasalubong in the airport due to lack of time.

It’s been two (2) months since I’ve been there (as to this writing), and the first thing I’m missing is the milk tea. I remember buying twice a day as if I’m not experiencing acid reflux. I can’t stop convincing my friends to go there because for me, Taiwan is the cheaper version of Korea and Japan; it has four (4) seasons, the panda and koala live there, plus there are cherry blossoms/sakura! I heard the country is also a good place to buy gadgets.

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