Taiwan adventure

Taipei Day 1
We arrived in Taipei just before 3 pm after a 12 hour flight from Amsterdam. I got stopped by the disease control as my body temperature was too high..but fortunately I didn't have a fever, just a cold and they let me enter the country. Hallie meet us in the airport with wonderful gift bags full of maps, food, facial masks and even medicine for my cold in mine - just the beginning of our great hosts in Taiwan.
We took an hour bus to the center and our hotel, Forward Hotel. Showered and then went out via metro to Taipei 101, the second tallest building in the world. In the mall below, we ate at Din Tai Fung, which had received a Michelin star at their Hong Kong restaurant. An absolutely delicious meal, perfect for curing jet lag.
Then we went up to the 89th floor of Taipei 101 to the observation deck. Could see a 360 degree view of Taipei. The most amazing part was the elevator up. It took 39 seconds going 60 km/hr; the fastest elevator in the world. I still had my cold so my ears hurt going up and down. The building also had a huge damper, 5.5m in diameter, that absorbs 40% of the wind movement. And a bonus, the building is LEED platinum too.
After that we took a taxi to Raohe St. Night market - we walked around and smelled all the food cooking, and saw all the cheap stuff for sale. Finally, we went to get foot massages at a place that is open until 2 am! It was painful, but a good pain. We finally returned to the hotel around 1:30 am and I fell asleep right away.

Today's strange eat: not too weird...sweet and sour soup with pig's blood, apple/watermelon fruit, chicken nuggets from the night market Taipei Day 2 We slept in a bit, and then Hallie brought us bubble tea and lunch boxes for lunch. Then we caught a bus for 1.5 hours to go to Jinguashi, a mountain on the east side where the Japanese had a gold mine. We saw a restored four home Japanese house, and hiked up to see an old Japanese temple in ruins. The Japanese occupied the island from 1895-1945. Then we took a short bus ride into a small town (Jiu Fen) and walked the tiny narrow streets. Apparently it is famous from a movie being filmed there. Then we waited 1.5 hours in the on and off rain for a bus; they were so full we had to wait for the third bus. This made us late back to Taipei for our dinner reservations, but we still managed to go for spicy hot pot and eat strange and wonderful things. Today's eats: sausage with fish eggs and squid, grape juice with lemonade, sesame candy bark, sugared soft candy

Taipei to Penghu - Day 3 Today we got up fairly early and met Taichi in the lobby to go for traditional Taiwanese breakfast. I enjoyed the soy milk drink and particularly when I could dip my churro-like pastry in it. It was a restaurant that Taichi had been going to since he was a child. Next he took us to the Longshen Temple, where it was extremely hot and busy. It was the special day for the God so it was very busy and special prayers were taking place. I got to experience the Taiwanese public toilet; the women were really nice and guided us to the right place to wait (in front of the stalk, not in one long queue). Had my chance to squat successfully. Hallie then meet us and took us to the National Theater, Concert Hall and monument for the leader of the democratic party that first brought the democratic Chinese to Taiwan (JKS Memorial). Finally we went to the airport to await our flight to Penghu. We said goodbye to Hallie, but would see her again in Rotterdam. It was a short 40 minute flight to Magong on Penghu, where Christina met us. She drove us to her house, which her mother has turned into a bed and breakfast. We drove around the island a bit, seeing the beach, stopping at 7-Eleven for beer, then going to a tiny restaurant for a BBQ dinner. The Taiwanese (Christina, Leo and his girlfriend) grilled fish, meat, seafood, corn, oysters and we ate delicious food once again. We've really realized how important food is to the Taiwanese. Today's eats: bbq oysters, pumpkin noodles Penghu - Day 4 Christina brought us breakfast to her house - I had soy milk (warm this time), and those churro things inside a bun. Then we left to drive to the dock to catch a 9:30 boat to am island in the north side. We first stopped on Bikini Island, a tiny private island where you could do banana boat rides, snorkel with just a mask and we even got pulled being a jet ski to view a coral reef. Nowhere we had to always wear a life jacket and there was no relaxing to be had...always activities. Just as we started to relax, the boat showed up and we had to pack up and move on to Jibei Island. There, we rented scooters and drove a short distance to grab some lunch. We dined on sea food and some noodles, and then had shaved ice and ice cream after. We did a bout of shopping, buying some pants/dresses each and then took off on our scooters. We explored the island, visiting several spots. We saw one place where the fisherman built the stone walls in the sea to catch fish. The current pushes the fish in and they get trapped, allowing the fishermen to easily get the fish, but it was a lot of work to build these 100 years ago. Finally we went to another beach, but we couldn't really swim there either. It is all about water activities for the Taiwanese, no laying on the beach tanning. After getting back to the main island, we showered and went for dinner and exploring in Magong. We had tea and walked around, having drinks and dessert by the sea side before heading back home. Today's eats: grilled shellfish (those conical pyramid purple ones, I don't know the name), shaved ice with seaweed Penguin - Day 5 Our flight was supposed to be at 9:30, but part way through the day we found our it was delayed and then booked onto an earlier flight at 6. But we still had lots of time to explore some more. We took the car into town and walked around Magong again. It was quite hot and we had fruit tea again and saw a buddhist temple. Then we drove around the islands write a bit, visiting a lighthouse at an army base, and eventually going back to a beach by Christina's place (Aimen Beach). We didn't have much time except to change, east some fresh crab and go to the airport. Once back in Taipei, we says good bye to Christina and found our beautiful hotel that Hallie had booked. She had even left us another gift bag with vitamins, aloe cream for our sun burns, and energy drinks. Our room was like an apartment, and it was a great neighborhood. We were beside a Starbucks and Ikea, and lots of other restaurants. We didn't stay out too late as we had to be up at 4 am to get to the airport to fly to Hong Kong in the morning. Today's eats: omlettes for breakfast, fruit tea Overall this was a great intro to Asia, especially because our hosts were so amazing. I really feel like we saw things off the beaten path, especially in Pengu, where we only saw 6 other Westerners the entire time we were there!