We woke to a beautiful view of Keelung City and a complimentary breakfast by our lovely Minsu owners.
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| A lovely breakfast in the welcoming area of the hotel with wooden tables and chairs and a giant plasma screen TV. |
After a hearty breakfast, we decided to head off to Jiufen to explore (since there was still about 3 hours more till check-out time, we had to make full use of it!).
To head to Jiufen from the Minsu, we had to climb the monstrous stairs of Shuqi Road. I even told the travel mate that I'll snap photos of it just to commemorate how much these stairs sucked the life out of me. Nevertheless, we went off, determined to conquer the beast.
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| The beginning of Shuqi Road (which is just stairs). Please remember to wear comfortable shoes! |
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| I swear this isn't even halfway through. This is a continuation of the photo above. I was determined to take photos all the way up the stairs, but after a while it was more crucial to focus on climbing stairs. YES I AM WEAK! Haha but I was just trying not to fall. |
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| Countless tourists here even though barely any of the stalls are open. All the stores on Shuqi Road are actually closed in the morning because they are teahouses 茶樓 which open till much later at night. |
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| The streets are so empty and deserted, completely different from yesterday. But the crowds start till to fill up the streets and alleys over the course of the day. |
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Photo from thebluewater.blogspot.com This was my absolute favourite loot from Jiufen because I got to keep the baby bottle and choose a favourite drink of my choice! I chose the rose water drink which was absolutely refreshing in that blistering summer heat! The words below read "Childhood Memories" - awwwww.  After that, it was time to head back to the Minsu to check out. To head back to Taipei, we would have to take a train from Ruifang Station. From our Minsu, we took a cab down to Ruifang Station, because as mentioned before, it is impossible to board the bus at Jiufen. There are also fixed prices for single destination journeys for the cabbies in Jiufen so you won't get cheated! All cabbies should charge you the same price. These are the prices from Ruifang Station to the following destinations: Jiufen (九份): NT180; Jinguashi (金瓜石); NT240, Shifenliao (十分): NT480; Shuangxi (双溪): NT600 (so the journey back should be more or less about the same price). Our cabby constantly tried to convince us to have him send us straight to Taipei (so he could earn more) but nahhhh.. we had to save money! So we politely declined ( a few times as he politely hinted a few times) and made our way. Alighting at Ruifang Station, we went up to the ticket counter and bought our train tickets.  We had to wait for about 40 minutes to take the Zi Qiang train, which was a little long. -------------------------------------------------------------------- TOURIST TIP:
if you are going to be using google maps to get around, they do have the train timings indicated in the routes mapped out for you, that should help you to plan what you can do conveniently.
Also, trains in Taiwan are very punctual. Make sure you are at the respective platforms early otherwise you will definitely miss the train!
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Once we were back in Taipei Main Station, it was lunch time! Since we were a little tight on budget, we figured that we should rule out eating at restaurants.
TRA Bento Boxes are really famous. You can purchase them during the train ride, or from the shops in Taipei Main Station itself (there are a couple, as we realised). They usually include pork chop on a bed of rice, braised egg, a side of vegetables and certain other pickled things (depending on which one you choose). There are vegetarian options available as well. These bento boxes range from NT60 to NT100 (if I remember correctly). The menu does change from day to day so be sure to check out what food they have on the day itself.
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| The queue to get the bento boxes at Level 1 Brezze Centre Taipei Main Station. Boxes usually sell out fast so you may not get the one you want. While queueing, think of a second choice just in case. |
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| Bought some Chatime Bubble Tea to go alongside our Bento Boxes. That's the NT100 one. |
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| Sitting on the Taipei Main Station floor and having lunch like everyone else. When in Taiwan, do as the Taiwanese do. Again, another glimpse sans the braised egg (I gave it to the boyfie 'cos I don't eat it) of the NTD100 bento. The floors are extremely clean so you don't have to worry about cleanliness issues. Also, no one will stare at you since everyone is doing this whole "get-comfy-with-food-on-the-floor" thingy. |
P.S. There are other shops (not of this brand) around Taipei Main Station that sell slightly more expensive Bentos but with better looking ingredients, you may want to give those a shot.
Taipei Railway Bento (TRA No. 1 Boxed Lunch Store)West 3 Entrance, Taipei Main Station
Opening Hours: 10.30am-7pm
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| Level 6 of CityInn Hotel 1 has an iTunes theme! |
We woke up and decided to go to Shilin Night Market (yes as you can see we didn't quite follow the itinerary because of exhaustions and such). If you are planning your travel itinerary, try to keep it flexible and open, or include opening hours/addresses of shops and locations so that if you shelved the plans for that day, you can always push it to another day and access the locations easily.
HOW TO GET THERE: From Taipei Main Station, take the Red line towards Beitou Station, and alight at Jiantan Station. Take Exit 1, and walk straight. You won't miss this night market since there's just too many people!
We were too busy talking on the train ride there that we got off at Shilin Station instead.
DON'T MAKE THE MISTAKE OF ALIGHTING HERE. The walk is way too long and you start to get tired and cranky before you even arrive at Shilin Night Market.
We made our way to the underground/basement food court area to grab some food (because it was way too crowded at Xin Fa Ting Shaved Ice area). Many of the stall workers will badger you into patronising their stall. No seriously. They will hold out menus, shove them in your face, "come in come in" in mandarin of course. If you hesitate, they will say "what do you want to eat?" WHATEVER IT IS YOU SAY, THEY WILL SAY "WE HAVE IT". So we relented to one stall because among all the other stalls, it was the only one that had 2 seats left.
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| 紅油抄手 Dumplings in Chilli Oil and Vinegar which were just so-so. The cut up spring onions provided a nice touch. There wasn't enough chilli oil in this dish to make it really jump out at you. Vinegar taste too was not too strong (though stronger than the chilli oil). |
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| Can't come to Taiwan and not try their oyster omelette. SINGAPOREANS AND MALAYSIANS BE WARNED: chances are you will not like this dish because it is way too starchy to the oyster omelette we are familiar with in our own countries. Based on that alone, I can safely say Taiwan oyster omelette is just not my thing. That being said, some stalls try to be cheapos and put way more starch in so that they can scrimp on other stuff - this stall for example. |
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While every other blog can recommend to you the typical Shilin Night Market street snacks like grilled squid, taiwanese sausages, fried milk, coffin bread; let me take a different approach and suggest to you other less commonly known snacks.
First up: 大餅包小餅 or Big Crepe wraps small biscuit?
This shop is located in the basement food court area somewhere near the centre. There are only 3 people working here: the guy who makes the crepes, a lady who takes orders and collects money, and a lady who makes these delicious morsels (rather slowly though).
When we walked past this stall, the travel immediately exclaimed: THIS IS THE ONE I ATE AT SO MANY YEARS AGO! Okay then, since it stayed fresh in his memory, we had to queue for it. I must say that the crepe-maker and order-taker work really fast but not the lady in action.
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| A photo of the lady in action. See those brown pastries there - they are the small biscuits or Xiao Bing. When you begin queueing, you will be given that laminated sheet there to choose which flavour you want, sweet or savoury. We chose pork floss. So the lady takes one of those brown things, puts in in a crepe skin and covers it up, then raises a hammer and smashes said brown thing into bits under the crepe skin. Then she opens the crepe skin, puts a spoon of pork floss filling (or whatever filling you chose), along with some grounded peanuts and wraps up the crepe |
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| Wrapping up the crepe and all the brown bits. |
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| Top view of this delicious snack. Even the plain crepe skin tastes really good , and is wonderfully thin. Give this snack a try when you are at Shilin Night Market. |
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| Happy with my tasty morsel! |
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2nd: for the people who have been to Korea and love their banana milk, I present to you the banana milk ice cream - which took me straight back to cold cold korea, slurping smooth fragrant banana milk through a straw too dainty for me; all while standing in the middle of a hot and humid Taipei night market.
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| This stall is/was (I hope its still there) out on the main streets of the night market, and has a large banner with Kim Soo Hyun's photo on it, along with this banana milk logo. Urm - since when did he advertise for Banana Milk? haha I bought this nonetheless - best decision ever! Even though I was too full to finish it. |
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3rd and last on the list: the ultimate find - and my ultimate steal of the night -- FRIED SQUID!
There are many fried squid stalls in Shilin Night Market, but I can assure you that this one is really really fantastic. You will also recognise it by its blue hued exterior and spinning metal oil remover. This stall is particularly unique because their pieces of squid are so huge and after deep frying these babies, they are placed in a spinning metal ring which swings out all the unnecessary oil.
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| This is the stall owners in action. Cutting up the crispy fried squid after it has been spun in a revolving metal container which gets rid of all the excess oil. He then tops the pieces of fried squid with a topping of your choice (that you chose earlier upon ordering). |
My verdict? YOU MUST BUY THIS SQUID unless you are vegetarian. I promise that you will not regret it. I practically ate almost 3/4 of that box even though I was so full and originally didn't want to eat anymore food.
If you're looking out for this stall, their name is 魷達鮮炸魷魚 Crispy Fried Squid and they are somewhere at the intersection between Da Xi Road and Da Nan Road.
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That concludes this post. Thank you for reading and do stay tuned to the final day of our Taipei journey in June! After concluding the Taipei series, I will move on to recount to you my holiday in Korea back in 2012, which also works as a preparation for me for my upcoming trip in November.
Do leave any comments or questions, or feedback to tell me how I can improve on my posts.
Till then,
Fly Safe and Eat Happy,
V
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