Taiwan Trip - Playing with Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall

The sun rose again but we let ourselves not to rush. We took our time. Mom and Ah Yi went for breakfast while I waited in the room.

We took the MRT from Shuanglian Station to Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall Station. 4 stations and taa daa, we were there. We followed the sign, walked out of the underground station and found ourselves in China.

Yes, China.

Chinese gate. Chinese gate guardians. Chinese ornaments. Jade.

This is the MRT exit. Even Chinese Garden MRT in Singapore is not like this.

We walked and saw a gigantic square with three buildings at three borders. Two red colour buildings and one blue colour building.

The two red colour buildings are National Theatre and National Concert Hall

The gigantic gate

Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall with its gigantic square

Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall was built as a memorial to late President Chiang Kai Shek. The idea was voiced up when he passed away in 1975. In 1976, together with his birthday, the ground breaking ceremony was carried out followed by construction. It was officially opened in 1980, five years after his death.

The roof of the memorial hall was designed in a shape of octagon to represent the lucky number 8. Two sets of staircase with 89 steps to symbolize the age when he passed away. The ground level was designed and utilized as a library and document room while the second level for main hall.

Of course we climbed! I mean Mom and I. Ah Yi just stayed at the square because she said it was booooooooring (with eight 'o' as a symbol of fortune)

The structure of the memorial hall

What you can expect from the top. For me it's beautiful. God is doing His work through humans.

The main hall with Chiang Kai Shek Statue

Chiang Kai Shek was a nationalist while Mao Zedong was a communist. Chiang Kai Shek was loved by the US but hated by the communist in China. They were from two different ends and they fought a long war. With its defeated army, Chiang Kai Shek fled to Taiwan and saved it from Mao Zedong. That's one of the reasons why Chiang Kai Shek was so well loved in Taiwan.

We ended our historical trip and moved on to the next destination by walking.

Love is in the air,
Little Feet

Next Post - Three Hour Awaited Xiao Long Bao at Din Tai Fung

Taiwan Trip - Hello Taipei, Hello Ningxia Night Market

We sat comfortably in the train that brought us to Taipei and reached Taipei Main Station around 8:30pm.

Business class???

This time, no running and no rushing. We walked elegantly and graciously out of the TRA Station, directed ourselves to the ticket vending machine and bought our Easy Card for NTD 100 (~SGD 4.5) per card. No worry, this NTD 100 is refundable.

After adding the usable value inside the Easy Card, we walked to MRT Station and took the train to Shuanglian Station.

I have booked a room in C U Hotel for about SGD 110 per night. The hotel is located about 3 blocks from the train station. Just walk out, turn left and walk all the way. Until you pass by a police station, you know you are near.

C U Hotel is located just at the row of the shophouses. There is a big glass door with its name on it. The lobby and the entire hotel is at the second floor.

What you will see at the corridor

I'll start with the toilet, reasonable size but without any gutter when you shower everything just spill everywhere

And the room is just a little bit bigger from the toilet and it is not square!

Despite all the limitations in this room, I was still happy to have a roof to shelter me. Anyway, the location of this hotel is superb. Walk out of the hotel and find Ningxia Night Market at the doorstep, literally.

We dropped our luggages and walked to Ningxia Night Market for our late dinner.

The whole night market just sells foods with some arcades at the back. Other than those street food stalls covering the road, you can find rows of restaurant by the sides of the road. It is not big but happening.

Ningxia Night Market: Food & Human

We walked one round before deciding what to buy. Some stalls actually had places for people to sit, so we bought some foods from different stalls and brought it to one place. That's the concept of dinner by Ah Yi. So we just followed her.

Ai Yu Lemon Tea with Pearl

Pork Dumpling

Some kind of Yong Tou Fu with don't-know-what Sauce

Fried Noodle in Egg Blanket

Not much, yes. I was so tempted to queue for a fried chicken with special sauce and crispy yam cake that had so many people queueing. But Ah Yi kept saying don't, why should you queue, yadda yadda yadda. Whether I am too Singaporean or she doesn't know that some things are worth for queueing.

So we went back, showered, watched some TV, and slept.

Love is in the air,
Little Feet

Next Post -  Playing with Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall

Taiwan Trip - Breathtaking Stones at Taroko Gorge

The previous night before we passed out, I handed my landlord NTD 200 (~SGD 8.5) for providing us bigger room for 3 people. I also handed her NTD 2100 (~SGD 90) intended for the bus tour to Taroko Gorge the next day.

When I got ready, she told me that the bus tour was so full that day so she sourced a private car for us to tour Taroko Gorge. She had two more people staying at her minsu who liked to join the tour.

Voila, suddenly there were 5 of us.

I learned my lesson. I knew I need to bought my train ticket beforehand. So, I walked with mom to Hualien TRA Station to purchase the ticket back to Taipei. It cost NTD 440 (~SGD 19) per pax.

After that, with the advice from our landlord, we went to 7-Eleven to buy some bento for lunch. To be honest, I was quite impressed with Taiwan 7-Eleven and the quality of the foods they sold. We spent NTD 245 (~SGD 11) for our bento boxes.

On the way back to the minsu, we stopped by one shop and bought our breakfast. I could not read Mandarin, mom was the same. So what we did was standing for awhile looking at other people's orders and asked.

We ordered a very thick sandwich with ham and egg and other stuffs and it was super yummy! We also ordered a corn egg pancake, a glass milk tea, and a glass of soya milk. When we was back to the apartment, we quickly ate our foods because we were too hungry.

This is the uncle that saved our tummy that morning

And around 9:30am, our driver picked us. We loaded our luggage onto the car, hugged the landlord goodbye and dashed for Taroko Gorge!

Taroko National Park is one out of nine national parks in Taiwan. In Truku language, Taroko means 'magnificent and beautifu'. Taroko is full of rocks and those rocks are not just ordinary rocks. They are marbles. Yes, the precious marbles.

Once we were out of Hualien, we can see the road opened up. It is a great countryside road like what you can admire in the movie.

I feel so serene

The driver told us that the distance from Phillipine Sea to the top of Taroko Gorge was less than 20km and it was one of the nearest in the world.

Our first stop was at Chong De Viewing Platform. In this viewing platform, people can take a lot of photos with the magnificent ocean and the mountain as the background.

The signboard

Mountain and its tunnel

The sky, the sea, the mountain, and I. How blessed I am.

The driver then brought us to Qingshui Cliff to have another view of the sea. He then brought us to the last course of the appetizer, Qingshui Beach.

Qingshui literally means clear water

Worth to see?

You can see the two railway that used to transport all the marbles from the gorges

This is the beach but I prefer the bird-eye view of course

And then we moved to our main courses. The driver dropped us at the first spot, Taroko Visitor Centre. This place is a huge building with a exhibit inside to show whatever information related to the gorge, like the map, the topography, the rock formation, the fauna, etc etc etc. The outdoor area of the visitor centre is as appealing. You can see the mountain, a nicely shaped grass patch, and some stone statues.

The visitor centre building 

Okay to be honest, I forget what it is 

The statue of the aboriginal tribe of Taroko

The sacred book of Taroko?

Overall view of the exhibit

One of the weasel that can be found here

We continued our journey to Shakadang Trail. This is trail whereby you need to take the staircase down to the bank of the river. After that you can walk along the river bank with rocks over your head.

The gate to Shakadang Trail

Okay I admit this is edited. You can't really see the turquoise color water.

The rocks are ABOVE your head literally

The trail opens up at one point

 It was about 12:00pm when the driver brought us for our picnic lunch. He drove up up and up, dropped us at a nice place which I didn't know the name and told us to have our lunch there. We found a bench and had our yummy bento boxes from 7-Eleven.

Yummy NTD 65 Bento Box

Our lunch place

The view from our lunch bench, I wish I can have this view ever lunch time

After lunch, we went to the main course of the main courses. This place was my favourite: Swallow Grotto Trail!

The entrance to the trail

We were dropped here and asked to walked until the other end of the tunnel. Yes, we should wear the safety helmet!

One side for vehicles, one site for people to walk. The rock is self standing and this tunnel was constructed by HAND.

Me at the end of the tunnel

Just W-O-W

The supposedly last stop before we drove out of Taroko National Park is Tianxiang. This place is like a pit stop with eateries and shops. If you don't mind walking and climbing, you can reach a Guan Yin Temple. I did not climb because it was quite late already and we should catch 6:30pm train.

The Guan Yin Statue and the Pagoda

Sit, relax, and take welfie

The other two people decided to climb so we waited for them quite a while before we could move. I requested the driver to bring us to Changshun Tzu Water Temple before heading out of the park. This is the place that made me decide I wanted to visit Taroko Gorge. A temple and waterfall. What a combination.

I just feel like this is maybe a screenshot of heaven

We moved on to dessert. The driver dropped us in front of the gate of Taroko National Park for us to take photos. I think it is a custom here to take photo with the signboard before you end your trip at Taroko National Park.

We can declare that we have visited Taroko!

Before sending us to Hualien TRA Station, the driver brought us to visit Qixingtan or Seven Star Lake. Qixingtan looked like a beach with so called waves. The black stones at the bank of Qixingtan are actually crystals. This place is usually utilized for cycling or concert. And that day, we went there to admire the skyline.

You still can see the silhoutte of the mountains

If only I knew they were crystals, I would have brought back some of the stones

And it was time for us to bid goodbye to Hualien. The driver drove like some action move actors through small roads. We reached Hualien TRA Station around 6:10pm, went to the toilet, bought Amei Muaji, rush to the train platform, and boarded the train.

Amei Muaji, the second best in Taiwan, according to the driver. And I really love it! Especially the chocolate and black sesame flavours!

Taipei, we are coming!

Love is in the air,
Little Feet

Next Post - Hello Taipei, Hello Ningxia Night Market!

Taiwan Trip - Horrible Unexpected Evening to Reach Hualien

Precaution - There will be very minimal photo in this post because I don't have time to take anything

Our long awaited bus finally arrived at the bus stop in front of Aboriginal Village Theme Park but there were no seat left. We stood all the way to Puli Bus Station.

No big deal.

So we stood.

At Puli Bus Station, we were asked to transfer to another bus that would bring us back to Taichung. So we took that bus.

There was seat. Good.

The journey was longer because it stopped at every bus stop. No problem.

When it reached the bus stop opposite Taichung TRA Station, I did not recognize the place. Only when Ah Yi read the sign, she told me and it was too late. The bus started to move.

So I got up since I would like to ask him whether the next stop was far.

But, to my surprise, when I got up, the driver hit the brake to avoid some crazy biker.

I lost my balance.

I fell down.

My whole body hit the floor.

Mom shouted.

I climbed back up and walked towards the driver.

I told him I intended to alight at Taichung TRA Station.

He scolded me.

I scolded him back.

He was not happy.

The next stop was Gancheng Station. So I alighted and passed him my tickets. He did not grab it properly and the tickets fell into the coin box. He scolded me even more. I pretended I did not hear him and I walked out.

I felt so angry and I cried.

We walked back to Taichung TRA Station with my legs and hands injured and they were throbbing like hell.

And another surprise was waiting for me at Taichung TRA Station.

The train ticket to Hualien was sold out and standing passengers were not allowed. The officer advised me to take a train to Taipei and get a train to Hualien from there. So I bought the ticket for NTD 245 (~SGD 11) per person, no seat.

We rushed back to hotel to collect our luggage and rushed to the station again to catch the train. We stood for almost the whole journey because we should give up our seats for those having a ticket with seat number.

When we reached Taipei, I quickly ran to the ticket counter to buy another train ticket to Hualien for NTD 330 (~SGD  14) per person. The last train. So I bought the ticket, grabbed 2 mochi and 1 nuts pie along the way and paid NTD 134 (~SGD 5.8), and boarded the train again.

Luckily this time we had seat and the train was super comfortable.

My dinner that night

My poor knees

My poor elbows

We were supposed to take 4-hour journey to reach Hualien from Taichung but due to this unforeseen circumstances, we took 6 hours in total and we reached Hualien around 1:30am in the morning.

I arranged to stay in one of the minsu in Hualien. And another luckily, the owner was so nice she picked us up in the train station to show us the way to her house. Her name is Sharon and you can find her in airbnb.

We settled down, took a bath, and after that, I slept like a cow.

It was funny how a happy time could turn bitter and sour in a few hours. And it was even funnier how I could keep saying 'lucky' in my unluckiness.

And these are the lessons of the day:
1) Do not sit too far from the bus driver when you are unsure where to alight
2) Never ever stand up when the bus is moving especially in Taiwan
3) Buy your train ticket in advance no matter how unsure you are about your timing
4) Pack something in your bag for you to eat during emergency

Love is in the air,
Little Feet

Next Post - Breathtaking Rocks at Taroko Gorge