Day 3 - Tainan

After spending time in Taipei in day 1 and Jiufen in day 2, it's time for Tainan!

Tainan is the oldest city in Taiwan and also commonly known as the "Capital City". When we went there, it was not the best weather for travel :(

Tainan weather from the train station

We went to the city by the free bus provided by the government. Even though Tainan was the "Capital City" in the past time, but they don't have underground train in the city. 

Very rare bus, and also quite hard to find taxi. For me, taxi is the best choices because the price is not expensive, meter based, and safe.

Near the airport, there is a very huge and European inspired museum, Chimei museum, but too bad we can't go there because apparently to enter the museum, we need to book at least 1 week in advance.  

Arriving in the city, we went directly to our hotel, Fuward Hotel. After we are done with check in, we go directly to Hayashi department stores which located right across our hotel. 

The building was build during Japanese invasion era. The elevator is antique, products sold also still rich with Japanese touch. The product sold there quite pricey especially they also sell Taiwan designer goods.

When you go to 5th floor, there is also a roof top you can go to enjoy the city view. They have shrine there and you can read the history of the building there. ( it will be no fun if I tell everything here ^^).

Since it was raining, so we only spent a bit time on the rooftop and decided to walk around the hotel to see what can be eaten for local dishes. After we walk, not too far, we found a restaurant that seem famous and already become a news in CNN and many other media. Since it was written in Chinese, I'm sorry I don't remember the restaurant name. We decided to go in and try the dishes.

Milk fish porridge soup . prawn noodle . taro cake

Those three dishes are the famous menu in Tainan. I love the milk fish porridge soup, but for the rest, it is not really my taste. They also show us how to make the noddle in case you curious:)

Don't worry, they have menu in English and it is not too pricey. But  I need to tell you that the portion can be considered small.

After that, we are planning to go to the biggest night market but since it rain super hard, so we decided to cancel and go to the malls to have dinner and then go back to hotel to have some rest.

next morning, the weather is still not good but we still decided to go to Anping Old street to see around. After arriving in the Anping Old street, we go directly to Anping Fort.

Inside Anping fort 

Too bad it was raining hard, we can't enjoy the scenery but it worth the visit. You can go to the indoor museum to know the history of Anping fort together with Koxinga, one of their heroes. We only stay for few minutes and we decided to go out to looking for rain coat to cover our body since the rain came with strong wind as well.

Near the fort, there is a family mart, so we go there to buy the rain coat and we found a temple across the street. During that time, there was a ceremony done under the rain, so we also want to see with our new rain coat. Wohoo!

It's us with our new rain coat!! haha..

 After looking at the temple for a while, we decided to dry ourselves and looking for a restaurant with famous local dishes. After googling around, we found the famous Chou's shrimp roll!

There are some restaurants in the alley of Anping claim selling Chou's shrimp roll but I don't know if it is real or not. Anyway, it still taste good haha!

Lo Rou Fan . steam shrimp meat ball . Chou's shrimp roll . milky fish porridge soup . papaya milk

All of them are good! the best things are they are not expensive. You can bring home the Chou's shrimp roll by buying the frozen pack. Queue always long, but I think it worth to try.

After we eat, we decided to go back to the train station to head to our next destination, Kao Hsiung..

It's time for Taiwan!

So, recently I went to Taiwan for holiday trip with my family. Usually, when I go with the "elder", I prefer to join a tour group as it is easier and hassle free.

As most of you know, joining tour means you have to have high acceptance attitude. Hotel always far far away from city, restaurant choices is not the best one in town, spending most of your time in the bus, and there still more things that can't satisfied your travel instinct. But it is good for the "elder".

After much effort, finally we travel by our own *yay* We are going to go to Taipei, Jiufen, Tainan, and Kaoshiung for 8 days.

Super excited to go, I was browsing a lot about Taiwan cities and what to do but what shocked me, there is not much blog or information regarding Taiwan for tourist. Most of the review was from 2012, 2013, or maybe 2014. Since it is 2015 already, so some things has changed.

I hope my blog will help you arrange your own Taiwan trip.

Day 1 - Taipei

Arrived there in the afternoon, around 4 PM, there is not much to do anymore in my first day. Since it was super early flight, so all of us was super tired and sleepy. We decided to stay in Green World Hotel Zhonghua, which located in Ximen area. For us, it was a very convenience place to stay if you want to go around Ximen area and it is cheap if you compare with other hotel around there.

It located right besides exit 6 of Ximen MRT station. When you travel from airport with heavy luggage, you can go by taxi (around NT$1100) or you still can go by MRT but exit 6 has no lift or elevator. It's your choice :D

The lobby is at the 13th floor. Don't go to the wrong floor because there also another one or two hotel in the same building hehe..

The decoration for the breakfast place

Twin bed room with no window

The bathroom

The room is quite small but the lighting is good and the most important thing is... clean! I also love their toilet as they use what I call "Japanese closet" haha! #happy

Next to their building, there is also 7 eleven and Family Mart, so if you crave for midnight snack or cute drink, no worries, problem solved.

Right after we put our luggage to our room, we go directly to Yongkang street.

Went there by MRT, stop at Dongmen MRT and look for Yongkang street in exit sign. It could be exit 4 or 5 (sorry I forgot). If you are in the right exit, once you are out from the station, in your right side should be NET, Taiwan fashion brand.

Go straight and in your right side, you will see Sun Merry bread shop. Many people buy pineapple cake there, but for me, Ciate still taste better.

Read some reviews from some blog, Kao Chi is Din Tai Fung rival and most of local prefer to eat there to avoid the long queue. So, with high expectation, we go there and tried their famous dish.

Kaochi menu

Some kind of Pork Pao

Pork Xiao Long Bao

 Over all, the Xiao Long Bao skin is too thick in my opinion. The taste is also so -so. It can't be compared with Din Tai Fung. We didn't try the other menu as we are planning to eat more variety in Yongkang Street. So, only if you have time and spare spot in your stomach, you can try.

After eating at Kaochi, we go straight and found out Smoothie House. You can see their advertisement everywhere in Dongmen MRT station. The queue is super long but it worth the wait!

supposedly our photo ><

Mango Ice with sorbet

It taste superb! especially we are eating it in a hot summer weather. There are many choices, but this one is the most ordered items. The mango is sweet and the Mango sorbet make it perfect! The portion is huge and don't worry, you will finish it as it tasted soo goood.

There are two choices for the mango ice, using sorbet or pudding. We are happy with this one but sadly we have no time to try the other variation. 

After our stomach are full, we just walk along the street for not so long because we want to go back to Ximen area to shop.

Apparently, after we arrived in Ximen, my mom can't stop requesting to stop by in modern toilet restaurant. So, with full stomach, we go there and see if we can do dessert only.

Arriving there, it is already around 9.30 PM so we need to order super fast as 9.30 PM is their last order time. They have minimum spending for each person so you can order anything but in total it should be tally with the minimum spending requirement. Finally we order food as well as we need to fulfill the minimum spending.

It's me playing around with the decoration

The taste of the food is not good, especially the ice cream (once again, this is in my opinion). We ordered sukiyaki set and pork curry set. Both doesn't taste good and it is quite pricey as well. It is good to go there once, just to know and play around, but I won't coming back again.

So, this is what I do in my first day, you can continue to my second day until I go home in the next post.