Charlie and I had so much fun during his time here. He saw a lot, but we also had time to just hang out and relax. So it was perfect. The first weekend he was here in Taipei we went up in Taipei 101 (currently the world’s tallest building, everyone in Taipei is so proud). It wasn’t the clearest day ever, but we could see a good bit. One of the coolest things, though, is that you get to the top by the world’s fastest elevator. It’s pretty awesome! We also went to the National Palace Museum, which is the equivalent to the Louvre and the British museum for Chinese artifacts. It’s absolutely huge. We took the hour and a half English tour which was a good introduction to the museum, but there is still so much to see and I definitely plan to go back. We really enjoyed the garden they have outside the museum, full of little pavilions, ponds, bridges and various animals.
We spent New Year’s Eve day at the Taipei Zoo which was so much fun! The zoo is fabulous, probably one of the best, if not the best, I’ve been to (maybe even better than D.C.) It’s huge. I was especially excited to see the koalas and the two hump camels. (But, I was disappointed that the kangaroos weren’t out while we were in there area. ) It was an unusually cold day, so many of the animals (especially the apes) were huddling together. It was kind of cute and sad at the same time. One of the apes had even put a rag over himself in an attempt to keep warm while huddled in his cave! That night, for New Year’s, we met up with some of my friends for the fireworks at Taipei 101. They were amazing! They actually shoot them off from the building and it’s quite a show. Definitely far, far surpassed anything I’ve ever seen in D.C. for July 4th fireworks. We sat about a block away from the building, so that made it even cooler.
The next day we were off to the southern tip of Taiwan to a beach town called Kenting. We took the relatively new high speed train which gets you from Taipei, almost at the northern tip, to Kaohsiung in the south, in an hour and a half. It takes about 6 hours by regular train to make the same trip. After haggling with the taxi drivers, we finally got a good deal, and made our way to Kenting. We stayed in an area called Nanwan Beach just outside the town of Kenting. Our hotel was awesome ($45US per night for a very nice hotel just like back home). Oh yea, and did I mention the ocean view from the room? It was amazing! The staff was really helpful and we set up our scooter rental for the following two days. The weather was warm (70’s), so it was really pleasant to be on the scooter, even with the wind blowing. The whole area is a national park and forest recreation area. On our first full day we drove in a huge loop which was mostly right along the coast. Our first stop was Erluanbi which is about 15 minutes from Kenting. This is where you can walk out to the official southern tip of the island. After that we made our way north up the coast. The water is a gorgeous blue, and most of the coast has coral rock formations. We stopped several times for pictures. It’s really nice because especially at this time of year it’s not crowded down there and there’s hardly any traffic. There’s an area of the coast, Jialeshui, where some of the rock formations look like animals. We ended up taking this ride up a bit of the coast on a open air bus/cart thing. I don’t even know what you call it! The driver was announcing, in Chinese of course, what the formations were supposed to be as we passed them. We had no clue what was going on, and honestly I think that thinking that these formations looked like animals was a bit of a stretch in most cases. But nonetheless, it was fun, and the water and the rocks were beautiful, of course. After that we started driving inland and making the rest of the loop back to Kenting. That part of the drive was interesting and pretty, as well. It was mostly rice fields and mountain views. It’s cool to go through some of those tiny little “towns” out in the middle of nowhere. Later that evening we went up to a hot spring village called Sichongshi about 30 minutes away. It’s a town full of hotels dedicated to hot springs. We found a really nice one and about 20 minutes after we got there everyone left, so we had it pretty much to ourselves. There are various pools some cool, some warm and some really, really hot. We sat in the second hottest one (a bit hotter than a regular hot tub) for the whole time. Charlie hopped into the cool pool a couple of times, though, which apparently feels good after having been in the really hot one, but I couldn’t take the cold.
The next day we went to the Aquarium (officially the National Museum of Marine Biology and Aquarium). It’s huge and extremely modern and nice! It also sits right on the ocean, so it’s beautiful. We were there on a weekday, so it was very empty and we managed to get in between the huge school groups. In some parts we had the place completely to ourselves. There are three different main areas: Coral Kingdom, Waters of Taiwan, and Waters of the World. The coral area was the coolest. There’s a huge tunnel you can walk through with the fish swimming all over. There’s also a sunken ship where it was interesting to watch the different kinds of fish swimming together and interacting. The coolest (literally and figuratively) part of the world waters area was the penguin area. The viewing area was much better than any zoo I’ve been to and you could even hear them making sounds. The beluga whales were also really cool to watch. After the aquarium we did most of the drive along the coast that we had done the day before. At one point we stopped at a beach area and I was in the water up to my knees. The water was so warm! (We could have spent the day on the beach, but had decided that we wanted to do things and take in the scenery instead of sit on the beach.) Charlie did all the scooter driving, but I also had a short scooter lesson in an empty parking lot. I sort of got the hang of it, but it’s hard!
We had a couple of great meals in Kenting. We ate at a couple of very nice western style restaurants. I ate mostly curry dishes, and Charlie had beef and rice mostly. It’s a very popular destination in the summer, but much slower in the winter, so everywhere we ate we were almost the only ones in the restaurant! Overall, Kenting was amazing. It was Charlie’s most favorite part of his trip out here, and definitely mine, too.
Back in Taipei, I wanted to show him some stuff I’d been to before. We went to Longshan Temple which is right in the city, rode the Maokong Gondola (without incident this time!), and went to the Jade Market. We also went to Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall. I’d been on the outside several times, but the inside had been closed for renovation since I got here, so I hadn’t been up in it yet. So that was really neat. I think that memorial and the gardens around it is my most favorite site in Taipei. We also went up to Danshui, which is north of the city and along the ocean. We walked around mostly and took a ferry to Fisherman’s Wharf which was a beautiful place to sit by the water. It’s amazing to watch the sun set up there.
Charlie and I had a wonderful time. I am glad that he was able to see some of Taiwan and what my life is like over here! Now it’s time to gear up for my next visitor. Mom arrives in about two and a half weeks. I can’t wait to see her and for us to go to Honk Kong! It’s hard to believe it will have been six months and that I am just about halfway through my time here. Pictures from Charlie's visit are now up on my site in an album called "Charlie's visit." I condensed the 600 pictures he took into just over 100, so take a look!
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