5D4N Taiwan 台北 Travelogue: Day 1

It's been almost a month since i came back from Taiwan and i've decided not to procrastinate further and start blogging about the trip as i'm starting to forget the details that happened in Taiwan! (Heng i brought this little notebook with me and took notes on details such as prices etc.) Prior to this post, i did 2 "pre-post" which you can read HERE and HERE! It was seriously not easy filtering 1300 photos to 50 photos for each day's post. So if you calculate, i have to edit abt 250 photos in total! You can expect this 5D4N Taipei travelogue to be quite idiot proof easy to understand and definitely useful if it's gonna be your first time to Taiwan. I can totally understand how "first-timer" feels about Taipei, trust me (:

Flight was at 8.55am, reached the airport at about 7.15am! This trip was a rather last minute trip (planned just 2 weeks before) and the air fares to Taipei was sky high! After comparing the different airlines, the cheapest was to take Tiger Airways there and Jetstar back to SG. Normally i would just book a round trip with a single airline, more convenient.

Happy me waiting to check in our luggage!

Ticket to Taipei! Another asia country down, left with BKK and Japan before heading out of Asia (:

Took Tiger Airways for the very first time. Was rather skeptical at first because of all the stories i heard/ read, and the fact that they depart from budget terminal where you have to walk to your plane on the tarmac kinda turns me off. But now, it departs from Terminal 1 and it's no doubt that the tickets are cheap compared to other airlines! Right?

Typical on the plane shot. I would definitely choose window seat for myself ♥

The day before i had a surprise birthday celebration and i packed a slice of the rainbow cake up the plane! 

My travel partner for this trip is once again - Angela! If you have been reading my blog, you would find her familiar it's because she's my poly classmate and we went for a weekend getaway to Bukit Tinggi a few months back. If i don't post photos of her, later you guys would think i emo went to Taipei alone or secretly with someone else. Whatever lah, LOL

The flight lasted for about 4 hours plus and we arrived at Taoyuan airport at around 2pm. There's 2 ways you can get to Taipei - #1: Would be to take a cab direct (est about NT1200, SGD$52) or #2: take the shuttle bus. We chose to take the bus, much cheaper. Directions: Take your luggage, exit on the left and take travelator down to the bus counter.

There are different service provided by different bus companies depending where is your destination.

Brought my bus tickets from 国光客运 which cost NT125, which is just SGD5.35. Taking a cab is like 10 times of a bus ticket! Plus it's not those lousy bus, it's something like those coaches you take to Genting, not that bad (:

Waited for the bus to arrive and the journey to Taipei will take about 45 mins to an hour.

Nothing to do while waiting so started camwhoring. Weather supposed to be cooling but it was freaking hot!

Alighted at Taipei Main Station to get the essentials such as 3G sim card and their Easycard for travelling on their public transport! You can buy choose to buy the unlimited ride pass (NT440 for 3 days, NT700 for 5 days) for a few days but we chose the one with NT500 (SGD21) value (NT400 value, NT100 deposit) - hoping it would last for 5 days, LOL

After which, we took the MRT over to 西門町 Xi mending Station where our hotel is! Totally did not expect to see such a crowd. I know it's a Saturday but still! Xi mending totally reminded me of Myeongdong when i was in Seoul.

Kids singing in the middle of nowhere with their guitar singing to the passerby. For a cause i think.

Took us quite a while to find our hotel because it's a newly established hotel - VIA HOTEL! It's situated above the streets! For the first time, you might even walk past it without knowing because the lobby is on the 2nd floor.

VIA HOTEL

17, Lane 114, Section 1 Chunghua road, Ximending, Wanhua, Taipei, 10843

Checking in was a breeze. The total cost of the room for 4 nights was about SGD550. This was the best we could get because most of the hotels that my friends recommended were already fully booked. But still, i'm very satisfied with the room because everything is so new! Plus, there's a bathtub! Ya, if you noticed, the bathroom can be seen through...

It was about 4.30pm when we check into the hotel and wasted no time unpacking because we did not want to waste the rest of the evening away! Decided to deviate from our initial itinerary and decided to head to Mr. Jay for dinner!

Took the MRT down to Taipei City Hall Station and... decided to cab over to Taipei Medical University :|

Cab driver did not know where the restaurant is so we had to anyhow-ly explain where is it using google map -__-

Upon reaching the university, we asked the students around for directions to the restaurant and we finally found it!

We were like, "OMG, WE ARE FINALLY HERE!!!" Not because it's a restaurant opened by Jay Chou, but because we were really really hungry, LOL Apparently there's a few of these Mr. Jay restaurant in Taipei and each of the restaurant is based on a movie theme i think. This one at the University is based on his movie - Secret , 不能说的秘密.

The Menu. Couldn't think of a better caption, LOL

Order a main course set and it comes with salad, soup, garlic bread, drink and dessert. Like a not bad hor?

I ordered a Sausage and Ham pizza (was expecting to be a personal size but it came regular size! Finished it myself anyway.) and Angela ordered Venne Smoked Salmon with orange cream sauce. Total bill for the 2 of us was NT834 (SGD35.60) I would say the set meals are affordable and the food is really not bad! Love the ambience too.

The piano that was on display in the restaurant. Very pretty and vintage looking.

The cashier offered to take a photo for us. Why all Taiwanese so nice and polite one!

After the meal, we decided to head to the Taipei 101! Actually planned to visit it during the day time but since we had time, no harm visiting it at night. In fact, the night view might be even better than during the day! So we walked towards the direction of the tower from the restaurant - digesting our food in the meantime, LOLOLOLOLOL

After walking for about 15 mins, we were finally at the junction approaching the tower.

Taipei 101台北101 

Taipei City Hall station <市政府站> Exit 2. Coming out from exit, turn right, you will see a bus stop. Bus (big, yellow in color). Operation: 1100‐2100, with buses coming every 15 min weekends, every 20 min weekdays.

HELLO TAIPEI 101! THE ONCE TALLEST BUILDING IN THE WORLD!!!

Took a photo with the mascot of Taipei 101! Ticketing is on the 5th floor of the building.

Bought the tickets which cost NT450 (SGD19) to go up to the 89th floor for the view. Was told by the counter staff that we have to wait 30 mins for our turn to go up the tower. Had to wait for about 500 people to go up first -_-

Walked around and took random photos while waiting for our batch ticket numbers to called for us to queue up...

As you can see from the above photo, batch no. 19500 to 19550 is in the queue at that moment and our queue no. was 20020. ABOUT 500 PEOPLE TO GO. The amount of people wanting to go up the tower was damn kua zhang.

Had to take a photo in front of the green screen before taking the lift. Here's the photo, LOL

World's fastest passenger elevator. So how fast is it?

89 floors in 37 seconds! That's really fast compared to the HDB ones, LOL I went to count my house one, to get to the 11th floor takes about 30 seconds. This is like 8 times during the same time frame. Can feel the pressure in your ear.

Random night views from the 89th floor! Very pretty sight ♥

Souvenirs that was on sale before taking the lift back down to ground level.

Another random photo of us a the souvenir shop.It was 10pm when we left the building. The night is still young! We then decided to take the MRT to Shilin Night Market, the highly raved MUST GO night market in Taipei.

Took the MRT over to Shilin Station and follow the signboard or the crowd.

Apparently it's just 435m from the station. An alternative, which i think would be much faster would be to stop at Jiantan 劍潭 station instead of Shilin 士林 station. The 士林夜市 night market is just opposite the Jiantan station.

Just across the road would be the start of 士林夜市! Wait till you see the crowd...

First store that caught my attention is 50嵐, which is like KOI in Singapore!

Shilin Night Market is known for their snacks. Upon stepping in, i knew i had to try everything!

First thing i had was random fish balls. But quite nice and flavorful leh! LOL

 Alot of people told me i MUST try this 青蛙下蛋 drink when in Taiwan so when i saw it, without knowing how it taste like, i immediately bought a cup, NT35 ($1.50) and surprisingly, it taste really good! Very refreshing and they had Aiyu jelly and lots of this mini mochi pearls (the 蛋?) in the drink. I wish i had a cup of it now, only available in Taiwan :(

I had it almost every single day in Taiwan, LOL 

大腸包小腸! This is apparently also one of the must try in Shilin. It's Taiwan pork sausage wrapped in glutinous rice.

Tried this potato snack too! 2 brands side by side selling the same thing but the one with the yellow banner has a much longer queue. Yellow one must be the authentic one then the pink one is the fake and not so nice one, LOLOLOL

This is definitely a must try! 豪大大鸡扒 Extra large Chicken! Only NT55 (SGD2.35) So much cheaper compared to the one we have in Singapore. In Taiwan, you have to take a plastic bag yourself and they will put the chicken in it.

The smell of their Smelly Tofu 臭豆腐 is seriously overbearing. If you think the ones we have in our pasar malam is too much, wait till you smell the real thing there. I could detect the smell of it from a distance away! Damn scary, held my breath everytime i walked past a smelly tofu stall, REALLY CANNOT TAKE IT!!!! How they eat one.  HAHAHA

Shilin Night Market is not all about food but there's also shops that sells apparels and such.

They also have these random games stalls for you to try your luck to win some prizes!

Some examples of the games. Very simple ones BUT not easy to win at all.

Shall end this post with this photo! Basically for NT20, you get a stick with a hook to try catch a prawn! If you manage to catch it, the stall owner will grill the prawn on his charcoal stove for you to eat. Oh my 天, seriously.

That's all i have for Taiwan Day 1!

Day 1 |  Day 2 |  Day 3 |  Day 4 |  Day 5