TW Trip Part 1

I just returned home last Friday from my TW trip. So, now I am back to the reality of my every day life but with parents still out traveling. Boo. Hehe.

My trip was a very educational and good one. During the first week, my parents and I went on a TW island tour with a tour group (approx. a total of 200+ people from the Bay Area!!!) I got to visit many pretty landmarks all over Taiwan, ate some very good food and learned some history. During the second week, I got to see some relatives who live in the Taipei area. I took some pictures but did not bring my camera back with me because my parents are still traveling. My pictures will be added to this post few weeks from now. So stay tuned. ;)

My island tour was like going to a boot camp. It was harder than work. We were constantly traveling from place to place. Can you imagine 6'o clock morning call each day? Okay most of the days. Being a wimp as I usually am, I was super tired. I think from now on I will need to train before I go on ANY tour. Haha. Want to know more about my island tour? Let me tell you in a similar format as Shot From the Hip's 10/11/05 post "Back Home" http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/geohsia

Some memorable places which I visited (this is not an all inclusive list-- almost though):

DAY 1
1. Jioufen- historical gold mining town with glorious past. This town has some unsophisticated old streets surrounded by beautiful mountainous and coastal scenery. I tasted some of its traditional country small eats. Yum! This town was revitalized by a movie "City of Sadness" by director Hou, so now lots of tourists come to visit. Good thing we visited during a rainy weekday. Fewer crowds.

2. Yeliou- the famous coastal park with an amazing array of natural rock formations in various artistic shapes such as the Queen Nefertiti, the fairy's slipper, and other interesting forms created by erosion and other natural forces. For the life of me, I could not locate the famous Queen's head. Good thing we found it just before leaving or else I would be highly disappointed. The scenery was truly amazing and I sure did marvel at God's handiwork. This is one of my favorite places visited during the tour.

3. Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall- saw CKS' memorabilia and the elaborate hourly soldiers' handing over ceremony in front of CKS' statue. Being as silly as I usually am, I actually ran after the soldiers trying to take pictures. Can you believe after I caught up with them, at the most crucial moment, my camera battery died? So sad.

4. Grand Hotel- stayed over night here (actually 2 times) at this famous world known hotel. Wow, who would have thought I would stay there?! Probably never again though. Too much $$$.

DAY 2
5. Martyrs' Shrine- saw another elaborate hourly soldiers' handing-over ceremony. This time my camera had battery but one of the solider guards told us to stay some distance behind in order to be respectful. I wasn't having very good luck in taking up-close pictures during these handling-over ceremonies. Sigh. In any case, the shrine was beautiful in the rain.

6. National Palace Museum- this museum holds the world largest collection of ancient Chinese arts and antiquities of 650,000 items. You can imagine my enthusiasm in visiting. Upon arrival, I discovered it was under renovation. I was sad. Some sections of the museum were closed off consequently so MANY people everywhere. I had to fight people off my path. Unknowingly I took an illegal picture of the famous jade cabbage and then found out I wasn't suppose to take pictures in the museum. Ooops.

DAY 3
7. Taipei 101- visited one of the tallest buildings in the world as of today. I did not go all the way up to the top because I visited during the daytime and was too cheap to pay US $10+ just to see the top view. If it was at night, I probably would. I heard the elevator was super fast. It can go up to the top within seconds. Boy, I would hate to be stuck in that elevator if electricity is out. Anyway, I spent most of my time at the lowest floor because it has a super big food court, with lots of good food, very reasonably priced, which I could not refuse eating a few things there.

8. National Music Concert Hall- this is one of the two halls located in the vicinity of CKS Memorial. Our tour guide told us that in order to attend any concert there, you have to purchase tickets at least 6 months in advance. We were lucky because we got special courtesy tickets for the national day celebration concert, so I got a rare chance to see the inside. To my disbelief, the sink water in the ladies room came out muddy. I was like what?! Go figure.

DAY 4
9. Su-Hua Coastline Highway- traveled on this gorgeous coastline highway to Hualien. This highway reminded me of Highway 1, one side cliff and one side beautiful ocean.

10. Taroko Gorge National Park- got to the entrance of park. Further in was closed off due to heavy rain and landslide damage days before our visit. In any case, I was glad that we could not go further because the last time I was there, we were with my grandpa. My grandpa passed away 4 years ago. I sure miss him! Anyway, I still got to see the famous towering marble cliffs surrounding the area.

11. Ami Culture Village- saw the very entertaining aborigine culture show. Their cross bamboo dance reminded me of the Philippino and Hawaiian ones.

Day 5
12. Hualien Marble Factory- saw some very interesting precious stones such as marble, jade, cat's eye... etc. (Sorry, I am not a jewelry person, so I couldn't remember much of the stone names.) TW sure has lots of rich natural resources!

13. Taitung Jhihben Hot Spring- enjoyed hot spring spa at our hotel. When I was living in TW, I lived in Beitou, where it is also known for its hot spring (different type of hot spring though). Our old Beitou apartment complex had hot spring facility. Having spa at Jhihben reminded me of my spa soaking days when I was little although the facility back at our complex wasn't this elaborate, outdoors and with sauna pools.

DAY 6
14. Kenting National Park- got to see where my parents went for their honeymoon!!! This place is truely beautiful. Its location is just around the equator. So nice hot weather with bluest sky and bluest ocean water you can find. Very picturesque like the beach calendar pictures I have at work. This place is my #2 favorite during the tour.

15. Fo-Guang-Shan Monastery- this is one of the 3 major Buddhist places in TW. It has a 25m high golden Buddha statue. (How much is that in ft?) Anyway, this place is BIG, other than the huge golden Buddha, it also has lots of other human size statues donated by faithful Buddhists. It saddened me in knowing that so many TW people do not know Christ.

Day 7
16. Kaohsiung Spring Autumn Pavilion- this pavilion has gigantic statues of dragon and tiger over looking a lake. The weather was getting too hot. I took a picture then hid under the tree shade.

17. Alishan Mountain- this place is magnificent. I wished we had more time there. The bus trip getting in and out of the destination was torturous. The mountain road was full of twists and turns. Few of the fellow passengers got carsick and I almost did too. This is another one of my favorite places visited during the tour.

Day 8
18. Sun Moon Lake- this lake is famous for its strikingly clear blue water against the picturesque mountain. This is my #1 favorite place during the tour. The scenery was just SO beautiful and peaceful. Too bad I did not go anywhere close to the lake. I could only admire it from afar.

19. Chung Tai Chan Monastery- again this is one of the 3 major Buddhist places in TW. Unlike the monastery I visited days ago, this monastery looked nothing Buddhist. This monastery architecture has unique features from Catholic, Muslim, and Hindu churches/ temples. Thus this architecture is SO weird but BIG. Bigger than the other monastery I visited. So much $$$ spent. Marble materials from Italy!!! It struck me that TW has such a culture for Buddhism. No wonder TW people are mostly Buddhists. It saddened me again that people do not know Christ AND I wish TW's National Palace Museum is this GRAND!

Okay not to bore you too much, I will update my TW week #2 in a different post. Just FYI, after going to that many places, upon my return, I am completely a homebody. Yes partly due to jet lag but you know I just don't have the desire to go anywhere. I wonder why?! Maybe I am all travel out!!!