[TW; 2023] Day 3 - Huashan, Songshan & Xinyi

October 26, 2023

[TW; 2023] Day 3 - Huashan, Songshan & Xinyi

Day 3

Route: Huashan 華山 > Airplane Laneway 飛機巷 > Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall
國立國父紀念館 > Taipei 101 > Tiger Mountain 虎山 > Raohe Night Market
饒河街觀光夜市

1. Huashan 華山

Started the day by catching some plushie from the claw machine near the metro station!

Hua Shan Market 華山市場

The market is full of people in the morning - long queue for the Fu Hang Soy Milk 阜杭豆漿!

Fu Hang Soy Milk 阜杭豆漿
https://maps.app.goo.gl/fZiSxDyQJQQtGG7N6

It was not my first time trying Fu Hang's breakfast. The first time I was staying an airbnb just across the road and bought it back to try - I didn't like the salty beancurd. But surprisingly this time I actually liked the salty beancurd! It was my favourite item out of all. Morale of the story - everything deserves a second chance :)

Explored the market a little and spotted this sashimi store, second round of breakfast!

Shirakawago Huashan 合掌村華山
https://maps.app.goo.gl/iSd5S8yX1KNLE1QA7

The food was very well presented!

Sashimi was good and fresh, miso soup was yummy - the only thing that was disturbing was the fish tank infront of the seats... eating sashimi infront of live fishes was just mind exploding.

Huashan 1914 Creative Park 華山1914文化創意產業園區

Huashan 1914 Creative Park 華山1914文化創意產業園區
https://maps.app.goo.gl/ecuAYBgvNPW2387k8

Again, not my first time here. But it was always interesting to come back here to look and shop for cute and interesting gifts!

The old winery was always nice to walk around and take photos!

2. Airplane Laneway 飛機巷

This is a very popular local place (and some tourist) to take photos of planes! I've a plane lover traveling with me so added to the itinerary on the spot!

There are a series of cute wall murals along the way to the plane spotting spot.

Here is a map if you're interested in murals hunting (click to enlarge):

And of course... planes! They were really very close up, no zooming required - I recommend to check the Songshan Airport website to check what is the best timing to come over to spot planes. We came in a very good timing (after lunch) where there were planes arriving and departing every 10-15 minutes before a long few hours break with no flight activity.

Airplane Laneway 飛機巷
https://maps.app.goo.gl/sgxy4TEJfwR1g4BWA

3. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall 國立國父紀念館

Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall 國立國父紀念館
https://maps.app.goo.gl/AZALHohtR5UvkAZM6

I lost count the number of times I have been here - but definitely a good place to stopby and just enjoy the peacefulness. Unfortunately when I visited, the memorial hall was under a little renovation, so I had to eat mister donut on the go! Usually people will picnic and just chill outside the memorial hall.

One of my favourite view of 101!

4. Taipei 101

Which reveals my next destination - Taipei 101! It was an easy walk from the memorial hall to the 101; no need to use google map at all. Just walk towards the 101 direction and you will make it there within 15-20 minutes.

So 101 for just one touristy thing to do - Din Tai Fung!

Din Tai Fung 101 鼎泰豐 101店
https://maps.app.goo.gl/YyytySZJcBxwsoiJ7

There are many Din Tai Fung outlets, we just wanted to be a little fancy to have it in 101:

Everything was so yummy - trip completed with good taiwanese food! To be honest, it tasted the same with the other outlets in Taiwan, so just pick wherever that is most convenient for you. But if you would like to be a little fancy - 101 will be great, just come before dinner (before 5pm) and the queue is rather short (30 mins). The earlier the better.

5. Tiger Mountain 虎山

We wanted to catch sunset in the mountain lookout so seeing this out from 101 streets mean we are behind time!

We hopped on a bus 20 near the streets and alighted at Yongchun Senior High School... that's where our mistake started.

So on google map there are a couple of pins on "hushan" and we choose the wrong pin for hiking. We ended up taking a trail that was a little scary and huge steps. In summary - we think we chose the most challenging entrance.

There was a lady tagging behind us so being a little lost we asked her if we are at the right entrance... she told us she was just walking pass and saw us climbing, hence decided to try too. But she headed off to another director at this road mark.

After a few twist and turns, long climbing up steps, texting my colleague that if she don't hear back from me please report the police drama etc...

Finally something rewarding after 30-40 mintues! It was really very amazing - I found this much prettier than Elephant Mountain's view.

But the real issue here is.. I have no idea which location on google map is the right pin, as in the more doable route. You can possibly try this since on google map it shows that you will be walking mostly on actual driving road:

虎山生態步道
https://maps.app.goo.gl/8QxDqq72AqrJ2kwYA

And the funniest of all was - we thought we were at the peak of the mountain but actually we are not. Anyways, good view is sufficient :)

But the next challenge we faced was coming down the mountain... we can't walk back where we came from as there was no street lights. And there was a part without any barriers where just a slip you may roll down the mountain. So using google map statelite view, we found a path that leads us to somewhere... not confident but just trying our luck in the dark.

After walking down slope in the dark for at least 15 minutes, we saw streetlights!!! We were thankful we didn't enter from this entrance as the steps are really steep (as you can see in the photos). At least the entrance that we took allowed us to make twist and turns, this is just stairs.

Funniest was, we were almost reaching the bottom of the stairs, there was a group of uncles having their community ktv session - they were so surprised seeing us coming down from the stairs, probably very uncommon for people to come down from this side of the mountain.

But the uncles were very nice and pointed us to the civilization - a temple!