another cliché
travel blog

After we landed, we breezed through customs and picked up our rental car. We lucked into a free upgrade, a Renault Megane, so we got to cruise around the island in station-wagon style. Luckily, Wade was far better at driving stick than I, and he took over after I stalled out in the parking lot repeatedly.

We grabbed a quick bite at a local spot (a bare bones roasted ham sandwich on a bun with fries and a pretty good coffee) then drove around Ponta Delgada getting a lay of the city before our Airbnb was ready. After we dropped out stuff, we headed over to Lagoa do Fogo and caught some amazing views.

We driver back, and bummed around looking for dinner. Everything was packed. Note for next time: make reservations. We ended up eating at the well rated Mascote, but the food took the better part of an hour to arrive and was mediocre at best. Either way, it was calories, and after being awake most of the least 48 hours, it was enough to call it a day.

I woke up, still pretty tired from the previous day’s babysitting adventures, but managed to repack a bit and reduce my pack sails further. It’s only 5 days on the ground and our Airbnb has laundry, so we’re covered.

I got early notifications that my flight was delayed 45 minutes, so I used the time to grab a coffee and muffin from Pinhole before getting a ride to the airport. The woman driving is studying anthropology, so we had a good chat about that.

From there, things were pretty low key. I was assigned a window seat in an exit row, there was no one in the middle seat, and the person seated in the aisle worked for Harvad doing women’s health work in Uganda. The flight attendant seated in the jump seat in front of me was cool, too, so the flight was easy. Good conversation, a bit of a nap, and a few chapters from How The Economy Works. Easy.

Once we landed in Boston, I headed over to terminal E to meet Tiff and Wade. I got there with plenty of time to spare, grabbed dinner, and then we boarded. Though objectively shorter, the regular prodding by my 8 year old seat mate, the back of my seat kicked consistently, and the hubub surrounding the poor girl in the row ahead of me getting sick, the flight felt twice as long.

Spent the day in Taipei bumming around. Hit up Taipei 101, got some chocolate and macarons. Super pricey but really damn good.

The bus station had pastries, so I bought about a dozen to snack on on the way home, then took a bus to a plane to a car.

Then headed over to Boris and Sara’s for New Years and had a great time watching fireworks from their roof!

Magical fairy forest hiking

Woke up, grabbed breakfast at the hotel, then headed to the Songshan Culture and Creative Park. Honestly, I could have spent a full day there. so many cool little boutiques and shops. We skipped the measurements in favor of food and heading over to Taipei 101, which sure was a mall. Other than the macaron Tiffany bought, nothing great. From there, we hung out at La Crema until Wade joined us from Miaoli. From there, we dropped our stuff at the hotel and headed to the Shilin night market.

We woke up and took the HSR to Taipei. we dropped our bags at the hotel, and then went exploring. First, we headed to the Wistaria tea house where we passed a lovely hour or two sitting around, drinking tea, and chatting. From there, we wandered around Da’an, walked through the Da’an Forest Park, unsuccessfully tried to figure out what a pergola is, and then headed backstop the hotel.

Refreshed, we checked out the Ximen night market, then headed to the Raohe night market. It was crazy, shoulder to shoulder the entire night. Really cool spectacle though, and excellent food to match. Amy even ate a passion fruit! We got back to the hotel late, maybe around midnight, and then crashed.

We got up, had breakfast at the hotel, then drove around the lake, stopping at a temple and walking up about a kilometer of steps to a huge pagoda.

We scrapped the idea of renting bikes due tot he smog and haze, so instead we grabbed lunch, walked through the markets, then drove back to Hsinchu to drop off the car. After dropping the car, we went to a restaurant one of Wade’s coworkers recommended after scoffing ant Ding Tai Feng. Which, reasonable, since Ding Tai Feng is, as best we can tell, the IHOP of bao. We ordered two round there, so Wade’s coworker wasn’t wrong. Full from dinner, we headed back to the hotel (after a futile search for dessert that ended in shame at a 7-Eleven where Wade got shade from the clerk for purchasing about a half dozen packs of soy braised quail eggs).

On Boxing Day, we woke up late, got breakfast across the street, then foot massages down the street. I was sorta worried about it beforehand, in talking with Wade, it sounded like happy endings are fairly common. Walking in, I wasn’t particularly reassured. All of the people working were short skirt-clad young women and all of the clientele middle aged men. However, I was there with Tiff and Amy, and we were in a big common room the whole time, so there wasn’t ever a question.

During the massage, the masseuse working on Amy asked where I was from. Clearly, it had been a topic of conversation for a bit of time. I told them American, but that my parents were Japanese and Swedish, garnering the usual reaction.

After that, we met up with Wade and drove to Sun Moon Lake. We checked into our hotel and walked around the little night market for dinner. After grabbing dinner, we went back tot he hotel for a game of Phase then sleep.

Well, it certainly turned out to be an interesting one.

Wade left early to make the HSR to Miaoli, so we slept in till almost 10. Once we roused our corpses, we got dropped our bags at the HSR and tried to get breakfast at Coffee Sweet nearby, but failed due to Christmas. For being a non-Christian society, there’s an amazing amount of observance.

We trudged back to the station and found a little stall that sold Teppan pancakes, basically using scallion pancakes as tortillas and filling them with stuff. That turned out to be perfect. we then walked to the green line, took that to Indian station, then cabbed from there to Wulai to check out the waterfall and hot springs. We got maybe a block into town proper when Amy realized she had left her phone in the cab. Unfortunately, by that time the cab had already driven off, and I’ve gotten out of the habit of memorizing plate numbers. When we walked to the police station to file a report though, I realized that we had been dropped off right in front of the station, and that the station itself had cameras watching the entrance. It took several hours, but the police managed to identify the cab, get in contact with the driver, and ask her to return the phone.

Relieved, we got some food and walked to the waterfall. It was well after sundown by the time we got back to town, so we opted to cab it back to Taipei main station.

From there, we headed back to Hsinchu to meet up with Wade. For dinner, we headed to Ding Tai Feng. Bao for days. We got all kinds of stuff including Xiaogang long bao with truffles, but the real star was the wontons in chili oil. From there, we just walked around a bit, then headed to bed.

woke up and got on the road with a goal of making it to Jioufen. The traffic up the east coast was horrible, but it more than made up for it by how beautiful it was. we ended up dropping jioufen and heading straight to Taipei because of time, though.

Once we arrived, we dropped our stuff at the Airbnb, a sweet little loft in the XXX district, and took a shower to wash the road off. Then, we took a cab to Christmasland to check out the spectacle. It was right outside the Mega City mall (evidently Christmas and capitalism have a long history) so we popped inside for some ramen. Tasty tasty ramen. Then we took a cab back home and passed out.

Just before I got in bed, my mom texted to wish me a happy birthday, just after midnight. It was super sweet.