Taichung in two days + Taipei Trip 2018

Hi friends. How's the CB (the circuit breaker) break treating you guys? 

I've finished watching all the shows I'm interested in on Netflix, survived lone beer/wine nights in my room, got bored of my Nintendo switch game console. So now I'm here, in hopes of writing about some of my really overdued overseas trips I've done with my pals over the past few years. I used to really enjoy doing this because it allows me to look back at the things I've done, nice food I've had, who I've done it with and some of the things I would NOT do again hahahaha.

Lol okay enough with the grandmother entry and lets dig into the Taiwan Trip I did with zhiyan two years ago (I think)

Wine @ Changi Airport before departure.

Transport

The easiest way to travel from city to city in Taiwan is via their HSR - High Speed Rail trains. Booked our train tickets online prior to our trip. The train ride from Taoyuan Station (where taoyuan airport is at) to Taichung Station is only 40 mins!

Had our driver in Taichung pick us up at the train station. 

Did some research and found him via online sources and contacted him through Wechat/line app. You can email me for his contact if you're interested because I lost his name card HAHAHAHA as it was quite awhile back. He drove us around for 3500 TWD (165 SGD) a day (10 hours). 

His cute transformers car LOL

Day 1

Some of the touristy places which we visited in Taichung

1. Rainbow Village

A super instagram spot lo hahaha with its vibrant and colourful art painted streets and homes on a former's veteran's village

Two days is more than enough to explore Taichung because, yes, they have night markets, but the city life is slightly less energetic compared to Taipei which we were more used to (zy definitely prefers taipei hahahah) or maybe we just need to have more taiwanese friends.

Lol I remember when we visited, summer just started so can psychologically feel the heatwave crashing back into my memory. HAHAHAHA I always preferred travelling when the weather is slightly cooler.

lol i'm sweating whilst typing this out in my air-conditioned room

Happy us hiding in an air-conditioned art and craft shop within the village

 I survived donned in my airport attire - long sleeves hahahahahahaha

2. Chun Shui Tang 春水堂

Lunch @ Chun shui tang, the teahouse which claims to be the 1st to have started the taiwanese style pearl milk tea and its very first branch was from Taichung.

Ordered their taiwanese fried chicken,

honestly can't remember whats this because this was too long ago HAHAHAHA

honestly I don't recall their milk tea to be mind blowing, haha too many good brands around, but their smoothie was good for the weather we were in!

Is this their signature tofu w special sauce or smth hahaha

nom, i'm a water tank (for sweet drinks) i swear

3. Gaomei Wetlands

An ecological preservation zone located in Qingshui District in Taichung. Best timing to visit is late noon, where you can catch the sea breeze along with the sunset.

lol damn, look at the touristy crowd during sunset timings *so not used to crowds now*

4. Miyahara Ice Cream 宮原眼科

Bookstore style building run by a pastry business.

You can purchase all their high end cookies & pineapple cakes at their shop here but most people like us comes for their ice cream!

Forgot what flavors we had but the combo was good with all the biscuit, fruit toppings and waffle bowl :P

Accomodation

Hotel 7 逢甲

No. 45號, Fuxing North Road, Xitun District, Taichung City, Taiwan 407

Did some research and decided on this affordable boutique hotel for 2 nights as it was walkable distance to Feng Chia Night Market - a well known night market throughout taiwan which we visited both nights!

5. Feng Chia Night Market (逢甲夜市)

Taichung's most famous and largest night market! Most stalls opens from as early as 2 - 4pm till 1 am!

overeat as usual hahaha I lost many pictures already cause all were taken with my iphone long time back

MY FAV TAIWANESE STREET FOOD IS THE GLUTINOUS RICE WRAPPED OVER TAIWANESE SAUSAGE, "DA CHANG BAO XIAO CHANG"

hahaha though all taiwanese street food is similar throughout the country in my opinion.

Day 2

Rise and shine homies, woke up early and off to the convenient mart before our driver arrived hahaha

Did some research via nearby breakfast area on google maps and found one of the BEST taiwanese egg crepe (蛋餅) I've had ever, and I ever tried Taipei's famous one before~

逢甲炒餅條 Taiwan Pancake

No. 231號, Wenhua Road, Xitun District, Taichung City, Taiwan 407

Choose two types of egg crepe style and brought it along in our car ride while we headed to the first attraction of the day.

pictures don't do justice to the taste, it was super good haha look at the egg yolk oozing out.

Rainbow eye makeup for the girl who is going to a flower farm HAHAHAHA

lol can see i put red orange yellow till green and blue hehehe

6. Zhongshe Flower Market 

A renowned HUGE flower market with tons of popular photography spots in garden landscaped beds and in January to March famous for their tulip field's full bloom!

spot the sunflower amongst sunflower lol kidding I'm not thick skinned

hahahaha like so romantic us

wow who we searching for in this lavender field when we've got each other.

My IG caption for this was a pun. 

Jay臭 (chou - smelly in chinese) hahaha gettit?

7. I'M TALATO

No. 451號, Yingcai Road, West District, Taichung City, Taiwan 403

A gelato shop in Taichung with a Super IG worthy corner you'll see!

quite the pinky couple today w zy~

ice cream was good! ordered one set with brownie haha quite forgettable cos I really forgot how it tasted like LOL

this was what we were talking about hahahahahah ICE CREAM POOL

I SCREAM

I would just like to apologize for the spam

8. Qingjing Farm (清境農場)

Known as Cingjing Farm as well, located up in the mountains and its a 1 hour and 45 mins drive from Taichung, between Taichung and Hualien. 

Great for people who enjoy a breath of fresh air and green grasslands.

Its the best decision we made because as the location was up on a mountain, the weather was SO COOLING and chilly compared to the heat we were on ground hahaha

happy us with the weather and breeze~

caught the sheep meh meh dog herd show there

there's alot of mini attractions/museum on the way up to qingjing farm and we dropped by one which was Carton King all things build by cardboards and creative paper art what nots. Nothing much to mention about haha

9. 輕井澤鍋 Karuisawa Hot pot

No. 276號, Gongyi Road, West District, Taichung City, Taiwan 403

Dinner on the other hand was mind blowing, lol cause I asked my taiwanese friends to recommend me good hotpots in Taichung and there you have it. For now its very well known amongst the taiwanese only! We went to one of it's outlets in Taichung city and it was so popular we had to get a queue number and wait for seats!

I AM CRAVING FOR THIS NOW..

our seats were awkwardly partitioned with another couple seated opposite us on the same table hahahah full house F&B problems.

Some of the ala carte sets we ordered

beef/pork or wdv the meat was lol damn good with the steamboat broth.

Being avid spicy eaters like us, we had their Sichuan numbing and spicy hotpot for our soup base. 100/100!!!

Soooo good, I can recall hahahahah. I forgot how to describe food but for this post, what I say is good means its the memory of the goodness was left etched on my tastebuds LOL

S.O.P handmade shirmp & squid paste

dough fritters. 

Can I interrupt this picture by saying I AM SUPER IN LOVE with this Braised Duck Blood side they served here which is shaped like shape of a tofu, texture similar as well just flavoured. It really goes super well after getting cooked in the soups. I doubt much people will dare to try it though cos it sounds abit intimidating hahahahah so I had the whole plate of it to myself as it really goes super well with steamboat and I was so happy HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH THANKS ZHIYAN (cos she doesn't like it)

No picture, but i posted a video of it on my IG highlight of my trip hahahahah its rly super duper good. my fav. Tried ordering it again in another steamboat restaurant in china but it couldn't win this restaurant's one!!! omg this is the longest description I have on food for this post LOL

carb dish hahaha can't miss out lu rou fan hehe

those sour plummy drinks after the meal yum

tummy full = HAPPY GIRLS

Day 3

think we went to the night market again and had some red wines the night before which I bought from australia before this trip hehe so zhiyan forced me to go for a run at the hotel's treadmill LOL this was probably my early morning angry face while she did her mask hahahahahaha ded 

thought of visiting a super popular cafe in taichung but it was full and the waitlist time was so long plus we needed to rush for our train back to Taipei on day 3 already so we just randomly had breakfast at some taiwanese shop near the cafe we initally wanted to try.

milk tea was not bad hahahah any rdm milk tea in taiwan won't go wrong I suppose!

I love my teas/coffees in the morning :D

hahaha their fried beehoon was good too I remember hahahaha 

fries and burger PASS!! good for a random stumbled upon food joint

bye hotel seven lol stupid I confirm trying to be 007 james bond LOL

more food cause I can at Taichung Train station before departure hehehe had some pork omelette rice curry YUM

we confirm eat until we were late hahahaha so no place to put our huge ass luggages, what is this LOL

do we have enough leg room even??? HAHAHAHA

slappable faces vs act pretty faces lol

bye taichung!!! it was great visiting new cities but now its back to our busy city life hahahahaa

LOL stayed in Ximending (as usual) in Taipei in the same exact boutique hotel we stayed in more than 5 years ago located hidden in one of XMD's lanes

blogged about that trip many years back so the address is in the link below

Your Travel Guide To Taiwan (2013); Taipei Part I

beds so small cos we gna b night owls in taipei

no time to wasteeeee lol everyday walk out is shopping and eating immediately hahahahaha

50 lan bbt!!

Night time was SOP to Shilin night market

okok i found the super nice dan-dan peanut cold noodles I LOVE there heheheh fav taiwanese street stall food too

I think we went to KTVs like every night here hahahaha the room package comes with some finger food buffet and drinks

the wine sucks but it was cheap HAHAHAHAHAHA

i'm quite intrigued by drink machines which can produce so much hot drinks HAHAHAHAHAHA

Day 4

Breakfast at

Jin Feng Braised Pork Rice 金峰魯肉飯 – Popular Lu Rou Fan Eatery

No. 10, Section 1, Roosevelt Road, Zhongzheng District, Taipei City, 100 (Near Chang Kai-Chek Memorial Station)

MY TOP RECOMMENDED EATERY for braised pork rice and affordable dishes in taipei. 

All the dishes there was AMAZING I love this kinda fatty braised pork meat.

Zy loves it too surprisingly cause its really good even though I don't think its her genre of food.

the best lu rou fan I ate in my life (so far)

soups and all dishes was so yummyyyy all hits, no miss

I never expected braised pork bits to go so well with rice noodles but we had the one here and it was so good i'm sold haha i'm a noodle over rice person anyway.

I'll definitely come back here the next time I'm in Taipei!!!!

Toasteria Café - Yong Kang (吐司利亞 永康店)

No. 200號, Section 2, Xinyi Road, Da’an District, Taipei City, Taiwan 106

per ZY's request we had to eat nice brunch and western foods hehehe or maybe we just wanted to come here for some drinks and pastries but as usual we over-ordered hahahah cause we just had Lu Rou Fan.

I remember it was raining so we couldn't head to the market we wanted to thats why!

I forgot what crumble cheesecake was this called but it was good haha the menu selection was wide here and their food was on point

Ok I remember this panini egg sandwhich to be EGGcellent look at how they made it. The yolk still oozes out.

rose latte for me cos I love my coffees

some flowery tea for zy~

Rain stopped! shopping time

Met some friends later that evening at Taipei 101 - formerly known as Taipei World Financial Centre - the super tall skyscraper which has fireworks surrounding it during new years - for some private teppanyaki dinner w personal rooms and chef.

hi freya and flens hahaha

Hung Hwa Teppanyaki Steak House @ Taipei 101

(food was good but its like just teppanyaki so i think this is a miss unless you feel that you have more cash to spare while you're in Taipei)

I think we each ordered different courses, one special surf & turf and another chef recommended dinner set

this should be lobster bisque hahahaha

abalone w special sauce lol drooling

the courses was endless but I got lazy to take much photographs cause I only brought my phone out mostly in taipei

went to another room for after meal desserts & tea lol cos we were so stuffed by then

ended the night w another k session LOL

Day 5

More shopping at taipei main station and some underground malls

this bbt was dope but I can't read the chinese words hahaha

Visited ChiaTe to buy all the famous taiwanese pastries like pineapple cakes etc back for our family! :P

Another worth mentioning hotpot in Taipei heheh also highly recommended by my Taiwanese friends cause I doubt we can eat hotpot every meal we are there. So we go for the best!

Wu Lao Guo 無老鍋 – Elixir Health Pot

highly recommend their creamy tofu hotpot which was super rich and flavorful

The best tofu ever in a shape of a shit or icecream hahaha you decide. Its super good once it hardens after its cooked in the steamboat, one of the must order sides here! THEY HAD MY PIG BLOOD TOO hahahahah I guess its a taiwanese steamboat thing yum

100/100!!!!!!!!!

lol going for retro look issit

taiwanese SNOW ICEEEEE omg i die

settled our dinner at one famous oyster omelette and carrot cake shop in Ximending

Tian Tian Li (天天利美食坊)

No. 4, Hanzhong St., Wan-Hua District (Ximending), Taipei City

super duper good okay despite packing it back to our hotel to eat

no party photos but this was the best I could dress up cause I didn't bring much shit haha and I don't bother wearing heels and dress, makeup is good enough hahahaha

Day 6

Last day and also airport day of our trip :(

Wokeup hungover as expected. Went to try the famous Yong Kang beef noodles which I heard many bad things about but its still so famous but its an instant regret. No need paste the address here I guess LOL

my DSLR did their food good haha looks good but its really ....... questionable didn't make us feel better eating their beef soup noodles (i thought soupy foods were supposed to cure hangovers?!)

NOT NICE. end of story.

preferred the bbt we had at the airport with MOS burger hahaha

OK finally I'm done with this post hahahahah super tired. OH I bought this taiwanese brand oyster meesua from taipei and its SO GOOD prepared it at home in sg!!! Look at that haha next time can refer to this and purchase again hehe.

End of post. See you guys, stay safe!