Taiwan Trip - Part 7

Before I start writing, let me apologize from a long pause between the Taiwan series as I'm having a busy time to get used to the working life... I'll try to squeeze as much time possible to finish the whole trip (right now it's only half way done, FML).

Here's our last station before leaving Taipei and venture into other parts of Taiwan. Of all the places, the Taipei zoo. Why do I say in such a way? I'll explain it later~

The panda stadium right after the entrance. They sure build a frigging big building just to hold 2 panda and a huge panda souvenir shop. Too bad the panda was too far away from us, couldn't get a good picture (the picture captured there are after maximum zoom, blur right).

Some usual animals that you can find on any other zoo. One thing I dun like about Taipei zoo is that they put their anime kilometers away from the visitor, unless the animals are exceptionally large, else you'll need a binocular to see the animal at the size of.. a ring?

Let alone about interacting with the animals... I wana ride on zebra :(

Here's another place that are quite interesting, the penguin house. Due to the hot weather, we were hunting this place in the zoo map just to hide inside it.

Penguins are cute, of course :) They reminds me of Pn. Wong back in form 6.

The bear with the head alone as big as the your washing basin. Well they do look kinda adorable, when they are not treating u as their meal.

P/S: The hell they seriously need to upgrade their glasses to some anti-reflection glass, my camera couldn't take any good shop at animal behind the glass!

The kaola (which I have no idea why it pronounce as kua-la instead of kao-la). Just being lazy as they are, staying on the tree and let you have all the shooting fun.

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Next station, Taizhong~ To be continued!

Taiwan Trip - Part 6

Went to Shi Lin night market, one of the very famous night market in Taiwan. It is so huge that it eats your leg to just walk from the beginning to the end.

Here's something very rare compared to the night market here, where the night market there have stalls for all sorts of mini games, from shooting, archery, ring-hooking, cards, etc. Winner gets a price, loser gets to pay.

Even the night market is darn huge, the streets are still filled with all the people...

"The Nameless Shop" is the shop name, guess what's selling inside? (I've totally forget whats selling there though, hahaha...)

For a guy like myself, shopping isn't really my aim and I could play those mini games in arcade anytime, so the work of the night would be FOOD HUNTING! We've picked a few introduced shop from the traveler's guide, and the first stop is this Taiwan Ba Kut Teh alike shop.

I know they looks like Ba Kut Teh, but they taste different in their own way. The only conclusion can be made is that it is tasty! We've even drank the whole bowl of soup.

The original XXXL chicken chop from Shi Lin! Finally I get to taste it... Though it taste about the same here T_T

Well I guess all fried stuff taste about the same, and they use about the same spice too, oh well...

Another very famous stuff here, the Cheesy Potato. Well, as its name imply, it's just potato with cheese, any cheese fans must-have!

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To be continued in part 7...

Taiwan Trip - Part 5

The next day morning, the plan is to go to Jiu Fen. The boss decided to go by using train (instead of bus) to experience the trains in Taiwan. The train ride is awesome, it has wifi in it and time flies when I was browsing the internet in the train! We arrive at Ruifang Station, then change to bus to go Jiu Fen.

And finally here we are, Jiu Fen the shopping heaven for the local merchandise.

Seriously, you can find all sorts of stuffs here. Here's where I got most of the souvenirs for the friends and family. Some of the shops are identical, but most of them are unique in their own way so you can really spend all day walking in this street!

Grill GIGANTIC mushroom, taste like grill chicken... Well at least they are something better than the stinky taufu.

Doing some 'syok sendiri' with the streets :)

Not only that you can do lots of shopping and eating here, there's some pretty awesome view at the end of the streets, where you can see the hills and sea!

We was told that there are some yam balls that are really nice in Jiu Fen, so we bumped into this yam ball shop and ordered a bowl of yam ball. The shop is somewhat translated as 'The Grandma Yam Ball'.

After finishing the bowl, then we've been told that the one we've been eating is not the original one... Ahhh!

Then we went fo find out that the original one was actually 'The Aunty Yam Ball', and there are also more people sitting there to have the yam balls. Got tricked!

The next destination is the Gold Ecological Park, which located very close to Jiu Fen, just a bus ride about 10 minutes.

Heard it was the Japanese who built a gold mine here, so there's many Japanese building around. This one has been refurnished and destinate for attracting tourist.

Underground Bunker, in your house!

They redecorated the house to what it should look like back in the old time, when the Japanese are still living inside.

The legendary 'Gold Creature', legend says it can't be seen by normal people, only those with a pure and kind heart are able to see them...

I must say, the old Japanese are enjoying their life to the fullest... What's better than having a house at the high hills and enjoy the scenery every morning?

The giant machine that used to help digging gold from the solid ground.

Cheng cheng cheng~ Venture into the gold mine! Though the air ventilation is good, but there's still water dripping from the roof at time to time...

They placed all these random statues all over the place to show the tourist how the people working in the gold mine looks like, the weird thing is that most of them having the same face...

A bowl of Tau Fu Fa after the long walk through the tunnel. Served in chilled!

There's also a Gold Museum here too. Just like any other museum, history and posters *yawn*. Nothing special except the a gigantic gold block below:

Weight 220kg of 99.9% pure gold. Market value worth over 300 million Taiwan Dollar (about RM30m).

Well I guess they are not worried about people stealing the gold bar, after all it is too heavy to be lifted. Apply all the force you can, and it won't move an inch!

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To be continued on part 6...