Awesome Nat + Taiwan Trip Day 5

Before I moved on to my Taiwan Trip updates, I am gonna share you a video of Kimmy’s daughter, Natacia, being captured in her daily training for her Cold Storage Kids Run 2011. Kimmy and I were from the YWC (Young Wives Club) set up by ourselves randomly. LOL There are 6 gals in this club. Studying together but young, we were all attached or married at that time. Hahaha, now we are known as OWC (Old Wives Club). Ladies, it’s been a long time since we meet up.

Anyway, Natacia is awesome to the max in this video and the video is well made. 🙂 Support Nat by viewing the video. The closing date for the video contest is 13/5/11 at 2359:)  We are looking at the view counts. Go on and click, click, click. A new star arising…..

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Now back to the Day 5 of Taiwan Trip. We are travelling back to Taipei. Early in the morning, we boarded a train from HuaLian to SuAo. The main reason was to cut down the time taken to travel on bus and also to experience the train ride in Taiwan. I was glad that I bought the data SIM card. With my iph, I spent the 1 hour ride watching shows from YouTube. 🙂

As we did not have our luggages with us, the train was pretty spacious. It was very comfortable and happy to say that, I am satisfied with the ride. 🙂

Almost reaching Taipei, we visited the NaTien Temple. It is a landmark of NafanAo (南方澳). This temple is used to host the 妈祖, a goddess which was said to be there to guide and bless the fishermen. In this temple, we could see  the goddess statues made with three different types of materials. Besides the goddess, the view of the harbour is breathtaking.

I was totally mesmerized by the architechtural structures, the dragons and the red tiled ceiling.

Ooooo, then we spotted the peanut ice-cream crepe. It was a disappointment. 😦 It was not as good as the ones we had in ChiuFen.

The “Yakcult” in the 7-eleven also caught my attention. It’s so much bigger in size than the ones we have in Singapore. 🙂

Oops… I bet you can’t see the size difference. LOL but yes, it’s about double the size of our Singapore Yakcult.

Finally back in Taipei. Today, the tour guide took us to all the historical sites. Firstly, we stepped into The Chiang Kai-Shek ShiLin Residence Park which was a homage to the former president. Besides visiting the home, we got to embrace ourselves in different flowers and garden scenary. To avoid getting lost in the big park, we sought the help of the map.

This is the house where the former president lived.

We are surrounded by flowers. 🙂

The Shine Cafe in the Park. Love the nostalgic feel to this place. Old vintage photos and decorations make this cafe comfortable to be in. I think is one of the attractions in the park as many people were sitting outside the cafe enjoying the scenary and coffee. 🙂

Next destination was the Martyr’s Shrine where we got to watch an elaborate ceremony of changing guards. Anne and I actually walked all the way into the shrine to view the whole ceremony despite the hot sun. 🙂 The guards are very professional. The funny thing is tourists who were there would follow the changing guards from main shrine to the main entrance. LOL

Oh, somewhere in between the trips, we dropped by the Grand Palace Hotel which was established by the former president Chiang’s wife, Song MeiLing. It’s really grand and according to the tour guide, some feng shui was taken into considerations in building this hotel. High hotel rates as well.

Finally, it was dinner time. This time round, we had the famous Xiao Long Bao for dinner. Dumplings in different skin flavors and colours. Not to be missed was the Sweet and Sour Soup. *YUMMY*

After dinner, we were given time to stroll along Hsienmenting (西门町). The first thing, we looked for was the Ah Zhong Mian Xian. Thumbs up for that one. Never to miss if you are at Hsienmenting. 🙂

Taiwan Trip 2010 Day 1

This is a long overdue post. It was a 7 days/6 nights trip to Taiwan. The trip was supposedly to be a family trip with my parents, siblings, Jonathan and the kiddos. Sad to say… Jonathan was posted overseas and because of that, I “dumped” my kiddos with my in-laws to have my well-deserved break (a self-declared one :)) Andrew and Angie, both are not free due to work. So instead of my own family, the trip was extended to my aunties, the big and the youngest aunties. A good experience for me as this was my first trip out with my aunties.

When we reached Taipei, it was already 4 plus thus only 3 destinations on our itinerary. The first destination was the Fisherman’s Wharf. Supposedly to be a place for lovers because of the Love Bridge. :). It was pretty windy and dark for phototaking. Due to the winter, the sun sets as early as 5 plus.

So windy that daddy and mummy got to hide under the LOVE bridge for the photo. 🙂

The next destination was the 淡水老街 (TamShui Old Street).

Daddy was very excited when he saw the food. Though not very hungry, we decided to try our 1st food which was the red bean “tong luo shao”. The smell attracted us to the stall. As we walked down the street with our “tong luo shao”, we spotted the ‘Jiang Mu Cha”. Couldn’t resist due to the cold. With the “tong luo shao” in one hand and “jiang mu cha” in another…. heavens!!!!!

Anne was happy with the 1st food in Taiwan. 🙂

Besides the food, the shopping also attracted us. The 49 bucks on the cardboard attracted my attention but the pricing is not applicable to all the bags wo. 🙂

Small auntie spotted another good food. We suddenly became food critics. Gave our comments here and there. LOL The squid is definitely good. Too bad that was the first and last time we ate cos we couldn’t find in any other towns.

We departed the place and proceeded to our 3rd destination which was the 士林夜市 (Shihlin Night Market). The time given by the tour guide at Shihlin was short too short. 😦 I think was only about 2 hours for us to have dinner and shopping. We decided to spend our time on food since the time given was too short for shopping.

The first stall we sat down to have the following…. Daddy didn’t really like the fried oyster. We still prefer the Singapore version. Maybe oilier??? LOL I like the beehoon and squid soup though.

The tour guide also recommended the soups to us. So we definitely must try. 🙂 The next stall we sat down, immediately ordered the different herbal soups.

Besides that, I ordered the fried smelly beancurd and the dumpling. On the table are the 麻油鸡 (sesame chicken) and 十全大补汤 (some tonic soup which said to keep the body warm).

Tummy filled up, then we took a slow walk to the other side of ShihLin before we headed back to the bus. First night ended off at TaoYuan. Day 2 will proceed to 台中（Taichung).