We started our trip with the most countryside-like place in our itinerary, meinong. With the help of our minsu owner, who provided us with cycling routes, we cycled around with their bicycles for most of our time there. However, the bicycles were a little too high for us and our feet couldn't touch the ground; we had to tiptoe >< And we got lost a little too often as well, so we couldn't visit every place that the owner recommended us to go. After an almost sleepless night in the plane, I think we exerted most energy in our first day there (and also got really sun burnt). Oh, the temperature there at that time was quite similar to singapore, but how the heat felt on the skin was different, probably due to the humidity difference. I actually love the place cos it was small and so uncity-like! I wouldn't mind staying there longer, since we were only there 2D1N.
Our next destination was tainan, where we spent 3D2N. It was my first airbnb experience, we chose a room with an attic and it was nice and comfortable! Anping district was walkable from our place, which is sort of a tourist area, with the old street, anping fort and the anping treehouse. There are a lot of dining options in anping. On our first night there, we had dinner at this famous place and their fried prawn rolls was amazing! I preferred our local oyster omelette to their version though, their oysters, egg and flour were like separated. So on the 2nd day, we went to a few of the tourist spots. I was really looking forward to the treehouse because through my research, they said it was not actually a house atop a tree, but the trees grew so large that it sort of consumed the abandoned warehouse! Really glad that I saw it with my eyes, it was a nice place. Then we also went to the famous Chikhan towers, and I thought it was not bad too. Another place I looked forward to was the Hai'an street, which was somewhat like an art district, with the painted exteriors of buildings. Not sure if we walked correctly, but there were fewer buildings than I thought haha. Then we also walked through Shennong old street, which was close by. The last destination of the day was the Tainan flower night market! Our first night market of the trip! I've never been to one before so I thought it was fairly big. There were so many food options that we couldn't decide on what to eat.Our first choice there, the 统大 chicken cutlet was soooo good! (Then I concluded at the end of the trip that actually, most chicken cutlets sold in taiwan are yummy haha) There were many stalls selling clothes, accessories, house products, and also game stalls.
Our third destination of the trip was pingtung, where we also stayed for 3D2N. The area itself is not a popular tourist spot, but from there, there are buses that take you to several tourist attractions like sandimen and maolin. We took a train from tainan station to pingtung station but before that, we had some time, so we explored the area around tainan station. There were many clothing shops so we went shopping haha (with our luggages ><) I love the fact that our 飞马饭店was just across the road from pingtung station. Since we reached there only in the afternoon, we chose to go to places near to our hotel. The hotel provided a map that showed all the tourist spots in pingtung, so it was quite useful. There were several museums, so we went to this art museum nearest to us. To me, it is more interesting than being in a history museum ><. Andddd the artist actually did quite a few paintings of meinong, so it felt familiar. After that we walked around the department store situated opposite the museum and spent a lot of time in the bookstore. In the end I bought 2 chinese books despite thinking that I'll take forever to finish those books. (Currently I have already finished the 九把刀book, what an achievement) We then sat in the park nearby until it was dinnertime and we made our way to the pingtung night market. Unlike the tainan one, where many many stalls were set up in a large empty area, the pingtung one was much smaller and consisted of streets of stalls, with indoor options. It was harder to navigate around because there were so many motorcycles moving through as well, so we settled dinner in an air-conditioned restaurant. There were a lot of small shops in the area, so we spent some time shopping around after dinner before making our way back.
The next day, we took a bus to maolin. The different attractions in maolin are quite a distance from each other and transport was not that convenient, so we decided to only visit the waterfall. It was a long walk to the mountain from the bus stop, and we still needed to hike up to reach the waterfall. We did a good thing by buying bread on the previous night because there were practically no shops in the area. I have to say, even though it was no grand waterfall, I loved the place!! It was so cooling, and there were soooo many butterflies. We figured it had many more butterflies than the yellow butterfly valley in meinong haha. And a bonus was there was a young family with us, and their 2 boys were so cute! We also sort of exchanged our food. I swear I could sit there forever (anything to get out of the heat). We ate the fruits we brought and relaxed there. Lucky for us, the crowd only came when we were about to leave! I don't think I would be able to enjoy the place as much if there was a crowd of people.
For the rest of the trip, we spent it in kenting and kaohsiung, but since there's so much to write about kenting, I shall leave it to another time! Anyway, I realised it is soooo important that you get a sim card with internet access throughout your trip! We used google map almost the entire time day. Without it, I think we would have spent so much time getting lost. Really thankful to my travelmate, cos she was the one navigating us most of the time with google map haha. And if you have a student card, you really need to bring it along because all your entrance tickets will become half-price, saves you a lot of money! Our trip was not without its drama though. I almost couldn't fly because I didn't renew my passport and they only let me because it was exactly 6 months. Fly any later and I really wouldn't be able to fly, so I was extremely fortunate in that sense. Then we got involved in a dog war in kenting and got chased by a dog, it was pretty scary; I think I developed a fear for that particular area. And at the end of our trip, what with all the delays and transfer, our luggages went missing in action and we only got it back the next day. Besides all the drama, it was an enjoyable trip, and I got to experience myself how nice taiwan people generally are (:
