Sightseeing: Taroko Gorge

Where have I been for the past two weeks? In between studying and travelling with a guest of the familial kind, things have been pretty busy here. This weekend just passed, among other areas, I visited the beautiful Taroko Gorge.



Taroko Gorge was the destination most recommended to me whenever I asked a local. Blessed by excellent weather, it was incredible how few people were there (even though the tour guide said it was relatively crowded) to gawk along with me at the naturally chiselled walls of marble, topped by lusciously green forestation. The entrance was marked by this gateway:


The government website is at http://www.taroko.gov.tw/, and the tour company we used was Edison (http://www.edison.com.tw/eindex.htm). Our tour guide the lovely enthusiastic Josephine really added to our experience, although I have noticed a curious trend for local guides to have speakers strapped to their persons belting out their spiel to all and sundry. With scenery this beautiful though, I admit I was often too busy gawking to listen.

Tumbling down the length of the gorge was a stream, the water stained a whitish grey by (presumably) the marble fragments. New Zealanders who have visited the Fox and Franz Jospeh glaciers and seen the streams leading away from the ice will have some idea of what shade of grey I mean, as it is very similar.

In several spots were clearer aqua blue pools at the base of waterfalls - these looked as though they could have been spring water rather than rain water, although I am no expert.

The best way to see the area was to pop out and walk along the tunnels carved into the gorge with viewing openings. The guide pointed out several tracks of varying difficulty for those more serious about tramping (include a rather high track with dubious-looking suspension bridges erected circa 1914 by the Japanese).

Further down the gorge, at times you may be able to see fish jumping along this high waterfall (none were out and about when we visited).

Hualien on Taiwan's east coast makes a good stopping off point for reaching the gorge, especially if you're not going with a tour group. Hualien is easy to reach by plane and train (I haven't driven in Taiwan so I can't speak informedly about the drive down, although I have been told it's about 4 hours).

(p.s. a little shout out to my sis who took these photos on my point and shoot camera).

Sightseeing: Taipei 101, Beitou

After only a few months of living in Taiwan, the inevitable stream of guests has begun. This of course means an increased quota of sightseeing. Every so often I will blog about some of the places I have taken guests. First up, Taipei 101 and Beitou.

Yi Ling Yi - Taipei 101

Taipei 101 is currently the world's tallest completed structure (there is always another building somewhere aiming to go just a little bit higher). It has a website at http://www.taipei-101.com.tw/. To get there, hail a cab and tell the driver "Eee Ling Eee" (Mandarin for 1-0-1).

Inside the building's basement is a decent sized foodcourt with many decent options, and Jasons (a grocery store with an inhouse bakery and many western products). A variety of higher-end clothing stores and jewellers fill about 4 floors worth of space; worth a wonder around for those interested in shopping. For expats, the fourth level is a great place to find reasonably priced english language books at Page One.

Near the top of the building is an enclosed platform/floor open to the paying public with 360 degree views of the city. Tickets are purchased on level 5, next to the queue for the smooth high-speed elevators. Larger bags will need to be left at the ticket counter.

Tickets cost 400 NTD for each adult and 370 NTD for each child under 12, and include the audio guided tour around the viewing area of the city's major sights.


For a better view of the city, try to pick a day with better weather and minimal haze. The first time I visited the viewing platform, electrical thunderstorms were hanging over the city; not as helpful for visibility, but quite an atmospheric experience.

On this occasion, we made it to the viewing platform shortly before sunset, and watched the last rays dip below the horizon.


As the daylight faded away, the city began to light up. I would recommend this as a good time of day to bring guests. If they are particularly keen to see the city buildings, arrive with enough time to have the audio tour before sunset for better visibility.

Beitou - Spring City Resort

In the northern part of Taipei, steaming hot springs have led to a packed cluster of hotels for people to soak away their city stress. The easiest way to reach Beitou (especially if you're in the southern part of the city) is to catch the MRT.

This was the first time I had caught the MRT in Taipei, being mostly a taxi-hound. For the first time, students in the International Chinese Language Program have the proper National Taiwan University student ID cards. The major benefit of this is that those cards also act as stored value cards giving discounted MRT fares.

The MRT was easy to use, quick, well maintained, and not too crowded on ours journey from CKS Memorial Hall station to the Beitou station (pictured below). The full adult fare each way was 35 NTD.

We visited Beitou on Friday 10 October, which also happened to be my birthday. In light of this not so auspicious occasion, I booked an overnight stay at Spring City Resort (http://www.springresort.com.tw) for my first Taiwan hot springs experience. The resort had a free shuttle service between the hotel and the Beitou and Xinbeitou MRT stations.

Inside the Japanese themed grounds, we enjoyed a number of smaller pools, including several with different kinds of bubbles, quiet pools, sleeping baths (constructed for lying down in the hot bubbly water), a super hot pool for the brave, and an area laid with heated smooth marble stone slabs for resting on.

My favourite pool was the waterfall pool, where several waterfalls pummelled down giving my shoulders an awesome massage. The sole cold spring pool, a small circular granite pool with rose petals floating on the surface, was a close second; firstly for cooling off in between the hottest pools, and secondly because no-one else ever seemed to use it so I had a little floral scented paradise all to myself.

Another enjoyable feature of the hotel was the private hot spring tub inside the hotel room for use after retreating from the public areas:

As a closet hot spring junkie, I can see Beitou quickly becoming one of my favourite parts of the city, and can recommend the springs at this hotel. I look forward to trying out other hotels in the area too (for research purposes you understand, to give myself a basis of comparison -one must suffer for one's hobbies).

High Speed Rail - the toilet perspective

This afternoon a visitor and I zipped down to Kaohsiung and back on the High Speed Rail. The trip took 1h30m each way and cost (business class) $6240 return for two people. We booked and paid for the tickets online at http://www.thsrc.com.tw/en/index.htm This site has an english language option and is very easy to navigate. You'll need your ARC or passport handy.

With my handy dandy camera, I took a few pictures along the way for those who have yet to experience the HSR. Arriving at Taipei Station looks a little something like this:


And at the Kaohsiung end, a little something like this:

Once inside, if you have booked your tickets online you need to pick them up. We chose to stand in line and get old fashioned face to face service. The business class line was to the left (purple sign), the passengers requiring special assistance line was to the right, and in between was the line for the remaining customers. Collecting the tickets was very painless, with just a look at the print-out of the emailed confirmation required.


Alternatively, we could have visited one of these automated kiosks.

Here's what a HSR ticket looks like. In the rear of this picture is a train waiting at the station in its white and orange livery.

Once you have your ticket, check the electronic signs to see what your platform number is. The easiest way to find it on the sign is by the train's number, which is also printed on your ticket. Then use your ticket (magnetic strip side up) to gain admission to the waiting area through the turnstiles.

Once through the turnstiles, there are plenty of places to sit and wait for your train's arrival. These chairs were surprisingly comfortable.

The electronic signs and a loudspeaker announcement (in both zhongwen and english) will indicate that your train has arrived and is ready for boarding. Take an escalator down to your platform. At the Taipei end, the attendants checked tickets at the top of the escalator and would not let passengers onto the platform until their train was ready for boarding.

Down on the platform, find your passenger car, which should also be printed on your ticket. Outside the business class car, attendents checked tickets then welcomed you on board.

Inside the business class car, seats were in rows of two. The signs on the wall seemed to indicate that instead of turning the train around on a circular track, the attendants somehow swivel and reverse all the seats in the cabin for the return journey so that the passengers are not seated backwards. I would be interested to hear if anyone can confirm this.

The seats were quite comfortable and reclined a fair distance. Each seat had side-wing headrests, coat hooks on the wall, a pull down tray, a footrest, power sockets and audio channels (although you needed to provide your own headphones).

Partway through the journey, the friendly attendants come around offering nuts, coffee, tea and water.

As you can see, we had a pleasant experience on the HSR. There is one important facet I have neglected thus far to mention. I feel strongly that an important indicator of the quality of public amenities are its restrooms. In Kaohsiung, I nipped in to check these out and found a sparkling clean facility.

What upped the grade to outstanding was the attention to detail. Each roll of toilet paper had been folded into the traditional hospitality industry triangle. I forgot to take a "before" photo, but in this "after photo" you can see that the roll on the left side still has its end folded. From the toilet perspective, I give the HSR an unashamedly geeky two thumbs up.

Leaving aside my HSR experience, the last time I visited Costco I snapped a shot in the foothall area. Clam chowder doesn't seem to be offered in many places in Taipei. Here at Costco, I tend to order the chowder when I go. It's fine. Not awesome, not bad, just fine (and a little too salty for my taste).

In case there was any doubt, it seems from this photo that the chowder is definately Campbells. I thought any fellow chowder consumers who wondered about its origins might be interested, so here's the shot:

And a final note: a great big thanks to those who have left comments on earlier entries! I really enjoy hearing about other's experiences, both those kiwis in Taiwan (or have been in Taiwan) and Taiwanese over in New Zealand. It seems we're in agreement on the magnificence of the fruit supply here - yes lychees are awesome (especially after they've been chilled in the fridge a while). Thanks also for the language tips on my video further down. Xie xie nin men!

Flag seeds and celestial fruit

The flora in Taiwan can often look a little different to back home. Recently it seems that someone planted flag seeds all over the city and blossoming season has arrived.

These children have already picked flag blossoms in a variety of colours. Here they are excitedly waving them all around - perhaps they will make a flag chain a la daisies.

I'm not sure what strange seed varietal produced these botanicals. A large number of people seem however to be watching them grow.

Yes, a beautiful afternoon for gardening at CKS Memorial Hall.

These readily available local delicacies are the dragonfruit (pinky red) and starfruit (yellow). I have often seen them at the fruit vendors but this is the first time I have succumbed to their piao liang exteriors.

Cut across, it soon becomes apparent why this is named starfruit.

This was a bit more of a surprise! Sweet, juicy, and reminiscent of a kiwifruit.

In search of the bread aisle

There are plenty of small scale local supermarkets around the neighbourhood. Stepping inside is however a little different to Foodtown in Greenlane. This evening I embarked on a quest to find a large size scotch brite pad. Newcomers to my local Wellcome supermarket may find themselves embarked on an even tougher quest - to find the bread aisle.

Along the way I snapped a few pictures for your perusal. Unfortunately I didn't get a good shot of the entrance. Better lighting would show that the parking lot consists of a row of about eight scooters on the footpath.

Grocery shopping is not a disabled friendly exercise, and tends to focus the mind on what you really need. What goes home must come up the entrance stairs again, generally by hand (unless you've learned to balance pineapples on your head. I haven't).



Here we are in the vege aisle, which consists largely of many asian greens, 7 mushroom varietals, and small quantities of things needed in a stirfry. A quirky thing you may notice is that often floating about in your bowl of soup when eating out is the presence of shredded lettuce.

In the seafood section, the fish come whole rather than filleted, and are accompanied by a range of squid, whitebait, prawns, sardines, sprats, octopus, and fishballs. Aside from a lack of scallops (and dubious use-by dates) the selection is pretty good.

Next door in the meat section, there are very few joints, roasts and packages of mince. Costco has a much better selection of cuts. Instead, meat mostly comes chopped for stir fries, in small bony pieces for fatty sweet sauced dishes, or sliced for shabu shabu (hotpot).

While searching for the bread, you will come across the noodle aisle, which stretches down the length of this photo. I love the range of noodles here in Taiwan. These packages range from your basic 2 minute varietal to monster bowls with 4 different seasoning packets and a foil pouch of marinaded meat.

Nearby is the complemetary soya sauce and fish sauce section.


In the dairy department, it is very common to find snack size samples of other beverages packaged in with the bottles of milk. Today for example on this shelf with 2 litres bottles are cardboard drinking cartons of chocolate-flavoured and "pudding"-flavoured milk.

Down the cold aisle is the large iced tea section. My favourite iced teas come in grapefruit and muscat grape flavours. Hen hao chi! Those red and yellow signs advertise current discount specials.

In the freezer section, at least half if not more of the space is devoted to dumplings, steamed buns and fish balls. Pork steamed buns, if boring to some, are my favourite. I first had them in Singapore back in 1999 and it's been a quiet love affair since.

For those of you who were wondering about the bread aisle I mentioned earlier - here it is. All two half-shelves of it. Bread in Taiwan tends to be quite sweet.

The loaf on the bottom shelf, left hand side, is called "Milk Toast". It is generally the kind I buy, but the loaf is so tall that halfway through toasting I have to take the slices out and turn them upside down to make sure it's heated all the way around the slice.

The other shelves in this very small section have slightly asianised versions of other baked goods, such as swiss rolls and nut clusters.

As a final note - my quest for the scotch brite pad was successful. All's well that ends well.

Air Raids and KGB

Earlier today I sipped a hot cup of something with a fellow kiwi in a case with a name beginning with R on the eastern side of Fuxing South Road in the block between Xinhai and Heping (a nice cozy place that would fit right in back home in Wellington). While sipping this hot cup, I mentioned to my friend that I liked the movie Pearl Harbour not because it was necessarily a good movie, but because I liked its 1940s atmosphere.

A random chain of thought then led me from this war movie to remember I took a few clips of the air raid drill back in August. Disappointed as I was at the lack of people screaming, running about waving their arms, and yelling "The aliens are coming, the aliens are coming!" it is still a little creepy to see the almost deserted roads and hear the sirens. YouTube is defeating me at the moment but once I have it sorted I will post the video clip.

During the weekend I paid another visit to the KGB. That is, Kiwi Gourmet Burgers, the takeaway that shows how a kiwi burger should be done. You can find it here:

This is the reverse of KGB's card. As a note to newcomers, one of the easiest ways to find a path back to a good eating spot is to pick up the restaurant's card. You can then show the card to a taxi drivers and bob's your bobo. Taxis in Taipei are very cheap compared to back home. Flagfall is 70 NTD (about $3.20 NZD), and a trip around town usually costs me about 110-150 NTD. YMMV.

Back home, potatoes are a kitchen staple. Roasted, baked, mashed, scalloped, boiled, hashed, chipped, microwaved, casseroled, souped, oh my! Here in Taiwan, potatoes are somewhat a gourmet item, coming in packs of two. Potatoes that is, not kilos. Eat your spuds before you arrive (Onehunga Roasts, I miss you! Call me sometime. xxx.) So here you have it - KGB chips.

Sometime I will give you a mini tour around the wonderful world of Taiwanese stationary. A combination of cutesification, chinglish and a lack of appreciation for colour schemes result in exercise books that I don't just use but also adore. Along those same lines, I quite liked the pattern on KGB's chip wrapper, and I will take care to heed its advice.