I know it’s been a while, sorry.

The last day in Taiwan was spent going to a Thai Massage. (No it wasn’t a “Rub N’ Tug”). For a 2 hour massage, it only cost $1200 NT, which works out to about $40 a person. Now this wasn’t an ordinary massage. First of all the room had two beds. After we got dressed into some Thai garments, they washed our feet. After that they began “working” us over. A Thai massage is the type where they bend you in every possible position you can think of, all the while jamming their knees into muscles. A few parts were a little painful, but overall it was awesome and definately recommended. You feel so rejuvinated after it’s all done.

That night we just went out to supper to the Shabu Shabu restaurant. Sunday we woke up early and headed to the airport. We had to stand in line for a good 20 minutes to check in. After that we said our goodbyes and I went through a couple of security checkpoints with no problems. I had to wait around for another hour or so, then took a 2 hour flight to Osaka Japan. A few hours after that it was only a 8 hour plane ride to San Francisco. But this ride was sooo much better then the flight to Taiwan. For one it was much shorter, and secondly, we had TV’s at the back of the seat in front of us. The only bad thing was that they were showing the same movies going back as they did going there.

I got to watch the sunset from the plane and the sunrise. Seeing the sunset and sunrise above the clouds was a pretty amazing site to say the least.

Well now that I’ve been overseas, I don’t think I’ll ever really travel to the south for a vacation. Going to a country where you don’t speak the language and everything looks different is something everybody needs to experience. Yes you will pay more then if you went to Cancun for 2 weeks, but you can see hotels and beaches anywhere.

We got back to the dorm in the afternoon on Thursday. Amanda did a few loads of laundry as we unpacked from the road trip. Before we went out for supper, I wrote on my postcards I had bought. Word on the street is people have received them - 11 days after I sent them…not bad. For supper we headed back out to the Tapinyaki (edit Teppanyaki) restaurant. Later that evening we headed to the Taoyaun night market. There we had some really good fresh fruit smoothies. We also bought some gifts for back home. What isn’t good about this night market is they allow scooters through the street. Now remember the street is only about the size of 1 car, so with lots of people there, there’s not much room to maneuver. Needless to say, Amanda got ran over by a scooter. The Chinese lady just looked down and took off, not even stopping to check to see if she was alright. The worst part was she ruined her $3 pair of sandles! Of course that gave her an excuse to buy a new pair at the market!

Friday we decided we would head back into Taipei and visit the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and then visit the big night market. We rode the train into Taipei and made our way through the MRT and easily found the CKS Memorial. The main Chiang Kai-shek statue kind of looks like the Abraham Lincoln statue in the U.S. The Memorial is really big and includes plenty of flowers and small ponds where you can feed the koi fish. The guards came down closer to sunset and took down the flag as they played the Taiwan National Anthem (I think..at least is sounded like it).

We made our way to the Taipei 101 as we were wanting to go to a Chili’s that was near by there. After walking around the building, we finally found the restaurant. This is where Amanda pigged out! Guess she realized that this would most likely be her last “American” meal in a while, so she ordered nachos, onion rings, and a burger! I just ordered the ribs! Lets just say ate me under the table that night!

Oh and while in the bathroom, this sign is in front of the urinal. What the hell? Do Chinese people pee 3 feet away, that they need to be told to stand closer? Nobody else was in there with me so I quickly snapped the photo. Would’ve been a little embarrassing if somebody walked in while I was taking the picture!

From there we headed to the night market where we shopped a bit more and then headed back to Taoyoun. The next day would be my last in Taiwan!

We had to sit around the Taitung train station for about 2 hours while we waited for out train to arrive. We read some paper and drank some coffee. They at least sell a couple of English newspapers. It doesn’t tell much about the rest of the world news, but at least you get a brief overview of what’s happening in Taiwan.

The train ride took about 2 1/2 hours up the east coast. It was pretty neat as you would have a mountain on your left and then the pacific ocean on your right. When we arrived in Hualien we grabbed a cab. The cabby spoke really good english and we indicated that we wanted a cheap hotel…but not too cheap. He took us to one place which was $1600 NT, but he quickly turned that down and said he knew of a better place…even cheaper…oh great.

The hotel he took us too turned out to be not too bad for only $1200 NT ($40). The view was a little better this time too, although the view still looked a little “slum like”. The bathroom also had a built in shower in it, meaning that when you went to the bathroom, you were technically in the shower too! I forgot to take a picture of it, but just believe me when I say it.

We ventured out into the city to find a place to eat. On the way here we saw a Domino’s Pizza sign, but couldn’t quite remember exactly where it was. After arguing on a few “restaurants” we finally came upon a Shabu Shabu restaurant and decided to give it a try. The man graciously gave us an English menu. We decided to order the spicy broth with it. Boy was that a mistake. The menu said a “light” heat. My freaking tongue and mouth were on fire from the start. Needless to say I didn’t eat as much as I would’ve liked too.

The next day we went back to the train station to catch a bus up to the Toroko Gorge. We were warned from a dorm roomate that she had previously taken a bus into Toroko Gorge and she basically feared for her life. We put that aside and decided to go for it. On the bus was Amanda, myself, and Belgium girl and an Australian guy. Both were backpacking and were stopping into Taiwan for only a month.

The train ride was nuts. Roads through the Toroko Gorge are barely 2 car width’s wide. Take a bus into consideration and it cuts it even closer. Yet, this bus driver was going 80 KM through the windy roads. You would look out the window and all you would see is the ground 100 feet below you.

We finally made it to the last stop where we got off. There was a hotel at the top, charging $6000 for a night to stay. We ventured off looking at the surroundings around us. We decided to head to the buddist temple that seemed to be in the middle of the mountain. The temple had a ton of statues and great views to which you could see the gorge a long way down.

From there we ventured back down to the river. Amanda was in heaven as she started to collect some rocks. After that we decided to leave a little gift on the ground like others had done before us!

We headed back on the bus back to Hualien. We headed out for supper again to the Shabu Shabu restaurant. This time getting the non-spicy broth. It was delicious.

The next morning we got to see a little sun, but that quickly went away by bit morning. We headed back to the train station and then back home. Our little 6 day adventure was over!

On Monday we took the tent down, packed up the scooter and headed back into town to drop the scooter back of to the rental place. We waited for a bus to take us to Fanglio. After about a 45 minute bus ride, we bought some train tickets to take us across the island, through the mountains to Chihpen.

The train ride was pretty neat, on the way there, you basically go through the mountains and seeing the scenery unfold before you is quite amazing. Things were pretty dry everywhere as I don’t think they have gotten much rain lately.

We got off a Chihpen where we tried to get a cab to take us to this hot spring resort that Amanda had been too previously. Amanda tried to explain to the cabby where it was. He was obviously confused as he said the place had closed. Finally another Chinese woman who could speak very good english came over and tried to help. Amanda could remember enough on how to get there that we just told the cab to take us and we’d tell him where to go. Sure enough, 10 minutes later, we were at the resort.

After we checked in, we quickly changed into our bathing suits and headed for the hot springs. They had 4 areas, each warmer then the other one. One even was a balmy 42°C. You couldn’t really stay in that one too long, as it was just too damn hot. We headed back up the hotel room after we pruned up where Amanda took a nap and I watched Star Wars till it was supper time. We ate some spicy chicken with peanuts. It was really good.

After supper we headed back to the hot spring for another relaxing evening. I should mention that they make you wear caps on your head. You aren’t allowed to go into the spring without one. And because we just happened to forget our swimming caps, we were forced to wear shower caps. And if you’re wondering, there is no pictures of me in a shower cap! Well there was, but that will never be seen!

The next morning we had some breakfast, took another swim, and then checked out of the hotel. A van was going to take us to Taitung, just a 1/2 hour passed Chihpen. We had a little time to waste before that though, so we checked some email and took in the surroundings one more time. The driver kept trying to get more money from us and made us talk with the girl back at the hotel room.

From there we took another train up to Hualien where we would visit the Toroko Gorge.

We were woken relatively early by some roosters a couple of properties down. By relatively I mean 9:30 am. The day before at the Mexican restaurant we had noticed that they served breakfasts there so we decided to head there again. They had freshly squeezed orange juice which was awesome. I ordered an omelet which was unbelievable. I think Amanda ordered the same thing, but added some potato’s onto the plate. Again, it’s something she doesn’t get a chance to eat too often. The only potato she usually gets is with french fries from McDonalds.

We headed up with the scooter up to Kenting National Park which was just a short 10 minute ride. The park is basically walking paths through the thick forest/jungle. On Amanda’s previous time here they had caves in which you could walk around and see bats flying around. This time however, all the caves were closed. If I could read Chinese I could tell you why! There were also signs posted everywhere warning people of the poisonous snakes, centipedes, and wasps (not my picture). After walking around for a while, taking a few pictures of old trees, new trees, and weird trees (Autumn Maple), we headed to the lookout tower at the top of the mountain.

I forgot to mention it was insanely windy that day. We didn’t stay on the top of the tower for long as it was just too cold. We stayed long enough to snap a few photos of the surroundings. From the top you could see the China Straight and the Pacific Ocean.

As we started to come back down the mountain, we noticed far up ahead that an animal had crossed the road. We quickly approached it and found it was a monkey! Amanda got a little excited as she had always wanted to see a monkey in Taiwan as they’re apparently in abundance. It didn’t stay around too long, but long enough for us to get a picture.

As we headed back down (almost crashing…my fault) we turned down a side road. We came upon a nice farmers field with some well known rock formation in the background. Later on in a postcard, we noticed that the place we had visited was on a postcard, so apparently it was a well photographed place.

We then visited the main Kenting Beach. There were a few people there, but I think as it was too windy, it made it too cold for people to actually enjoy the beach. We walked around for a bit and Amanda collected coral and shells and I relaxed for bit, just enjoying the view.

For supper we found a new restaurant called Smokey Joe’s. This place had everything all over the walls with art. The menu had at least 200 items for you to choose from too. I chose a tortilla pizza (damn good) and Amanda went with the chicken fajitas. When the fajitas came, we swear it had at least 3 chicken breasts in it. We of course asked for “doggy bags”. They didn’t last long in them however as Amanda fed her leftover chicken to some stray dogs.

We headed back for the night in the tent. The next day would be mostly traveling by bus and train as we needed to cross the island to the east coast.