Taiwan and the days after

Taiwan. What do you think of when you hear this word? Do you think of hot springs,delicious food or night markets. Maybe even other things..... Well let me tell you about my trip....

We arrived in Taipei at night then took a exhausting bus ride to our hostel. The bus company is called FreeGo and stops opposite our apartment. The stop is called 新世界. Our hostel is called Leopard Woods. If you want to book,click on this linkie http://www.leopard-woods.com

Compared to other hostels,it was quite dirty but the owner,Cindy was nice. Although if I had known the living conditions there,I CERTAINLY would not stay there for ONE WHOLE WEEK!! But never mind aye? What's done is done. Oh,I forgot. The nearest MRT stop is Ximen MRT or 捷運 as they would call it. According to our itinerary,we were supposed to walk around Ximending Night Market. However we were poor tired lambs that needed some rest. So we just grabbed some awesome chicken wings from this roadside shop near our hostel and a salty rice sausage and snoozed.

Day no. 2:We woke up über early and bought a NT$500 Easy Card from our Ximen stop. There was a deposit of NT$100 that we didn't collect in the end. I'll tell you why later. Then we got the Taipei transportation guide from the counter. Gee let me tell you that that was one monster of a map! Can you imagine unfurling the map at every station trying not to poke (or cut) someone's eye in the process. At the end of the day we found a much more compact and helpful map dumped by other people in our hostel We purchased/collected tickets for Rueifang (train station for Jiufen) and Hualien. My mom found it much cheaper to buy the tickets in advance as there is some random discount for the HSR. Dunno some 15 to 30 days earlier you get 20% discount?! I don't know. We took the 9 a.m. Train to 自强號 1061 to Rueifang Station 0900 - 0940 at the cost of NT80. We crossed the road to take the KL bus otherwise known as 國道. You should see the stops 「台北-中山高-瑞芳-九份-金瓜石」線. It takes around 20 to 30 minutes to get to Jiufen. But snag a seat ASAP when you get there as I had to stand the whole time on that shaking bus and I can tel, you honestly it wasn't fun at all. The bus's frequency is once every 15 or so minutes. And it is at a cheap price of NT15 too!! Alight when you get to Jiufen old street. Watch out for 7-11 and Starbucks when you get off. It is now midnight. I will continue this later. :)

Nicole