Destination: Taiwan
Duration: 13 Days 13 Nights (Nov 18~Dec
01, 2015)
Day 10: Hualien -> Taipei
We
would be traveling to Taipei from Hualien today without any pre-booked ZhiQiang
express (自强号) ticket. Our Minsu owner was so nice and asked her helper to fetch
us to Hualien Train Station and pre-packed our breakfast for us. The breakfast
pack consisted of sandwiches, egg pancakes (蛋餅) and apple juice. We ended up buying a
local train ticket to Yilan (宜蘭)
before getting bus ticket from Yilan to Taipei. This was the long route and
would take longer time than ZhiQiang Express though. Lesson learned: always
pre-book the ticket!
 |
| Standing there for an hour+! |
 |
| Breakfast Pack by our Hualien Minsu |
 |
| Sandwiches!!! YUM! |
 |
| Finally reach Yilan Station |
 |
| Found the Bus! |
 |
| Continueing our Breakfast (Egg Pancakes) on the bus! |
The bus
stopped near Xiangshan station (象山车站) so we took the Taipei MRT using our Easycard (悠遊卡)
to Ximen Station (西门町车站). We booked Tomorrow Hotel (明日大饭店)
for TWD1600/night (through booking.com) which happened to be a stone throw away
from Ximen Station Exit 6. One would see the big label when walked out from the
Exit.
 |
| First thing that caught our eyes after we disembarked - Taipei 101!!! |
 |
| XiangShan Station! |
 |
| We are here at Ximending!!! |
 |
| Our Hotel at Exit 6! |
 |
| 7-11 is just at the Right! |
Since our
check-in time was 2pm, we ended up leaving our luggage there to have a
walk-around to kill time. The conclusion – kill time is definitely NOT a good
sign for our weight! Apparently there were tons of famous food stalls right
around the area! *facepalm* The 1st thing that caught our eyes was
the queue in front of Ah Zhong Mee Sua (阿宗麵線).
We joined the queue and bought ourselves the famous mee sua – not too shabby
there. One thing we loved was the unlimited condiments at the shop.
 |
| Look at the line! |
 |
| Yum Yum! |
 |
| Free Flow Condiments |
 |
| Cute Teddy! |
We continued
on and found the self-proclaimed bubble tea/milk (哇!青蛙下蛋)
stall. We were not sure about how true it was but the drinks we bought - bubble
tea (青蛙下蛋) & Lemon Aiyu (柠檬爱玉)
were both delish! The tapioca balls were kind of soft and did not taste
plastic-y. The drinks were not too thick
thus one would not feel too filling by drinking it. It was definitely a
conspiracy for us to drink down more calories willingly! *cry*
 |
| The Authentic Bubble tea? |
 |
| Their Drinks sure taste nice! |
 |
| Cute Doggie!!! |
Our next
target was the Hot-Star Large Fried Chicken (豪大大雞排).
The chicken was deep fried on the spot and it was juicy and tender but we
didn’t feel anything special on this though. We still preferred those grilled
after deep fried (烤炸雞排) such as the one in Kenting (link)
& Fengjia (link).
 |
| It's time for Chicken! |
 |
| HUGE XXL Chicken! |
Finally we
went back to check in and were given our breakfast coupon – one may either use
it for the breakfast spread or use it as a TWD70 voucher in 7-11 which was
located right beside the reception. The room was okay and the best part of this
hotel was really the location. It was right at the MRT Exit! *thumbs up*
 |
| Our Bed - the Comforter is ugly though! |
 |
| Toilet |
 |
| Bathtub? That's a surprise! LOL!! |
 |
| Free water too! |
After a
short break, we took the MRT to Xiangshan station (象山车站)
for sunset. Let’s just say there were a lot of stairs involved, too many if you
ask me! We didn’t even hike till the top since we were too crippled for that!
We only made it till the lookout platform and sat there until the sky turned
dark. One word of caution though – be prepared for mosquitoes attack once it’s
getting dark! *slap* We were really lucky to get the ultimate picturesque angle
from our seat! *grin* Our seat was grabbed immediately once we left the
platform. =P
 |
| It's time for HIKING!!! |
 |
| I'm pretty sure i did not sign up for this!!! |
 |
| The View is Breathtaking though! |
 |
| Let's take a pic with 101 before it's getting dark |
 |
| Sun is setting slowly... |
 |
| An Elephant at the platform rail! LOL!! |
 |
| Sammy is hungry again! |
 |
| It's finally getting Dark! |
 |
| Sammy wants a picture! |
 |
| Goodnight! |
 |
| Look at the Crowd!! |
We then took
the MRT again to Jiantan Station (劍潭站) for Shilin Night Market (士林夜市).
There were people everywhere in Shilin, you just couldn’t walk anywhere without
bumping into people! This definitely dampened our mood! We went into the
underground foodcourt and got a Big Biscuit wrapped small biscuit (大餠包小餠)
but I think we got the wrong stall since we couldn’t even see clearly due to
the crowd inside this foodcourt! *facepalm* Anyway, it was some kind of peanut
biscuits wrapped in some fresh tortilla wrap – not the deep fried version from
the other famous stall.
 |
| Leaving Xiangshan Station |
 |
| Look at the Crowd at Shilin Night Market!!! |
 |
| Going to the Shilin Underground Foodcourt |
 |
| Big Biscuit wrap Small Biscuit? |
 |
| Peanuts Flavor Biscuit |
 |
| Wrapped in Tortilla Wrap? Hmm... |
We were
really agitated by the crowd and walked to the street instead but were still
trapped! We ended up buying the fried pork bun & cabbage bun (生煎包).
It tasted similar to the breakfast we had in Hualien (花莲)
Minsu but with smaller size.
 |
| Fried Bun |
 |
| The Pork Bun |
We then
stumbled upon this green onion pancakes (蔥油餅) stall
with long queue and were excited to get one since we loved the green onion
pancakes from Hualien yesterday (link). We finally got our pancakes with egg after
queueing for some time but were disappointed with it! It was beyond oily and
the spicy sauce was not as nice as the one in Hualien. *sadness*
 |
| Queueing again |
 |
| This is literally drenched in OIL! Yucks! |
We bought
some Chinese herbal milk tea (靑草茶) and it was too minty for me. There was this spicy
cold noodle (痲辣凉麵) stall right beside the herbal tea thus we went in
to have a try at their Thai style cold noodle. The noodle was very refreshing
since it was cold and sour.
 |
| Herbal Tea Stall |
 |
| Herbal Milk Tea |
 |
| The Cold Noodle Stall |
 |
| The Thai Style Cold Noodle |
We saw Ah
Liang Mee Sua (阿亮面线) and ended up with one bowl too! *facepalm* Our
tummies were on the verge of bursting by that time. The taste of the mee sua
was just normal though. We finally called it a night and went back to Ximending
by taking MRT.
 |
| Ah Liang Mee Sue |
 |
| The Mee Sua |
 |
| Giant Giraffe!!! |
There were a
group of people dancing at the junction (or was it a square?) since it was Saturday
night. We also bought some beers from 7-11 again! Did I mention that the Watson’s
here seem to be opened for 24 hours? Imagine me walking to Watson’s after
12midnight to get pore strips for my nose which I couldn’t
bear all the blackheads anymore! LOL!!!
Next Day (Shifen, Pingxi & Jiufen)
 |
| Ximending at Night! |
 |
| Dancing! |
 |
| Nice Deco |
 |
| More Alcohol! Sign me up! |
No comments:
Post a Comment