Taiwan Day 3: SML - Cing Jing

Its'time to move to our next stop.

We had the simple breakfast provided by hotel, check out and hop on bus to Cing Jing.

Using the bus ticket included in the SML package, we hop on the bus at Ita Thao (opposite police station). 20 minutes later, we arrive Shuishe.

From Shuishe, we hop on the bus to Puli (NTD 57) which took 35 minute.

This is the Puli Bus Station.

We wait for the bus to Cing Jing. NTD112 and the journey is 1 hour.

Arriving in Cing Jing, we get down at Cing Jing guest house and drag our heavy bag uphill to our pre-book hotel - Ailiga Cing Jing.

Arriving in Cing Jing, we are not allowed to check in yet. Thus, we drop our luggage and get the hotel to help us call for minivan transit (NTD50 each) to Cing Jing Farm.

I was quite disappointed that there is no shuttle service provided.

We had our lunch at the food court in front of Cing Jing entrance.

Looks like many variety of foods, but somehow feels that there is nothing to eat.

We ordered this - Gyoza.

Not nice for me. Lol.

Bamboo rice. The rice is not warm enough.

And roasted chicken which was so tough that it could break my teeth. Hahaha..

The lunch cost NTD260.

Cing Jing Farm entrance cost NTD180/pax.

It looks so nice in picture, don't it?

Perhaps we went to NZ, so this was so-so only.

We didn't walk the whole farm. Coz we are not sure on the route and too lazy.

Thus, we sit waiting for the horse performance.

And it's time to go back to hotel.

We had to walk to this 400+ steps of stairs down. @@

Finally reach the ground.

And walk back uphill to our hotel. Super tiring.

Finally can check in to our room. The room was disappointing for the price we paid.

The location so uphill, no free shuttle provided, the room doesn't look maintained well. Insects net door has fallen off, thus we are unable to open the door because insects will fly in.

There's hot water dispenser machine in the room but it's not functioning anymore.

Anyway, that's our Cing Jing trip. And we are going to head back to the city on the next day.

Taiwan Day 2: Fu Beng Restaurant, Sun Moon Lake

This is one of the restaurant we'd include in our itinerary, after read the good review from other's blog and tripadvisor. It serves local Taiwanese dishes.

It's located about 5 minute walk from our hotel and we reached with the aid of GPS.

This is the entrance of the restaurant, which is kind of weird as it looks like the back kitchen rather than front door.

The restaurant is quite small and crowded when we arrived about 7pm. The staff took some time to come and serve us. Menu is available in English.

We ordered the famous local vegetable. In Malaysia, we called this "Paku pakis". I guess in English, it is called as fern leaf? This taste good. But somehow I still prefer Malaysian cooking style, which usually cook with sambal belacan and taste slightly spicy.

We also tried steam chicken with spring onion. Taste OK and the portion was quite large for both of us.

Dried lily soup. Small. NTD50. A generous amount of meats and dried lily was given. However, the soup tasted too bland and we didn't finished it.

3 dishes as above with 2 bowl of rice comes up with total bill of NTD390, which was reasonable for us.

Taiwan Day 2: Sun Moon Lake (Ropeway/ Syuangang)

Location of our hotel was quite strategic. Right from the front door, walk straight will leads you to the SML Ropeway Station. But, it is an about 15 minutes walk though.

We stop by this Taiwanese sausage stall.

The seller was very friendly and informed us about the event that SML is having on that day, which we are not aware of.

NTD100 for 3. It's the best I'd tried. Very juicy and delicious.

On the day of our visit to SML was also the last day of the operation of the ropeway before it will be closed for one week maintenance. How lucky was that?

The ropeway ride which took about 10 minute will arrive at the entrance of Aboriginal Culture Village. We didn't visit it though. After spend few minutes, we took the ropeway back to Ita Thao.

We then head to the streets, hunting for foods.

Long queue for red tea. We bought a cup NTD40. Nothing special.

Another queue, This time it was fried chicken wing stuffed with rice.

NTD60.

Yums~ 

Guo Bao NTD50.

I wish they gave more meats.

Finally it's 3pm. We checked in to our room and take a short rest before heading out again.

We then took the ferry again and stop at Syuangang Pier to visit the temples there.

There's a stall selling "Ah Po" eggs at the pier.

Good to try.

We then hop back the ferry to head back to Ita Thao.

After our dinner, which I'll write in separate post, we then join the crowds for the event.

Marvelous drum performance. Although there is a lot of people, but luckily the weather was not hot.

The event was held once a year.

The event ended with fireworks.

And that's our SML visit :)

Taiwan Day 2: TaoYuan to Sun Moon Lake

As usual, I'll try to plan our trip to be "back pack"where we can go places on our own without hiring tour guide. Initially hubby doesn't really agree with my idea, but somehow he give in and let me plan the trip. Yeah~ :)

How to go Sun Moon Lake from Taoyuan/ Taipei.

We took taxi from our hotel in Zhong Li to Taoyuan HSR, cost NTD250.

The HSR tickets were booked earlier through online, as there will be up to 30% discount for early birds, where tickets can start to be reserved 28 days from your travel date.

On your travel date, collect the ticket from the counter.

Good Morning Taoyuan~

We bought MOS breakfast set for 2. Greenbag was given :)

NTD236 spent.

Hash brown. Nice.

Seafood rice burger. Yelks~

Beef burger. Not to my liking, as it was too dry.

Inside HSR.

Arriving at Taichung HSR, look for the bus station at 1st Floor, 5th Exit.

Purchase ticket to Sun Moon Lake. There are also package available which is more worthy.

Check out the package and schedule at nantoubus website.

Inside the bus. The journey took 1.5 hours.

The bus will stop at Shuishe Pier. Then we took the 1 day unlimited ferry ride to Ita Thao, where our hotel is located.

The ferry will make its first stop at Syuangang Pier before stopping at Ita Thao. After Ita Thao, the ferry will the go back to Shuishe.

Because we arrive early, we are not allowed to check in to our room. Check in was strictly only after 3pm. So we drop our luggage at the lobby and start our Sun Moon Lake visit.

8D 7N Taiwan

Our honeymoon trip this year is Taiwan.

Since we both had been to Taiwan before, this time we tried to cover places we never went previously.

How we spent our 8 days (to be precise, it is 7 days actually)?

Day 1: KL to Taiwan

Arriving Taoyuan airport at almost midnight, we hailed a cab to our pre-book hotel in Zhong Li. Cab cost NTD560 for an approximately 20 minutes ride. Since we are just going to spend a night here to get some nap, I'd booked a simple hotel called Central Hotel which cost RM180 per night.

 Comfortable bed.

Room was small but it was clean.

Day 2: Tao Yuan to Sun Moon Lake

Day 3: Sun Moon Lake to Cing Jing

Day 4: Cing Jing to Tai Chung (Feng Jia night market)

Day 5: Tai Chung to Taipei - Maokong/ Raohe/ We Fen Pu/ Xi Men Ding

 Maokong

 Raohe St Night Market

Wu Fen Pu

Day 6: Jiu Fen/ Shi Fen

 Jiu Fen

Shi Fen

Day 7: Beitou/ Dan Shui/ Shilin

 Beitou

Dan Shui

Shilin

Day 8: 101 Taipei/ Shopping at underground mall

And there is how our 2016 long vacation goes. As we had agreed to have a more relaxing trip, we took things slowly. We didn't cover a lot of areas but enough for a memorable vacation. And we also took some time to visit 2 out of the Top 10 must try breakfast in Taipei.

 Lo-Co food.

Fong Sheng Hao.

Stay tuned for more information on the trip :)