Taiwan Trip Photoblog: Ye Liu - Jiu Fen - Hua Lian

After an eventful day at Tapei city, we decided to go out of  Taipei city centre for once. Our first stop was Yeliu Geopark, a cape situated in a small town in the middle of no where called Wan Li. Yeliu geopark is located between Taipei and KeeLung, whereby you can catch a bus from Taipei main station itself.

According to wiki, the stratum of yeliu is basically composed of sedimentary rocks; the formation of sea bays is due to the impact of sea erosion on softer rock layers, while those hard and solid ones may therefore turn into sea capes eventually. The total distance measured from the entrance of the Yehliu Geopark to the end of the cape is about 1.7 km; we didn't dare to meet the challenge of finishing the entire landscape simply because its too hot. Peter was basically bathed in his own sweat and we have to go hiding under the shades like every 5 minutes. Well, we cant complain much since its summer time and the picture turned out to be stunning with the cloudless clear blue sky and crystal blue sea. 

We spent around less than an hour at Yeliu Geopark and left like boiled lobsters. We took a local bus back to Kee Long town and then re-routed to our next stop Jiu Fen. This is our second time visiting Jiu Fen. Although the old town still has it charm, but we got a bit bored since there was not much of difference in terms of the scenery and stuffs you can find in the shops compare to our previous visits. Nevertheless, we had a good lunch at one of the local beef noodles shop and the famous taco balls shaved ice. 

That pretty much summarized up our short and sweet Taipei trip. 

Our next stop was Hua Lien. We had to take a 3 hours Taipei - Hualien train since the journey its quite long. One thing I have to mention is that Taipei main station is MASSIVE, there is a centre court which is so big I wonder why they would waste such a big space. The second floor is floor of eatery place but its slightly more pricey compare to normal restaurant. The train station was jam packed with locals since its summer holiday, but thanks to my good planning, we bought our train ticket online 3 days before we flew to Taiwan. *patting myself at the back*

One of the great highlight of our 3 hour train journey was 台铁便当- taiwanese bento set. The bento set which cost around NT55 have this authentic looks and tasted delicious. I bought the set which came with a big piece of pork chop and some vege. yum yum.

Hua Lian is one of the most beautiful city in Taiwan, the city face the pacific ocean and having the entire stretch of central mountain range at its back. Naturally, the tourist highlight of Hua Lian are the mountains and the seasides.

Once we have checked into a cozy minsu (B&B), we went to visit a local night market named Zi Qiang night market which was famous for their local food. The spread is not as diverse as what Shihlin market in Taipei had, but it was charming in its own way. We had some finger food and one of the highlight was the coffin bread, which is basically a thick piece of deep fried bread stuffed with all sort of ingredients such as mutton, chicken etc.    

The next morning we booked a tour guide to bring us to Taroko Gorge. But before heading to the famous tourist spot, our friendly tour guide brought us for a scrumptious breakfast at a local restaurant in Hualien which selling the famous gong zheng pao zi. The queue is super long but am not too impressed with the pao, it tasted like normal pork bun but with thicker and chewy bread dough. 

After the satisfying breakfast, we headed towards the Taroko Gorge with much anticipation. The view at Taroko Gorge were simply magnificent, long stretch of mountains, huge and deep rivers, limestones, caves and cliff. Its just great scenery one after another. Because the national park was so huge we have to drive in instead if walking. Its consist of 10 attractions, namely: 

• Tunnel of Nine Turns (九曲洞 Jiuqü Dong)
• Eternal Spring Shrine (長春祠 Changchun)
• Swallow Grotto (燕子口)
• Jinheng Park (靳珩公園)
• The Bridge of the Kind Mother (慈母橋)
• Tiansiang (天祥)
• Jhueilu Precipice (錐麓斷崖)
• Lioufang Bridge (流芳橋)
• Hill of Yu the Great (大禹嶺)
• Buluowan (布洛灣)

However, we are only able to visit just 4 spots as some were closed down for maintenance. The tour guide dropped us at each of the attraction spots and wait for us to go in and explore on our own. It was pretty strenuous as we have to walk many kilometers from the main road into the small paths in order to reach each of these attraction. At one point we were climbing up hundreds of staircase which is ascending at 60 degrees up to a temple look alike bell tower. It was so tiring but the panoramic view of the endless stretch of mountains on top of the hill worth all the effort.

There was also this suspension bridge which hanging at least 100 meters above a dangerously looking cliff. If the height is not scary enough, it basically sway from left to right whenever the wind blows.  I enjoyed the magnificent view of the cliff which heightened a few folds by the adrenaline rush. But Peter who has problem with the height not even dare to look down while crossing the bridge.

Our second day in Hua Lien ended with the visit to the famous Qi Xing Tan.The beautiful beach was consist of no sand, just tons and tons of smooth little rocks. After a whole day of strenous walking, we just sat on the beach, played with the rocks and watched the beautiful sunset. What a great way to end the day! 

Taiwan Trip Photoblog: Taipei day 1

Since I am too lazy to blog the details of my recent Taiwan Trip, i'm gonna let the photos speaks by itself. 

The first day in Taipei was fairly relaxing. We went to Taipei main station to purchase in advance our Taipei- Hua Lian Train Ticket first thing in the morning. Followed by breakfast in the famous "Yong he dou jiang dian" which can be found at the corner of every main street in Taipei.  

Hearty breakfast with soy bean drinks, xiao long bao and stuffed onion pancakes

Next we head to the Confucius temple at Datong district, whereby the temple is modeled after the original Confucius Temple in Qufu, Shandong Province of China. It was quite fun to look at all the details of the architecture and design of the chinese temple while reading about the write-about of  the famous Chinese fu-zi of all time. We even got the chance to view the famous Confucius 4D show for free!  

Then, we found out accidentally that opposite the street there is a Summer open air concert going on, and we can resist the chance to have a look inside. The whole area was super huge whereby it used to be the exhibition site for flora expo. We went from one stage arena to the next, some are open to public but some imposed restricted entry. Overall we enjoyed the atmosphere but decided to leave after a while as we cant stand the 37 degrees heat!

 

Next stop was our favorite place in whole Taiwan, the Beitou hot spring. But before that, we had simple lunch with Taiwanese local cuisine - braised mince pork rice, dry squid soup and pork balls. Yum yum. I am super in-love with the hotspring in Taiwan. The first time we came to Taiwan, we went to the Beitou public bath rather than private bath due to a simple reason- its cheaper. You can find all sort of private bath hotspring package which is basically a small bath tube in a hotel room available for 2-3 hours in ALL the big hotels in Beitou. Some may goes up to hundreds, we had chosen the public bath which only cost at a few dollars, but with much better ambiance and surrounding! The public bath is consisting of at least 4 big pools of different temperature, the pools are surrounding by tall trees which not only provide great nature view, but also shield the pools from the outsiders. Although this is not our first time being here, we still love the place!

After a good soak, we went to famous dan sui shopping district , which is just a station away from Bei Tou. The street are full with flocks of tourist, good street -food, and many many lovely dogs. Taiwanese love to walk their dogs, i think Dogs in Taiwan live a happier life compare to Malaysia's.

Peter has his 10 dollar head neck massage which is ok. But the highlight was the fisherman wharf. We hop on to the boat to go to the fisherman wharf for a sunset view.It didnt occur to me how fast the sun goes down the horizon. 1 minute the whole sea is bathing in the golden sun rays, and the next minute the whole sky turned pitch black. And the next thing you will see is the colorful neon light of the Fisherman wharf's bridge shimmering brightly in the dark. The view is simply magical. Frankly, I cant think of a better way to spend the night than this. 

Then, we ends the night with good ramen, a bit expensive but i guess you pay for the view as the restaurant was located on the harbour overlooking the sea. Then while on our way back to hotel, we were munching more snacks while passing by the shopping street. 

Stay tune for the rest of my Taiwan photoblog!

Singapore Trip- Part II Acclimatization

I rarely blog nowadays. Sometimes not even 1 post in a week. I wonder whether the writer's block really exist or its just in my head (translation- It's plain laziness). It's always easy to blame it on something which you can't control rather than admit that you are unwilling to make effort. However, I do realized that words do not come easily to me these days compare to how it used to be. Is it because I have experience less these days? or is it because I have experience too much, so new things no longer excites me easily? 

Or maybe its just a natural process, I didn't lived through 29 years of my life for nothing. One of many things life has taught me is the ability to acclimatize and acquaint with new things without being too stir up. Once in a blue moon, I would wonder what else that life can offer to me? And the very same thought scare me to death. It would be such a pitiful state if there is no more expectation in life. 

* Chase away the funny thoughts *

Anyway, one of the things which still adds spices in my life is travelling. Peter and I made a promise that we would travel at least once a year, and we are quite lucky to have it twice this year (and another one to look forward to during Christmas). But I am really looking forward to go somewhere far far away next year, nothing concrete yet. I hope I will have enough of moolah by then. ;)

Anyway, back to the Singapore trip. Here comes the part II.

Still on day 1, somewhere near the Fullerton Hotel. We wanted to take a picture with the Singapore icon Merlion, but the big one was closed for some construction, so in the end we only managed to took a picture of a teenage size Merlion.

We went to watch the National day rehearsal near the Fullerton hotel, it was the first time I see the spectacular sight of Marina Bay Sand. My friend told me that some people refer the architecture and design to Noah's Ark (which is stuck on the highest point on the mountain when the water receded), which sounds funny to me. Anyway, there is no denial that it looks magistic especially with the background of full blown fireworks.

We cant resist the temptation to go back to MSB the next day, just to check out the Garden by the Bay and its luxurious shopping mall. Garden by the Bay was exceptionally beautiful, even at night. The funny structure which looks like the living fauna with tentacles came out from the movie Avatar glowing beautifully in the dark. Its looks magical and almost felt like some alien fantasy. 

MSB Shopping mall is big and classy, but again shopping mall is just shopping mall. We had a piece of cheesecake at "Beanstro" (the bistro version of the Coffee Bean) beside the Rain Oculus. Its interesting to have a cup of coffee while listening to the torrent of 'rain' swirling down from the roof top.

Lets talk about food, we had MOS burgers at Bugis- Teriyaki and PREMIUM Wagyu burger, very unconventional choice of raw meat, which priced slightly more expensive from the usual fast food, but the patty tasted really tender and the amount of sauce is just right. No overflowing mayonese like McD.  

We also went to the Cafe Cartel for some serious pork ribs. However I must say the amount of walking we need to do to get there was crazy, from one shopping mall to another, up and down escalator, in and out of underground etc. In fact both Peter and I had leg cramps that night after walking like thousands of miles in the day. Thinking back, it was so funny that both of us took turns to moan in pain during the sleep because of the cramps. BUT luckily the food didn't disappoint us. It was juicy and smoky, generous in portion with lots of sides. Definitely one of the highlights of the trip.

We also tried the local Cho Bak Mee, some vinegar, soy sauce based dry mee topped with porky goodness like the mince, liver and balls.

After an so-so experience at local dim sum restaurant the day before, we went to a high class restaurant for some serious dim sum upon friend's recommendation. My oh my, they were seriously GOOD. Every pieces came with distinct taste and texture, the plating itself was a work of art.  

The food tasted better with great companions!

Lastly, local hawker experience at Newton with a family friends of ours. We had grilled sting ray, satay, fried squid, rojak, chicken wing, all the local favourite, yum yum.

That's all, till my next trip then. 

The ad hoc Singapore Trip part I

It was an ad hoc trip,which means I made no pre-planning and basically we just packed our bag and went. But it was a great trip nevertheless, mostly thanks to my wonderful friend who had volunteered to be our tour guide. I was amazed at how accustom she is to Singapore now. She literally knows every corner of the city like her own backyard.

We reached Singapore fairly early and after checked into a modest hotel, we headed for our breakfast. This is a local dim sum shop which serves ok but nothing much to shout about dim sum. They have this mini charsiew bun which is deep fried into golden slightly brownish color. At least its something new compare to Malaysian dim sum. 

  

Varieties of dim sum, some sort of sweet sauce for dipping, my friend and I

Koi, Singapore bubble tea

Like Malaysia, it's common to find bubble tea shops along every street in Singapore. We tried something totally new, named Koi, which was fine but seriously who can remember the taste of different brand of bubble tea. BUT, i have to say my current favourite is Gong Cha. I totally heart their classic which has a salty milk layer separated from the tea layer. The slightly salty milk layer has such a distinguished taste which makes you cant help but crave for more!

We went to China Town and did some window shopping, I know it sounded touristy, but it was really nice to walk around actually like a tourist. Not too sure how different Singapore China town is compare to Malaysian's Petaling Street. I haven't went there for eons years. But I guess the goods in Singapore China Town are more mainland-Chinese inclined rather than local oriented. 

We went to this cute Tin Tin themed shop which sells all sort of Tin Tin merchandise. The life size doll of the characters were so cute!

Next we stopped for a bowl of hearty Bak Kut Teh from the famous Songfa Bak Teh restaurant. It was equally good with Malaysian version and the only difference is that the Singapore version's soup is more clear and more peppery.

Yummylicious pork ribs with salted steam peanuts. 

Next stop was Clarke Quay. High end shopping and eatery street. Nice view and good for slow walk.

We saw this funny structure at Clarke Quay. I think I am really dont have that many artistry cells in my brain,  it looks like a giant male reproductive organ with a shower head end to me.

And then we passed by the famous Fullerton hotel, and saw some rocky kids jumping off the walkways. On top of that, we also saw a pigeon with a GIANT ASSHOLE. Are the Singaporean artists too 'sophisticated' or is it just me?

Anyway, do stay tuned for my part II of Singapore Trip

No Longer Macao Trip Part 4

Ok this is the last post of my Macao trip, which takes forever to publish!

Say hi to Hong Kong!! 

We spent a good two days roaming around Kowloon and Chin Tsa Chui area in Hong Kong, travelling back and forth by ferry from Macau (takes around 45 minutes per trip). 

The Victoria Harbour was very beautiful. We have a good walk at Avenue of Stars along the pier, where you can find all the famous celebrity hand prints and statues, like the late Bruce Lee. His statue were 2.5m high and made of copper! The Avenue of Stars was modelled on Hollywood Walk of Fame, which honours the celebrities of Hong Kong Film industry. Well, Hong Kong is THE place where the globalization of Chinese entertainment industry started, especially the Cantonese kungfu movies. The actors and actress definitely deserve all the credit. 

Oh, we saw the famous Hong Kong's United Buddy Bears at the pier too! 

Meet Loah, Peter's gaming buddy. He is super nice and super friendly. Funny thing was he just came back from Australia after studies, so he is pretty much foreign to Hong Kong's tourist sites, and we end up  exploring the tourist spots together. He brought us to Mongkok where all the tourist shopping streets located, and the streets are EXTREMELY busy and packed.

They were alot of street food, but we didn't try much as we were saving our stomach for the dim sum. 

Here comes our LONG AWAITED HONG KONG DIM SUM BUFFET at xiao fei yang. I have totally forgotten how much per person cost, basically its made per order but you can order as much as you can eat! The taste of the dim sum is slightly different than the Malaysian's version. We always have varieties of pork or prawn filling in Malaysian's version of dim sum, hence it tasted pretty much the same after a few plates. However the original ones in Hong Kong comes in so much of varieties, they have dim sum with fillings such as vege and nuts only, beef intestines, and even "yao zha guai" wrapped in the dim sum skin.  

YUM YUM!

According to Loah, dim sum is usually for older generation, whereby they have all the time in world to just relax and eat. Whilst for youngsters and walking class, usually they will just go into a Chinese restaurant, da bao something like sandwich, then start to eat while walking off. That's sort of confirm our perception towards the Hongkies whereby the working class literally have no life. ;(

 

During our second trip to Hong Kong, we have tried the local Cha Chaan Teng (morning tea restaurant) named Australian Dairy Co.. I'm really not sure what does Australian has to do with the restaurant cuz its very Chinese to me. It was an eye opener experience because the restaurant was super hectic and busy. The crowds were crazy but the food was super good. People were basically lining up beside your table waiting for you to go off, and I keep seeing people stand up from their seat and another came sit down, or came in and out of the restaurant. We ordered the usual set of the breakfast which includes fresh/ cold milk, macaroni with ham, toast bread with sunny side up or scramble egg. And gosh the scramble egg was SUPER good. I have never known in my whole life that scramble egg can taste like that. 

Most of the places sell the Kowloon Dairy's cold pasteurised milk in glass bottles, and it was very refreshing. I have tried the chocolate version and it was equally good. 

We have also tried the local "Kim Gary" or "Causeway Bay" type of Cha Chaan Teng which looks a bit more high class. We tried their famous crispy bun served with sweet condensed milk (don't know why its called nai you "ZHU" in Chinese, it has nothing to do with pig!), polo bun and their Portuguese pork curry. It was pretty satisfying as well.

Well, that sums up our 4 days Macao (extended to Hong Kong) Trip, overall it was good but seriously, no countries can beat Taiwan k, which remained to be our favourite country to travel to. We have yet to have the chance to explore Hong Kong to the fullest, but I have to say that shopping wise, they have the best to offer. I hope H&M will open up in Malaysia real soon. 

Till then, ciao.

Macau Trip Part 3

Food galore!

If you like dairy product, one of the not-to-be-missed Macau delicacies is milk pudding or steamed milk or in commonly known in chinese, 炖奶 'dan nai'. The famous delicacy can be found in small establishment along the famous shopping streets in Macau, as well as in some of the modest local cafe (茶餐廳). The milk pudding was steamed not just one layer, but double layer, and also come in different varieties such as milk pudding with egg yolk, ginger milk pudding, soy beam milk pudding, milk pudding with red bean paste etc. The texture was smooth and creamy, whereby the jelly tofu like structure just slipped down your throat in seconds. We also tried the Coconut Milk with Tapioca (西米露), which came in big metal cup and was equally tasty. The meal wouldn't be complete without the famous pork chop bun. yum yum...

One of the nights, we had our dinner at Wong Chi Kei restaurant 黃枝記粥麵 which located at Senado Square, across McDonald’s. We had char xiu rice, xhar xiu noodles, pork chop rice and curry pork rice. Their noodles are very springy, love the clear taste of the soup, but the curry was nothing to shout about. In general the curry cuisine in Macau are very mild, and the chilli oil are not spicy at all. I think Malaysian are pretty much used to fiery sambal (shrimp chilli) paste, which is not so common in China / Hong Kong. However the chilli oil reminds me of my days in UK, whereby the only spicy ingredients we can find in the entire Liverpool (in fact China town) is Lao Gan Ma Chilli Oil.

We used to eat all sort of food (rice, noodles etc.) with Lao Gan Ma Chilli Oil just to quench our thirst for spicy food. Am sure this will bring back some memories to my fellow friends who used to stay in UK as well. ;)

Another noodle shop which we had visited was Loja Sopa Da Fita Cheong Kei. Again, its a very modest establishment, small and cramp, but their famous noodle Har Zi Lo Meen 蝦籽撈麵 was very refreshing. Its a simple noodle dish whereby the springy noodle is tossed with prawn roe dust in kon lou (dry) style. We had also tried the unique deep fried Mace Balls, which basically fish paste coated with rice crackers deep fried until golden. Its very bouncy, you can taste the fish taste in every bite and the oil which was strapped in the balls was literally exploded in your mouth. 

Thats all for Macau food, next is our trip to Hong Kong and the dim sum galore!

Macau trip Part2

Before I start with the Macau Trip, just wanted to share a comic strip from www.akiraceo.com with Peter. Yesterday night he came back very early from yum char session (which is absolutely rare), with the look of utter defeated on his face. 

Checkout the full post click here. I think many had felt the same since the Diablo III craze virus went epidemic. 

Anyway, come back to Macau trip. Other than the St Paul ruin, we have visited many other tourist spots.

Macao Fisherman Wharf. The night scene was extremely beautiful, you can basically see the entire Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge run across the ocean from one side to the opposite. The serene view and the relaxing ambience reminds me alot of Penang. However, Taiwan Fisherman Wharf is 10X better.

There are many 'interesting' architecture and buildings located at Macau Fisherman Wharf. Aqua Romanis, a Roman-themed shopping centre (Good spot for slow walk and camwhoring); Roman Amphitheatre, an outdoor Colosseum equipped with 2,000 seats, designed for concerts and other performances; funny looking Vulcania, a 40m tall replica volcano which house some rollercoaster rides; and Aladdin's Fort, a middle-eastern fort which is home to some funfair rides.

This Venetian Macau at Taipa, one of the biggest and most famous casino. Am not repeating what I've written about Casino in my previous post. Basically its all the same except Venetian has this shopping street with fake sky (see upper right picture) inside the building itself. Well, probably you would have notice by now that Macau is full of funny looking counterfeit ancient Roman/ Egypt Empire architectures and buildings. They are interesting to see but I ain't gonna come back for second time. 

A non casino tourist site which worthy to be mentioned is the Macau light house. Its supposed to be local hiking/ jogging site, and there is a church and light house on top of the hill. You can get the 360 view of the Macau city from the top which makes it the perfect place to shoot wedding photos.

Well, lets talk about the interesting part, food at Macau!

















This is our first meal at Macau. which is quite a let down, it was a China-cuisine restaurant which serve very Chinese Zha jiang mian (noodle with mince meat in soy sauce) and chinese dumpling. each cost around 40 Hong Kong Dollar. Not recommended at all.

This is our breakfast inside Venetian Macau. We have it at Fatburger, a not so common fast food chain (at least in Malaysia), despite the fact that it was advertised that they only use good quality of beef patty, the food itself was nothing to shout about. The funniest thing is there is a Malaysian delight stalls in the food court which sells nasi lemak at whooping $70! Can you believe it?

We also had the famous Lord Stow's Portuguese egg tart. He supposed to be the first person who came up with the famous local delicacies. $8 per piece, expensive but the taste live up to its name! The best we had in Macau.

Then we visited the old Taipa village near to the Venetian Macau, where the real "Nandos" supposed to be (see the red rooster sign in the picture). We have a good cup of local Naicha (milk tea) and a unique egg tart made of coconut milk! And when we are back to Senado Square, we tried another egg tart at local famous  restaurant called Margaret cafe. I know that alot of egg tarts from 3 different shops in a single day, but gosh its addictive!

Stay tuned for more food at Macau in my next post.