Taipei Day 3

20th May 2008

We signed up for one day tour... to The National Revolutionary Martyrs' Shrine , YehLiu GeoPark, Jiu Fen and Yang Ming Shan Hotspring.

The tour guide-cum-driver has the same surname as me. Mr Poh. He is very helpful and nice. Brought us to other places which was not included the itinerary. Supplied us with water when we were thirsty, gave us umbrella to shade us from the sun.

Side track: China has Wang Lee Hong (did i spell his name wrongly? Anyway I am not his fan...)to advertise their mineral water and Taiwan has my idol Lin Jun Jie to advertise theirs.

The best part of the tour was that Mr Poh did not even request for additional tips. However, due to his commendable service, we gave him some coffee tips though.The entire tour cost about SGD$50 (NTD$1000)and its inclusive of all the entrance fees as well as the Mr Poh tips. I feel that it's rather reasonable considering the distance he travelled. One thing i regretted was that I forgotten to take picture with him...

ANyway, that day, I Woke up super early for breakfast. Tour starts at 830am.

The breakfast meal remained dull...Didnt manage to lighten my pale face.

Our First stop was Grand Hotel. Mr Poh brought us in. I guess that he must be a big shot cos apparently tourists are not allowed to enter the hotel as the hotel management did not want their hotel guests to be disturbed.
Surprisingly, a night in this hotel cost less than SGD$300. I was thinking, maybe, I should stay there for at least a night in my next visit to Taipei. lol...Wanna have a feel of empress' life.

After we took this pic, we realised that we were wearing the same colour..Unintentionally though..

The hotel has thousand of dragon. Be it on the wall, ceiling or statue. The water-spitting dragon, shown in the photo below, is the only statue left standing after a bomb blast a decades back. That's why it is so significant to this hotel. Unlike other chinese dragons which have 5 fingers, this has 3 fingers. Hm... I have forgotten the reason for this... kekeke..

Very Red and Chi-na-ish..


The external view of Grand Hotel... Live up to its name..

next stop was The National Revolutionary Martyrs' Shrine.

Took pic with the guards and we were lucky enough to witness change of guard. They have guard changing ceremony every hour. GUess what, the important criteria to being their guard is that the guy.... must be at least 180cm...
I supposed most of the guards are idol of sec school girls... cos those Secondary school girls beside me kept repeating," wow, ta men hao shuai oh.." when the guards were marching towards the gate..

KOk Kok and a bunch of kids ... He looked like their PE teacher lah

After that, Mr Poh brought us to a famous bakery shop which won the best pineapple tart. We were more interested in their bread... hehehe...

Didnt bought anything from this shop... but I tried their Tai Yang Bing for the first time... Very nice!! Milky taste..

After filling our stomach with the free pineapple tarts, green bean cake and Tai Yang Bing, we headed to Yeh Liu Geopark. This was one of my must-go place after looking through SK's facebook pic. Recommended!!!!

To make ur entrance fee more worthwhile, pls go with a tour guide cos they will show you more interesting stuff than u naked eyes can show u..

Reasonable entrance fee SGD$2.50

Story behind this geopark...

Behind kok kok is a camel....Use your imagination...
Beautiful.. Got free suntanning here..

Mushroom looking stones...

Can you spot a whale???

Hint: Kok kok's right side..

Ginger looking stones

Black Pig being washed up the shore
What does this stone look like ?
A turtle

What about this?

Koi

This pic and the following one are abit obscene.. hehehehe

Woman's genital area...

and...just beside this is the....

man's genital area.....

Mr Poh said that the stone ,shown in the next pic, looks like nipple... but it looks more like candle to me... I am not so dirty minded lah...*wink*

This is an...

Ice-cream ..

But the front view looks like....
an alien with half of its brain exposed

I like this pic cos it captured 3 features. The Koi (behind me), the skeleton head (beside me) and the alien.

GUess what does these stones looked like?the back view of a happy family... Daddy on my left, mummy on kok kok's right and two babies infront of them

Our Love nest

Lovey dovey Us

A giant Turtle and a frog

This is one of my fav... ah meng

Back view is an elephant and hippo

Giant gorilla scolding her kid

Taiwan's map

This is a statue of an honourable guy who sacrifice his life to save a drowning gal.

A natural forming stone embedded in the ground

Dragon Head

Superman
Their famous Queen's head
see what u can see...Hint:my zodiac..
Mouse head with its tail encircling the pillar..

This once is quite obvious

panda head

Monitor lizard
After 1 hr of sunburnt, we went to Jiu Fen. This place became popular cos of a drama film few years back.

This place has alot of popular food... I didnt know I have a stall...BHB..lol Beef Noodle...Yummy but abit oily

Ah lian leh... dunno why i stand like this

Peanut ice-cream wrap

After that, we went to this restaurant. Looks like Gaudi's work.. this architect is a girl.. she made use of unwanted floating log to build this restaurant.. Surprisingly, the menu looks affordable... Mid to low end i would say..

The interior of the restaurant

Some one in our tour group treated us this snack..made of milk... sticky sticky one.. coated with peanut... very nice...

After that, we went to this stall selling Pi Xiu..Apparently, this fortune teller claimed that the chinese name of suntec city was given him and he appeared quite frequently in Taiwan's show.
He taught us how to place our furnitures, bed, sofa according to our zodiac...

Let me teach u how to see... Example I am a rat... so according to the pic below, my furniture must be placed in the sense that I should not face west...maybe I can place my bed in a way where my feet points to east instead so that i will have good luck and prosperous health...Believe it or not..

For chinese name, (do not include ur surname), count the number of stroke. If ur name adds up to 4,9 or 13 u will have fortune, power and luck..

If the total adds up to 2 digit e.g. 24 take 2+4=6..means u have nothing... lol

BUt if u have a zero (such as 10, 20, 30) and 16, then u will have trouble...
According to the fortune teller, Mei Yan Fang, Zhang Guo Rong and Deng Li Jun had either 0 or 16...Diao for them...

Please do not ask me for advice if u have either 0 or 16...I am merely a mild believer of feng shui... I believe that U can control your own fate...

After the feng sui lesson, We went to Yang Ming Shan for Hot spring bath...Wohoo.. Relaxing!

After that, we were supposed to end in Shilin Night Market, but since we had been there already, Mr Poh drove us to Ning Xia Ye shi.. he was so nice to drive us back to the hotel to put our bags before driving us to the night market...

Similarly, Kok and I Pig ourselves out again... lol

Our first dish... O AH JIan
Followed by Xiao Long Bao...
Wohoo... tang Bao... best!
Then we had this soup.. Very tasty ...NICE ! Highly Recommended

After that, we strolled back to Xi meng ding... for coconut milk Tea (my all time fav)

Nua-ing

And finally it's shopping time again!!!

This couple t so cute!


Tiring day... but worth it!