Some pictures and notes from a 10-day trip to Taiwan, Nov 1-11.
Day 1-4
Direct flight from Seattle to Taipei (TPE). Staid at a small boutique hotel at the edge of the lively Ximending neighborhood. Visited the National Museum of History, the Shilin night market, Taipei 101, and Taipei Zoo (missed the pangolin, but fell in love with a sloth instead). Hiked the Four Beasts Trail (managed just three), and saw more than a few temples.
Day 5-6
Picked up a rental car at Taipei Main Station (expected a rental counter, but instead someone met us, and led us to a car parked in one of the public lots outside). Drove Provincial Highway 9 to Toucheng, with a detour on some even smaller and windier roads to a viewpoint overlooking Thousand-Island Lake, and with a stop for tea time in Pinglin. Had planned to a hike through the tea plantations here, but it was too wet… Spent the night in a beautiful apartment by the ocean in Toucheng.
Day 6-8
Drove to Jiufen, following Highway 2 along the coast, with stops at Biguan Tidal Park and at Bitou Cape for short hikes. The main alleys in Jiufen were packed with tourists, but it’s a pretty town in a scenic setting and the food is good. Staid at a family-run bed & breakfast. To escape the crowds, we [hiked up Keelung Mountain]9https://www.hikr.org/tour/post190982.html, which is basically one long paved-stone staircase.
Day 8-9
Had originally planned to continue driving along the coast, but given the bad weather, we decided to reroute through Taipei, and spend the afternoon at the National Palace Museum instead… After a long lunch at Dun Tai Fung! That night we staid in a room in a traditional house in the middle of nowhere, but a short drive from Yangmingshan National Park.
Day 8-11
The first trail we tried was still closed due to typhoon damage, but one of the trails up Qixing Mountain was still open. Too wet to see much. Fortunately this trail, too, was paved with stones all the way. Stopped at the Beitou Hot Spring Museum on the way back to Taipei. For the last two nights, we staid at the Regent Taipei, which has a nice rooftop swimming pool, sauna etc. On our last day, we visited the Miniatures Museum and the Botanical Garden, and stocked up on oolong tea.
Notes
Language: English isn’t widely spoken. But unlike for our Japan trip, I didn’t bother memorizing much, beyond nǐ hǎo and xièxiè. Most restaurants have an “English menu”, with good translations. None of our Airbnb hosts spoke any English, but we managed fine with Google Translate.
Food: Standards weren’t quite as high as in Japan, but decent, and (despite a similar GDP per capita), everything was less expensive here. Lots of great street food options.
Driving: Drivers were well-behaved, and followed the rules, just had to get used to all the scooters in Taipei. Traffic lights seemed slow? Mountain roads were all nicely paved, but often steep and narrow for extended stretches. Ubiquitous mirrors help see around tight turns. Street signs use Chinese characters, so I may have missed a few turn-offs…
Typhoons and earthquakes, oh my: This trip almost didn’t happen, as a large typhoon hit Taiwan just before we arrived. Businesses were closed and many roads blocked, but by the time we arrived, everything was almost back to normal. We had also planned to drive further down the east side of Taiwan and visit Tarako National Park, but the typhoon plus an earthquake closed down much of that, so we decided to save that for a future trip.
