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A journey to celebrate 16 years of friendship @ Jiufen + Taipei

The host from Sealuv hotel was kind enough to drive us to Wai Ao train station to catch the train to Ruifang, where we will then transit to Jiufen. The train ride was only 45 min and while waiting for the train on the platform, a young Taiwanese guy who is still schooling at one of the University approached us for a chat and companion on our way to Rui Fang. Luckily, we had Michael to entertain him throughout the 45 min journey.
 


 
1. Ruifang to Jiufen
 
As we were staying for a night at Jiufen, it could be a little troublesome for us to carry our luggage because there were many steep stairs to climb at Jiufen old town. Luckily, Ruifang train station provides a luggage storage facility at a minimum fee.
 


 
After checking in our luggage, we hired a cab to Jiufen as it was more economical for us to share the cab cost. Soon, we reached Jiufen in about 20 min.
 
Jiufen is an old town that originate from the Qing Dynasty. Today, the town boosts of many restaurants and cafes, souvenir shops and ocean view. I wish I could have enough time to sip tea or coffee at one of the cosy café. (Perhaps, next time) The majority of attractions are concentrated along the cobblestone steps of Shuqi road between Jiufen elementary school and the police precinct. Besides the main roads, there are numerous small alleys and lanes that snake around the area and sometimes even run beneath the buildings. While most people visited Jiufen for day trips, the town has a number of boutique hotels for guests to stay overnight. The night scenery has its unique charm.
 
We decided to stay at Winsor Boutique Hotel that was highly recommended in Tripadvisor. Indeed, the rooms are beautifully decorated in wood elements and each room face a sea view.




 









sea view from our room




view from the top

nice place to have coffee or tea



 

night view @ jiufen

 
There are plenty of things to eat and shop @ Jiufen. In particular, it is a must to eat the fen yuan @ one of the store in Jiu fen. I would say the restaurant up the hill served the best fen yuan. Other things to try are the meat ball soup and the ice-cream wrapped in popiah skin.





 
 
2. Lanterns @ Shifen
 
At night, we went to Shifen to light the famous "Tian Den" (Huge lantern) where we will first write all our wishes on the lantern before lighting it up and let it fly up high into the sky.
 
 




 
 
3. Back to Taipei
 
For the next 2 days @ Taipei, all we did was to shop and eat. The usual places to shop include Wufenpu, Ximending and Shiling.  For this blog, I must raved about the famous shaved ice topped with lots of juicy mangoes @ "San Xiong Mei" café, located in Ximending. The shaved ice simply melts away smoothly in my mouth. I really love it.
 


 
 
We also tried the famous Ah Zhong Mian Xian, which tasted so good as usual. Personally, I don't quite like garlics and hence ordered one without any garlic. The mee sua was so smooth as I drink it down my throat.  
 

 
For dinner, we decided to have hotpot buffet @ one of the restaurant at Ximending. The buffet had a variety of ingredients for the hotpot. In terms of meat and seafood selection, there were plenty to choose from. We ordered Yuan Yang for soup base and it was fantastic.
 
 

We also visited the night markets at Shilin for some local delicacies such as the oyster egg, the fried chicken cutlet, fresh oyster and stir-fried abalones.
 

Fried Oyster


Fresh oyster


Abalones

 
4. Check in @ City Inn Hotel, Taipei Train Station
 
For our stay in Taipei, we checked in to City Inn Boutique Hotel. I must say that the hotel is really fantastic. The interior of the hotel is richly decorated with bright wall paper and comics pictures. Not only does the room look chic (like those of the boutique hotel @ Seoul), the toilet is clean as well. What is even better is that the hotel provides washing machines and dryer for us to do our laundry.
 



 
There is also a nice restaurant (cannot remember the name but the restaurant is next to a roasted meat shop) near the hotel that served freshly made soya bean milk, Xiao long bao and Dou jiang.
 


 
The 9 days trip @ Taiwan had ended and it was a good one for all of us despite some hiccups along the way. We boarded the express bus from Taipei Train Station to Tao Yuan International Aiport. The bus was fast and we arrived in less than an hour. Before boarding the flight, we had one last Taiwanese food at the airport. It was delicious as well. Oh man, I'm so going to miss some of the Taiwanese food, such as the "Ru Rou Fan"!
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

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