Tuesday, May 5, 2015

2015 Trip to Taiwan-First Day

We arrived Taoyuan airport terminal 1 at around 5:30 am. After clearing immigration and collect our luggage (close to 6:20 am), we took airport shuttle to terminal 2. There is chunghwa shop at the departure hall) which will open at 7 am. We need to get prepaid sim card. Before proceed to the shop, we first went to food court for breakfast. There are seven eleven and MC Donald at the lower level.

Below is the few options that you can choose from, offered by chunghwa. We got 5 day pass that costs 300 TWD. That includes unlimited data plus $50 of airtime. The staff said it will allow me to call local number for maximum of 8 minutes. It's enough for us. 

We then took city bus 国光 to taipei main station. It costs 120 TWD per person for bus ticket. The journey was about an hour. We reached Taipei Main station at 9 am. Before going to our hotel, we went to ticket counter to get our hualien train tickets. I have purchased the train tickets online. The puyuma train tickets can be difficult to get. And you can buy the ticket online two weeks in advanced. I got 7:20 am train for the next morning. 

Our hotel for the first night is at New Stay inn. We stayed there two years ago, and it was pretty nice budget hotel. For twin shared room, we paid 2250 TWD (102 SGD) per night. 

After settled the hotel, we put our luggage at the reception, and we went to see my friend at San Chong area. From there, our first food hunting was "mien xien"/misua nearby Zhong Zheng ji nian tang (中正纪念堂). It costs only TWD 35 for a small bowl. It was delicious. I myself think this one is more delicious than Ah Chung mien xien at ximending. It was located at a small road. You may alight at Chiang khai sek MRT station. But, i can't remember the exit number. 



After having one small bowl of mien xien, we went to a "lu rou fan"/braised ground pork rice shop. If you visit taiwan, you defintely have to try their lu rou fan. It's very oily, but delicious. 
There is usually a queue for that shop, especially during lunch time. But, since we were early, we got a shared table right away. 


We spent only 115 TWD (5 SGD) for that meal. We know about this shop during our previous visit when we went for our prewedding photoshoot. The bridal staff brought us there. 

After that satisfying meal, we went to a bakery shop, called Gakuden. They have a lot of branches in Taipei. We live the chocolate mochi bread. They claimed that they use Valrhona fine chocolate. But, indeed the type of chocolate used does make a different. We simply love the chocolate taste in their bread. I forgot to take picture of the chocolate mochi bread. It is a small bread, each package contains 5 mini bread. Below is their other type of bread, top picture is chocolate creamcheese, and the bottom one is black sesame cream cheese. Both are good. 


Then we walked around to check out the area around. We passed by a dessert shop, and we decided to make a try. We ordered one bowl of green bean barley dessert to share. 

It was close to 2:30 pm, and I was very exhausted after the red eye flight, so we decided to go back to hotel. It's a bout the check in time which was supposed to be at 3 pm. 


After few hours of rest, we got ready for ximending. There, we tried ah chong mien xien. It costs 50 TED for a small bowl. We got one to share. Again, we think the mien xien we had earlier was better. 

After that shopping time. From xi men ding, we went to Zhongxiao dunhua to look for some particular uniqlo tshirt. The shirt is out of stock in ximending shop. We then had our dinner around there. After a long walk trying to decide what to eat, we went in to a hong kong restaurant. I was too hungry and tired at that time, and I forgot to take any pictures of the food we had. 

After dinner, we went back to the hotel. We had to catch early train to hualien the next morning, so we should get enough rest. Please stay tune for my next post for an adventurous trip at hualien.