The next day we all got up around 9:00 AM and went to KFC to redeem the free breakfast coupons that the hotel had provided us for staying with them. Unlike the U.S., KFC in Taiwan has many more options other than fried chicken. For example, I got Mexican sausage porridge and red tea for breakfast and, surprisingly, it actually wasn’t bad.
Our breakfast.
Afterwards we walked back to our hotel and packed up our belongings to check out by 11:00 AM. Luckily, the hotel agreed to watch our luggage for the day so we wouldn’t have to lug everything around the whole day. That day my friends decided to go snorkeling at a popular snorkeling area called Houbihu. Since I had already snorkeled before in Penghu and Thailand though, I decided to save some money and lie out on the beach instead. Fortunately the weather had improved significantly from the previous day and there was actually sunlight to enjoy! Very happily, I lay out in the sun and just relaxed. A few hours later, my friends finished up snorkeling and joined me at the beach. Unfortunately we were short on time and had to leave the beach pretty early to catch our High Speed Rail at 9:30 PM that night. We caught a taxi started our return trip to Taipei. Interestingly enough, I noticed that the highways around that area of Taiwan bore a striking resemblance to the freeways in the United States. At first I felt a little homesick, but then I realized that I only had a little over two weeks left in Taiwan before I had to leave and quickly snapped out of it. When we got back to Zuoyin, we ran to grab a quick dinner and then went back to the rail station to wait for our train. Just two hours later I found myself back in Taipei grabbing my luggage and heading back to the dorms. Overall Kenting was a great trip and a great experience that left me appreciating the eclectic spots that Taiwan has to explore.
We lived in Rich Hotel, it was not the best, but it was alright.
Over the Dragon Boat Festival weekend, my friends and I went on a two day excursion to Kenting. The Dragon Boat Festival features dragon boat races held in honor of the poet Qu Yuan who, according to legend, drowned himself in protest after being slandered by envious officials in 280 BC. As it was a long weekend, Kenting (which is already a popular vacationing spot in Taiwan), was even busier than usual. After calling literally almost fifty different hotels, and after being told that each hotel was “ke man,” or “at capacity” in Chinese, I luckily was able to find a fairly priced hotel room for me and my friends.
In order to catch the first High Speed Rail, or “gaotie,” (the fastest train in Taiwan), we had to get up at 5:30 AM to leave the dorms by 6:00 AM. We caught our train just in time and essentially slept for the entire train ride there. We arrived to a city called Zuoyin in a little less than two hours and, from there, took a taxi the rest of the way. Another two hours later and we finally reached Kenting. Unfortunately though, as soon as we got dropped off in front of our hotel, we were met with gloomy weather and unexpected rain. While we were definitely quite disappointed with the weather, we were nonetheless determined to enjoy the little time that we had there. We checked in, dropped our luggage off, and set out to explore the city.
Our first stop was lunch. After debating on which restaurant to go to, we finally decided on an interesting looking Thai restaurant about a block away from a hotel. The food was relatively pretty good, but a little overpriced in my opinion. Afterwards we explored more of the area around the hotel, did some shopping, and then headed back over to our hotel to change. Despite the weather (although it did stop raining!), we changed into our bathing suits and headed for the closest beach. I, along with another one of my friends, decided to lie out on the beach relax. The remaining crew set out to explore the rest of the beach and took a dip in the water. While the day itself was a little chilly, the beach was surprisingly crowded with kids playing left and right. After staying for about two hours, it started to rain again and we took it as a sign that we should probably leave.
We had fried noodle dish, coconut chicken, and papaya salad. They're all very yummy!
This is Xiaowan, it is a really small bay.
While walking back to our hotel, we made a detour and stopped at a nice little plaza area. We got some Starbucks and ice cream, hung out for a bit, and then headed back to our hotel. As soon as we got back to our hotel, we started watching some TV and ended up taking an unplanned nap for a couple of hours. Next thing I knew, I awoke to my friend telling that it was already 8:00 PM and that we should go out and walk around the night market. I woke up, got ready, and we all headed out.
Kenting Road was really crowded. The picture in the middle is a famous bun shop that's opened by a celebrity in Taiwan, the buns were really delicious. And we saw fireworks on our way back to the hotel, I think it was for the Dragon Boat Festival holiday.
While some of the busiest night markets in Taipei already leave me feeling pretty overwhelmed, nothing could have prepared me for how busy and crowded Kenting’s night market was that night. I think that it was the combination of Kenting already being a popular tourist destination, paired with the fact that it was Dragon Boat Festival, that resulted in a street jam packed full of strolling pedestrians all eager to take a look at what local vendors were selling, as well as a steady stream of cars desperately trying to make their way down the busy street. Whatever it was though, the night market was the busiest night market that I had ever seen.
A skewer of deep fried custard, a box of fried squid, a bag of fried crab, a flakey crepe with peanut butter and butter cream, fruity frozen yogurt, a few bags of souvenirs, and five hours later, I found myself tired, stuffed with food, and very satisfied with the night’s happenings. I headed back to the hotel, showered, and went straight to bed content with my trip so far.
I was engraving my friends' key chains. Look! They're all so cute!
Over the weekend one of my friends decided to venture out and eat at an apparently famous street called Yong Kang Jie (Yong Kang Street) in Taipei. After waiting about an hour to gather everyone who was going together, we finally set out. As there were eight of us, we split up into two taxis and had at least one fluent mandarin speaker put into each cab just in case the taxi driver didn’t know the way. The restaurant that we were going to was called Yong Kang Beef Noodle Soup (although oddly enough it was about a block away from Yong Kang Jie). As many good eats in Taipei,Yong Kang Beef Noodle Soup was also located in an alley. The signs outside were bright yellow so that it was really hard to miss finding the location. The signs outside also boast that the restaurant has been around since 1963, so theoretically the food inside should be pretty tasty. Upon arriving, we noticed that the restaurant was still really busy even though it was already 1:00 in the afternoon. We waited for about 10 minutes until we were given seats. My friend actually planned that we would hit up a few spots that afternoon, so we decided that we would order minimally there and just split everything so that we would still have an appetite for later. Collectively, we ordered two orders of soy sauce braised beef noodle soup, beef soup, steamed ribs, and an array of little appetizers. The food, I must say, was pretty delicious. The beef and beef tendon were both really tender and soft. The noodle soup itself had a good hearty flavor. Overall, based on the quality of the food and helpfulness of the staff, I can really see why the restaurant has been open since 1963!
Afterwards, we headed over to a little restaurant about a block away called Yong Kang Kou. We ordered the stinky tofu, oyster vermicelli with intestine, and handmade sticky rice stuffed in intestines. While the English names of these dishes might not sound very appetizing, actually eating them is an entire different story. Everything was so good and very authentic Taiwanese tasting. It was definitely a good find.
After finishing up our 2nd round of food, we walked across the street to a shaved ice plane called “Ice Monster.” The entire outdoor seating area was packed and the line curved around the corner of the street. My friend told me that it one of the most popular shaved ice places in Taipei
and apparently he was right! We waited in line for about 10 minutes and ended up ordering the mixed fruit shaved ice, mango shaved ice with pudding, and red bean shaved ice. Everything tasted absolutely delicious--the fruit was especially ripe and sweet. I definitely plan on going again sometime in the near future.
While we were all basically stuffed, we kept walking around the area exploring the different shops all around. We found an interesting fruit shop that sold exotic fruits and drinks like Japanese grapes, durian milk, and avocado milk. We bought a few things there and headed next door to a dried snack store where each of us ended up purchasing about 600 NT worth of dried snacks to either eat ourselves, or bring back home as presents. Still not done exploring, we ventured off and decided to stop at a frozen yogurt place that had very pretty décor inside. There was a minimum purchase charge if you sat inside though and since not everyone wanted to get some frozen yogurt we got it to-go and decided to eat at a little park that was close by. We found a place to sit, ate our frozen yogurt, and afterwards revisited childhood and started to play around in the playground. The parents of the children who were there probably thought we were all crazy.
By the time we finished it was already nearing 5:00 PM and people were getting tired. A majority of people decided to go back home, but two other friends and I decided to stay out and explore an area at the very last stop on the green line of the MRT (Taiwan’s subway system) called Bitan. About a block away from the exit of the subway, we found Bitan’s scenic area which boasted a river with foot peddling boats that I’ve only seen in the movies. There were dozens of people out in the river on boats with swan heads, penguins, and whales peddling away to their heart’s content. My friends and I decided to rent one of the boats and give it a try. It was only 130 NT per person to rent one of the boats. We peddled out and went to one end of the river and peddled back in about an hour. It was really a pleasant area with people just walking around visiting the various stores and stands that were adjacent to the river. There was also a big bridge that crossed the river which lit up when it got darker. After returning the boat, we walked around the little night market area by the river as well as the street of restaurants next to it. I ate some deep fried mushrooms, deep fried meats, grilled mochi ice cream, and drank some sugar cane juice. The general atmosphere of the area was very boisterous and lively.After walking around for about three hours, buying lots of food, and just absorbing the scenery, we finally decided to go home.
Our breakfast.
We lived in Rich Hotel, it was not the best, but it was alright.
A cool looking restaurant in Kenting.
