Day 4 in Taipei

Today is Sunday!! The day of the big trip out of Taipei City!! This time, we took one of the trains (the railway kind) to Kee Lung, which is where one of the ports of Taiwan is located.. right beside the Ocean also I think (I'm not too sure cos my chinese map says that's the East Sea) We didn't really see Kee Lung itself cos upon reaching we took the bus to Bi Sha Fish Port (I did the chinese to english translation cos my map speaks chinese) It's a small fishing port town famous for seafood and we saw lots of weird seafood at the fish market there.. crabs, lobsters, giant prawns, crayfishes, shark meat, huge whole fishes, sea urchins, fish roe, seaweed, squids, all sorts of clams and shellfish.. aside from the fish meat, most of the other sea creatures are sold alive so it's really really fresh.. we had a seafood dinner at one of the restaurants there.. Jane and I had to guess what the dishes were cos we weren't very sure what the chinese names of all those fishes were.. luckily what we ordered turned out quite decent.. hahaha..

After lunch, we took a boat to Kee Lung Island some 20 minutes away from the port.. after getting off at the island, we followed a guide as she brought us around.. unfortunately she was speaking Hokkien, so we only managed to figure out that the island used to be a naval port and was used by the Japanese when they occupied Taiwan.. today the island doesn't have its own source of water or electricity and I don't think it's really inhabited la.. lots of greenery, rocks, stones and other stuff you typically find on an undeveloped island =) you can see photos from Aibek's blog if you like.. he was climbing around taking photos..



When the tour ended, we waited (for quite a while) for the boat back to the port and then tried some SEAFOOD ICE CREAM.. yes the ice cream is made from seafood.. we tried 3 flavours: prawn, squid and seaweed.. the prawn one tasted like prawn paste that was cold and creamy.. Squid didn't taste very much like squid but it was gray cos they mixed in squid ink.. the seaweed tasted.. well seaweedy.. hahaha.. interesting huh?

After that we took a cab up to Jiu Fen, which used to be a gold mine town that has revived and is a popular and unique place to visit, since it rests on the mountainside.. we had to climb lots of stairs to get up but once there, the view is great.. you get to see Kee Lung Island and the port where we had come from.. in the distance, rolling misty mountains flanked by the sea completes the perfect scenary.. ahhh.. so nice.. =) the shops here sell nicer stuff too.. a lot of souvenirs made of wood and the food sold here is also different from that in the city.. the whole place has this old exotic feel as you walk along the sloping cobbly pavement with short squat shophouses lining both sides… I did most of my shopping here.. =) then we had dinner in a restaurant perched near the edge of the slope so we could enjoy the night view while eating..



But being more village than city, the shops starting closing at 8 plus or 9 plus and we had to rush to the bus stop in case we missed the last bus out.. the road down was very winding like Genting and quite dark and narrow at some places.. it's quite amazing how the driver could get us safely down.. we alighted at Rui Fang where we took the railway train back to Taipei again.. the train ride back was very funny cos we were sitting in the carriage with a local family and the kids were staring openly at the 3 of us.. probably because we were speaking English, because Aibek didn't look local and because we were taking photos of ourselves.. =)



What a day!! I thoroughly enjoyed everything =)