I'm Still Asleep

Sorry for the serious gap in between posts! I just got back from a four-day trip around the island of Taiwan. It was so much fun but I am so glad to be back at Shi Da.

Day 1
Our journey started out with Jess and I not being woken up so I had nine minutes to get ready and finish packing. I had most of it in my bag but I left out my deodorant and my towel…so I was quite the image of hygiene during the trip. We took a short bus ride to the Taipei Main Station where we boarded the high speed train. That was very cool! It looked like the inside of a commercial jet. The High Speed Rail travels at speeds up to 300 kilometers per hour so our journey to Chiayi only took an hour and a half. There, we met with our tour guide and bus driver. After a long and bumpy ride into the mountains, we stopped at a tea plantation. We got to see them drying and rolling the tea. It was interesting and it smelled so good. Then, we sampled some of the tea that we saw being made. The Oolong was very good but not worth 4000 NT ($120 US) per pound. After more long and bumpy driving, we arrived at Alishan. It was so beautiful there. We had lunch and then went on a very long, scenic hike. I got some amazing pictures of the trees and the mist. There was so much vibrance and life. It was a nice change in pace from all of the concrete of Taipei. The air was so clear even though the humidity was killer. Dinner was chicken soup made without water. It was all rice wine for the broth. That was a fun time. We walked back up the mountain to get back to our room. All of the girls had to share a room so that meant that six other people (technically only five because Tracy always sleeps with Jason) had to put up with my snoring. Therefore, I sat outside the room for a while and read to give the other girls some time to fall asleep before my rumblings commenced.

Day 2
The day started far too early. We received a wake up call at 3:40 AM. The sunrise on Alishan is one of the five wonders of the area. Train time was 4:20 and the sun was scheduled to come up at 5:21. It was cloudy so we didn’t get to see the sun break the horizon. It was still beautiful although there were too many people crowded into the area. Instead of taking the train back to the hotel, we just walked back since it was all downhill anyway. Breakfast was a disappointment. I was expecting at least a little bit of fruit or something fresh since we were in the tropics. It was all duck eggs, rice porridge and peanuts among other things of a similar nature. My saving grace was coffee and toast with Nutella. The majority of the day was spent on the bus. We got to Kunding around 4 o’clock. I got to go swimming in the Strait of Taiwan. It was fun but I got stung by several jellyfish. There was a camera crew on the beach that was filming, as Mike described it, “a combination of Girls Gone Wild and Mickey Mouse Club.” It was two teams of girls dressed in fairly modest bathing suits popping balloons on each other and such. Dinner that night was amazing. I took pictures of everything because it all looked so fancy. I didn’t upload them so everybody can see them when I get home. We had clams, lobster, mussels and all sorts of delicious goodness from the sea.



Four Day Trip Around Taiwan

Here's a little slideshow of my really pretty pictures from the trip. I need to get to sleep so I’ll tell of the rest of my travels tomorrow.