It's the end of Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is indeed a really really big festival for a chinese. Today is Chap Goh Meh, the last day of the CNY festival, i'll just sum up what I have did for these 15 days.

it's CNY, of coz need to take a picture with my new clothes...haha

It's been a while since I was able to spend the whole 15 days of CNY with my family. The last time is during 2006 when i was waiting for SPM result.

1st day（初一）, the most important day, of course need to spend it with family.

our steamboat feast

2nd day （初二）, it's time to visit friends（拜年）, too bad, this year a lot of people can't make it and there are only 5 of us joining. But still, we were having a really great time.

friends :)

3rd day（初三）, meeting our one and only che zai who was unable to join us the day before, was having a yum cha session in kb town area. Such a coincidence to be able to meet cai shan, pei ling and jie shu, really long time no see :) . Too bad that we didn't take any picture that day.

4th day （初四）, everyone is leaving kay bee, sob sob :(

7th day （初七）, it's a birthday for everyone, went lou shang.

15th day, chap goh meh, my sis return to kay bee and she's going to have a really long holiday this time, yippy!! Thanks to my aunt who bought us a secret recipe cake today, yummy~

white chocolate cheese cake, love it

that's all for my CNY celebration, a bit boring, but the most important thing is to be able to meet all our family members and friends who I have not seen in a while.

Hope to meet you guys again real soon, miss u all :)

sistas :)

a must visit in taiwan -- yehliu & jiufen (野柳 & 九份)

for me, yehliu and jiufen are definitely some of the must visit places in taiwan. The scenery at these 2 places are just breathtaking. that's why it makes my day 3 in taiwan one of my most enjoyable and memorable journey.

have you ever watched the famous korean drama "ON AIR" starred by park yong ha, song yun ah and kim ha neul? this drama are being filmed at these 2 places too :)

source : http://drama.videoland.com.tw

however, this trip doesn't start really well as we got lost in taipei main station. this is the 1st time i realize that taipei main station is really huge, we walk towards the intercity bus station, and then only realize that to take bus to yehliu, we need to walk towards another building. An advice to the future yehliu visitors, remember to ask the locals, "where to take bus to yehliu?", but not "where is the bus station?"

finally, we bought our ticket and waiting in line for bus. In front of us, there are 4 Thais waiting together with us. Since the bus haven't come, my friend went to the washroom. At this time, the bus came, the driver came down from the bus, standing in front of us. we thought he will wait for us since only 1 person get on the bus. but then, he just get on the bus and drove away like that! OMG!!!

bus ticket to yehliu, NTD96

when I chat with the Thais, then only they tell us, this is the 2nd time they missed the bus, the 1st time, one of their friend went to the washroom, and this time, their friend went to buy some water, well, at least we learned a lesson, get on the bus as soon as the bus came. Luckily, the next bus came within 15 minutes.

finally, we reach yehliu!!!

this is where we get off the bus.

we pass by a harbour, take few photos there. as we walk further in, it's getting strange cause along our way there's nobody there, and finally, we reach a dead end. the conclusion is we got lost again!!! the yehliu geopark（野柳地质公园） is on the other side, haiz~~

we walk along this harbour, and finally get lost :(

here we are, finally!!!

it takes us so long in order to reach here, but the scenery here is so preettyyy~~ and the entrance fee is only NTD50. however, it's really cold over here as it is very windy. it's hard for me to take a proper photo as my hair was getting really messy >.<

each of this rock has it's own name, we are not allowed to touch the rock, there will be a guy keep "beep-ing" you if you did so

this is the queen head, we need to queue in order take photo with it

our next stop after yehliu -- jiufen（九份）!!!

to go to jiufen from yehliu, go back to the place where you get off from the bus just now, but the opposite side of the road. wait for bus that will go to kee lung（基隆）, then from kee lung, take another bus to go to jiufen.

jiufen old street

inside jiufen old street

the overview of jiufen

there are lots of nice food in jiu fen, let's see what we've eaten.

赖阿婆芋圆

we queue for half an hour in order to get this sausage, super damn nice

红地瓜手工蛋卷

花枝丸汤

醉鸡，don't really like it, cause it is icy cold

卤肉饭

from jiu fen, you may take a direct bus back to taipei. the journey will take about an hour and the bus will stop at zhong xiao dong lu（忠孝东路）

since we already there, we might as well have a walk.

in front of SOGO

these little guys will come out every 1 hour, we got lucky as we reach there 7pm sharp :)

taipei - yangmingshan national park, danshui, beitou hotspring

i shall continue to blog about the 2nd day of my trip in taiwan. We are still in taipei, and i am so excited because we are going to visit the famous yangmingshan(阳明山), wohoo!!!

so how to get there? we took a bus from taipei main

station (no.126 or 260) which will take us to yangmingshan. However, this bus doesn't take us to the tourist spot, we will need transfer to bus no.9 in order to reach the national park. Unluckily, we missed the bus no.9, and it's going to take 30 minutes (if not mistaken) for the next bus to come, it's so frustrating!! so we asked around to know whether these tourist spots are reachable by walking, but different person giving us different answer. Finally, we met this taxi driver, who approach us to know where we plan to go, we want to go to Siaoyukeng(小油坑), Lengshueikeng(冷水坑), and also Mt. Datun(大屯自然公园). After listen to his explanation, we understand that each of these spots are quite a distance from one another, and it's going to take us whole day if we plan to travel by bus. He charged us $1000 to take us to these places and also other famous spots and i think it's quite reasonable.

He is a very friendly driver, told us a lot of his own stories and explained to us all the places that we are visiting and also recommending nice food that we can buy in taipei. I'm so thankful that we met him. Plan to introduce him to others, but too bad, he is going to retire soon.

One thing i love the most when you travel by taxi, you can

ask the driver to stop by when you saw some beautiful scene.

So, the 1st place that he brought us to is Cingtiangang(擎天岗), this place is just marvellous, we spent a lot of time here taking lots of photos, mainly because of the big field there. There is people taking wedding pics there too. The driver told us that it's been a while since there is such a good weather in taipei, that's why there are a lot of people taking wedding shots.

just loved the view at Cingtiangang

feel like i'm in new zealand

our jump shoot , love the blue sky

Next, we move on to Lengshueikeng(冷水坑), which is also being called as Lake of Milk(牛奶湖) due to the colour of the water.

Lengshueikeng, look at the color of the small lake

After that, we moved on to Siaoyukeng(小油坑), one of the best-known tourist spot, it's quite crowded over here. The view is really breathtaking, a must-visit place if you came to yangmingshan. However, you might find this place quite smelly due to sulfur.

Siaoyukeng

Next station, Mt. Datun Nature Park(大屯自然公园). However, due to time restriction, we didn't get to spend much time over here.

inside Datun Nature Park

Our final station, Chutzuhu(竹子湖), for those who understand mandarin, don't get confused, chutzuhu is not a lake, it was, but it was thousands and thosands of years ago. We were having a really nice lunch over there.

photographed Chutzuhu from top

Chutzuhu is very famous with Calla Lily(海芋), however, something bad happened to me when i try to take picture with it. I stepped into the water where they plant the flower and my shoes get so dirty :(

Calla Lily

Next, we get on bus no.9 which will bring us to B

eitou MRT station. From there, we travel to DanShui station and walk our way to Danshui harbour. It took us about 30 minutes. I have been longing to visit this place for a long time. It is especially famous for its sunset view. The scene is definitely breathtaking. We saw 2 couples taking there wedding shots there too. Again, when i'm taking pictures, the wave came up and my shoes --- get wet again, sigh~~

nothing's more beautiful than the view of Danshui's sunset

after that, we walk towards Danshui Old Street(淡水老街), when you come here, must remember to buy the famous 阿婆铁蛋，we also tried a few foods there such as pepper biscuit(炭烧胡椒饼),a gei(阿给).

炭烧胡椒饼

阿给

After having our dinner, we travel to Xinbeitou(新北投) MRT station, the middle coach of the train has been decorated with hot spring theme, as you can see the hot spring bathtubs with LCD monitors on top which you can find the information for beitou specialties and tourist spots.

nicely decorated MRT

bathtub with LCD monitor, cute~~

We walked our way to QianXiTang(千禧汤), 10 minutes walk from Xinbeitou MRT station. I experienced the hot spring there, wow~ it's so hot!!!~ we were having a hard time to get ourselves into it. people were looking at us due to the noise that we make when we were entering, it's a bit embarrassing, haha... I also tried the cold spring, getting into a cold spring during winter night, it's really freezing!!! but, at least i tried, hehe....

that's all for my day 2 in taipei, shall continue with day 3, 4, 5, 6...... in my next post :)