Tour of Taiwan

I have been to Taiwan several times but it is always just to Taipei.  But there's more to see than just Taipei.  I hear a lot about Sun Moon Lake and Alishan mountain and how beautiful those places are.  When I see that Asia Odyssey Travel (AOT) has a tour of places other than Taipei and it fits into my schedule I asked Eileen to include that in my tour package.

I landed in Taipei at about 2pm and was picked up by a driver to take me to the Hu House hotel.  I love it that AOT provided a driver because it would be time-consuming and expensive to take a taxi or the train to the city.  Hu House is a small hotel in the middle of the city.  I asked the front desk if there is a night market nearby and luckily, she told me there is one about a 15-minute walk away.

Night markets in Taiwan is a cultural mainstay.  It is not unique to Taiwan.  You can find night markets all over Asia.  However, going to a night market is part of the fun of visiting Taiwan.  You can think of a night market as the opposite of a Farmers' Market in the western world.  Instead of selling fresh produce,  night markets sell appetizer-sized food or the locals call it xiaochi.  Think of it like tapas in Spain.  The variety of food offered varies from market to market.  They are usually run by family businesses and are regulated by the government.  I love going to night markets because you get to try different kinds of food and see different things that they sell.  Some of the popular food are:  oyster omelette, scallion pancakes, stinky tofu, etc.

Ningxia Night Market

Store selling beef noodle soup, a popular local delicacy

Taro and red bean dessert, topped with condensed milk

BBQ roast pork

Selling scallion pancakes

Making Oyster Omelette

  

Making Scallion Pancakes

I met the others in my tour group in the lobby of the hotel early the next morning.  Two women have been on the tour in Taipei.  Another two women and I joined the tour for the next few days.  Two women and I are from the US, one woman is from Singapore and another from Australia.  Our driver and tour guide is Addy.

Our first destination is Sun Moon Lake, one of the most popular tourist attractions in Taiwan.  The lake is home to the indigenous Thao people.  The east side of the lake resembles a Sun, while the west side resembles a Moon.  That's why it's called Sun Moon Lake.

Our group picture.  Driver Addy is on the left

Shopping street by the lake

Guavas are popular in Taiwan

Street Food

Pier at night

Our hotel - Einhan Resort

We took a cruise on the lake

The next day we drove from Sun Moon Lake to the town of Chiayi, where we'll visit the nearby Alishan National Scenic Area.  This is another well-known Taiwan landmark.

Location of Alishan in Taiwan

Map showing the forest area

Sign for the National Forest

We took the train up the mountain, then hiked down

The hiking trail

More of the forest

Story of Alishan Forest Railway

A Temple in the forest

Taiwan is also famous for its tea, typically grown on sides of mountains.  We stopped at a tea shop to sample some tea.

Tea Plantation

Tea ready for export

We stopped briefly at Hinoki Village, a touristy area with souvenir shops and cafes.

Prayer Requests

Fake sheep outside souvenir shop

A beautiful garden in the middle

Although Tainan was not on our itinerary, our guide Addy insisted on taking us to a restaurant famous for its beef noodle soup.  In recent years Tainan has been getting some attention because Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, the company that is leading the Artificial Intelligence (AI) chip business, was born here.  So was Lisa Su, the CEO of AMD, another AI chip company.  They are first cousins once removed (Lisa's grandfather is the eldest brother of Jensen's mother), although they never met until they were well-established in their professional careers.

Our next step is the Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum in Kaohsiung.  This is a sprawling Buddhist museum complex explaining the many facets of Buddhism.

Entrance to the Museum

A statue of Buddha and the many pagodas

A Chinese (or Happy) Buddha

A picture depicting the beginning of Buddha's transformation

Our final stops in Kaohsiung include a walk down the Qijin Old Street.

Qijin Old Street

The next morning we visited the Lotus Pond Scenic Area and then ending with a visit to the Kaohsiung Museum of History  By then we were tired and longing to go home.

Lotus Pond Scenic Area

Dragon and Tiger, popular animals in Chinese mythology 

Kaohsiung Museum of History (from Wikipedia)

Addy had someone pick me up and took me to the nearby Zuoying High-speed train station.  Fortunately, he helped me buy the train tickets a few days earlier because I may have bought the last ticket for that afternoon to Taipei.  The ticket costs NTD2,500 or about US77.25.  A regular train would have been cheaper but would have taken 5 hours instead of 2 hours.  The HST is as comfortable and fast as the ones in China.

Zuoying High-speed Train Station

I arrived in Taipei in mid-afternoon and immediately hopped into a taxi and showed the driver the name of the Grand Hyatt hotel.  It was a short 15-minute ride and it costs NTD300 or about $9.27.

Grand Hyatt Taipei