We got up at around 8.30am on Monday morning. I had a peaceful sleep the first night. We got ready by around 9.30am and started to walk around the hotel premises to look for breakfast like Soya milk and dough stick aka as 豆浆油条. We asked the hotel receptionist for the location and got a map of Taipei City from them and we went looking for the shop. Along the way, I saw the first famous 槟榔shops around the whole stretch of streets. Taiwan is famous for hot babes working in such shops and they are called 槟榔西施. The reason why I did not take any photos of the girls working in the shops is that the 槟榔西施are all aunties or not hot babes. My dad said all the hot babes aka 辣妹are in Taoyuan / Gaoshiong areas. So disappointing...










Taipei streets and near our breakfast place, there's a mall opposite which is similar to Sim LinS quare. Sells electronics and digital products there...



I tried the hot soya milk and it's really thick. My dad also ordered the 烧饼(pancake), 油条. The 油条 was wrapped by the 烧饼 so both are very very crispy and tasty. I've never tasted 烧饼 before and this was plain but it tastes good with the 油条 in it. You can also eat the 油条alone with the 豆浆where you can feel the crispiness of the油条though dipped with the soya milk. My dad also ordered the 饭团(rice roll) and inside the 饭团was small pieces of 油条and pork floss. You can order the 饭团with egg too.







Me drinking the hot soya milk...




How the rice roll looks like, they served us in plastic bags so we could easily hold it and eat it...




Sesame Pancake...




Pancake with Dough stick...



After our breakfast, our driver called us and came to picked us up. He was the arrangment made by my dad's Taiwanese friend here and he was a cab driver. We told him our route to go. As Taipei 101 opens around 11am so it'd be better for us to go soemwhere else first. So my dad suggested going to see Presidential House first so he dropped us off there and waited from a certain distance.













This may be the only place which has trees around.






Then we passed by another place near the Presidential House was the Freedom Gate. IT was previously not called this name. This new signboard was being changed probably last year and at that time, there were a group who opposed to the change of the name and signboard.

Next stop will be Taipei 101. We went up to Level 5 to buy the tickets to view from the top. I had thought that we'll be going right up to 101st floor but in the end, the viewing mall is only at 90th floor. It's NT250 per pax. Each lift could take about 20 pax one time so they'll normally wait till there's about 20 people in line before allowing us to enter the elevator. There's the lift operator in there speaking and explaining in English, Mandarin and fluent Japanese language about the elevator. It's the world's fastest moving elevator as it takes about 20 secs to reach the 90th storey.

Inside the roof of the lift , it had this changing lights which looks like they were shooting stars in the galaxy.

Some shots of the view of the outside from the top...

There's the Dome aka 小巨蛋...a place where singers hold 售票concerts (means need to pay for tickets; these are for major concerts. Usually, the usual concerts held outdoor like at Ximen Ding doesn't require paying to get the tickets, can just win or queue at 7-11 stores to get the tickets)

This shows the world's other tallest buildings and SG's Swissotel (72 storeys) were featured here. They meant to show us that Taipei 101 is the tallest in the world so far...

This mailbox is very cute and meaningful. You can buy a postcard from the souvenirs shop then write and post it straight in the mailbox. It can be for your family, friends or lover. I also saw this from the Taiwan drama that features most of the tourist attractions of Taiwan and taipeie 101 and Alishan is one of them.

After that, we went for lunch in the basement food court. The food court is really huge and we easily found a table. I ordered the Minced Meat Noodles aka 杂酱面 but it wasn't nice and the noodles were the ban mian type.

I finally managed to get a full view of Taipei 101 from a distance...

Then we went to New York New York which had a mini Statue of Liberty there but there's nothing much to shop there. It was more of a small departmental store there but there was a Muji outlet inside. Then we went to Shin-Mitsuoka and I bought a DVD there.

Then we met up with the driver again and he drove us to catch the scenic sunset at Damshui Fisherman's Wharf. It's at the end of Taipei District. It's about an hour's drive and once we reached Damshui, the houses there were facing the river and the houses there were like condominiums, looked as if this is a much richer place than Taipei. It was around 5pm when we reached there.

There's the famous bridge in Damshui. If you want to catch the sunset from the river, this is the best place...

There's my mum up there wiht the pink and red umbrella...

The view from the bridge....

Look at the fishing boats...Damshui Fisherman's Wharf is known as 淡水渔人码头

My loving parents....

The other side of the bridge...

F&B shops / restaurants ahead

My brother took these two shots for us...

Caricuartist....

Then we saw a dessert shop and the famous food that Taiwan (but it's not in Damshui) has it - XXXL Chicken.

Then we considered going for the boat ride which costs NT250 per pax (ard S$12.50) and it's a 1 hour ride. Never been up on such yacht, it looks like those private yacht but older and more rundown. We were given lifejackets too (and they were very tattered and torn too) and when the boat started to move, the person can even steadily fetch a few cups soft drinks for us.

Whenever a boat passes by us in the opposite direction, the waves will hit us really strong.

A church was spotted in sight....

Sun is setting soon...

Then my dad went downstairs to the lower deck....I managed to take a back view of my dad whilst he's taking photos...

Then I also went downstairs to join my dad....

At that time, the boat has already started to turn back so we were hoping we can manage to return back to the jetty and catch the sunset on time. However as the winds started to blow on us and the sea, the waves started to grew stronger and the sea soon became high tide. My dad and I were so afraid, we had to sit down on the bench provided immediately after realising the waves got too strong and we couldn't just hold and grip on to the railings. We even have to keep away our cameras in order to prevent our lens from the seawater. In the end, we were just outside the gate of the harbour and the guide decided to let us take photos and catch the sunset from the sea. So we were directly in front and close to where the sun is setting...

We did not wanted to have dinner at Damshui as we did not want to let the driver wait too long, we've been gone almost three hours...The driver said that going to Shilin is on the way back so I decided to head there then and we can look for food at Shilin Night Market too.

The famous XXXL Chicken aka 好大鸡排in Shilin. Look at how long the queue is?

Everyone's sure to recognise what this place when you see this pics of those signboards hanging around.

I chose this one cause I have watched this drama series before and the leading actor in the show knew how to cooked Oyster Omelette at Shilin so this had his drama poster on it, I assume this was the one...It was really good but I dun eat oysters so I din not try the oysters but the omelette was nice..

Spare Ribs soup. It tasted a little like Bak Kut Teh...

Then my dad started to queue for the XXXL Chicken when he saw there wasn't a long queue. They passed him three plastic bags. The chicken can only take away so in the end my dad ordered 6 pcs of chciken in the end. And the chicken was so freaking hot and so huge...

Beside the XXXL Chicken stall, there's a bubble tea stall aka 珍珠奶茶(in Taiwan) so I wnated to try it since Taiwan is the authentic ones (they were the ones who started the bubble tea craze) so I got the green tea and my mum started to like bubble tea in Taiwan. The cup as huge as I did not know there is a smaller size (same as the one we have in SG). Then mwe brought back the chicken and bubble tea and walked over to the shops across the night market. I managed to bought two tops from the same shop there at NT270 and NT280 (ard S$13.50 and S$14) respectively.

I actually noticed every fruit or food stalls have this feathery thing that spins round and round present. MY dad says it's for chasing flies and insects away.

The busy streets of Shilin...


Back at the hotel eating the soggy chicken, it's like really super huge. It turned soggy cause it was piping hot earlier and now the steam has condensed on the skin. I only managed to eat about 1/4 of the chicken.


My dad enjoying the chicken. He managed to finish the whole piece but left the whole chicken skin and had to throw the remaining 2 untouched pieces away.


We did not expect the chicken to be that huge. If you have sewen or tried the SG XXXL Chicken from Xiao Shilin, the size in Shilin Night Market here is twice that size.

Will talk about Day 3-4 which will be spent at Alishan in next entry...

Labels: family, holidays, Taiwan

[x] Shireen signing out at
3:59 PM