Tai Ping Shan 太平山, Taiwan Trip (Day 3)

15th May 2018, Tuesday

Today, we got up a bit early as we were going hiking at Tai Ping Shan.  We had also arranged a driver for today and tomorrow to drive us around the attractions. Breakfast was provided by the hotel, so we went to have breakfast in the canteen. It was buffet style but with simple dishes such as hotdogs, porridge, veggies, peanuts, salads. After breakfast, we went down to meet up with the driver, Mr Zhu. He was waiting for us at the hotel's entrance, we got on his car after introducing ourselves.

View from the top

Visitors Information Centre

Old Train Model?

The journey to Tai Ping Shan took around one hour to reach the entrance, where we bought our entrance tickets and another one hour to Cui Feng Lake. The driver drove us up to the visitors information centre and we had a short toilet break. There were no staffs on duty in the centre too. Then the driver told us to take a photo together and to also pose for photos... -_-!.....After that, the driver drove us up to the lake. By the time we reached the lake, it was around 10 plus. It was misty when we reached the start of the Cui Feng Lake Trail. We walked up to Cui Feng Mansion for toilet break before starting our hiking.

Starting Point of Cui Feng Lake Trail

Cui Feng Lake

Hiking trail

It took us around 15 minutes to be able to see the lake, where we stayed to take photos. After that we continued on the trail for another 30 mins or so. We did a u-turn back to the start of the trail as the whole trail needs 2.5 hours to complete, which we did not have the time to do so. We met up with the driver at the start of the trail, where we requested him to drive us to Tai Ping Villa. It was another one hour just to reach the villa. There were also other attractions like the waterfall which will require to take the Bong Bong train. Unfortunately, the train was closed for maintenance. So there were other attractions on the mountain that we can't go without the Bong Bong train.

Lunch

Cooling...

Bong Bong Train Station Closed

When we reached the villa, we asked around if there was any place for lunch. The staff told us that there is a canteen and a cafe located up the stairs. So we followed the directions and wahhh.....the stairs were soooo high...didn't expect need to climb so many steps before we can eat....hahahaa....However, there were many trees with red leaves, which really beautify the stairs.  Finally we reached the canteen, the lunch set comes with 6 dishes (consists of 2 veggies,2 meat and 1 soup and 1 toufu dishes) and it cost $250 per person. After lunch, we continued climbing up the stairs to start on a new hike trail.

Start of another hike trail

But gosh, there were so many steps up the stairs and we had to keep climbing. At the same time, we also turned our pokemon go on to clock the steps for the eggs. Got to admit, it was quite distracting with the pokemon go app turned on during holidays... :P....The hike trail we walked was on a forest trail and we saw a lot of big branches along the trail, where we had fun taking photos. It took us 30 minutes to reach the starting point of another hike trail. However, we walked a little up the trail and saw the trail was with rocks. So we forsake the idea of continuing the trail and u-turned back down with the same trail. Tired with all the climbing up, my legs were wobbling when climbing down the stairs.

When we reached the last part of the stairs, i saw our taxi driver helping a group of aunties taking photos. The group of aunties kept taking photos, one after another, pose after pose until the aunties realised that we were waiting to walk down the stairs. One of the aunties in the group invited us to take a group photo with them when they got to know where we came from.  Later, the taxi driver helped us to take photos with them with one phone after another. While we were taking the photo, a pair of uncles carrying their bikes down the stairs. One auntie was very sporty, she went and asked the cyclists whether she can borrow one of the bikes to take photo with. Another auntie in the group suggested to her friend to invite the two cyclists into the photo taking. So we all took multiple group photos cos need to pose and with different phones. Gosh, it was finally over...legs still shaking from the climbing....hahahah

After the photo taking, we went for a short toilet break and headed down the mountain. It was around 19 degrees and started to rain. When the driver was driving down hill, the fog got so thick that everything was white...can't even see the road clearly. Really lucky, we headed up the mountain early.
We were quite tired after the climbing and walking, and think we fell asleep on the journey back to the hotel which was about 2 hours ride. Glad we reached the hotel and can go back to the room to rest for a while. So we agreed to leave the hotel at 6.30 pm again for dinner at the night market.

S went for a shower while i turned on the TV to watch. After her shower, i just chatted with her and had potato chips to pass time. When it is time to go out, we went  over to the other room to find KT and Ss. When KT opened the door, they two were napping and Ss even changed into her pyjamas and napped...hahaha...Then we waited for Ss to change clothes and then we went down to the night market. When we reached the market, i looked for those recommended street food to try. We tried the
dragon phoenix roll ($25) as recommended online. It was good. Then we had giant sausages (3 for $100), tasty too. We also had spring onion bi ($30),pork rib cubes, chicken wings ($25),mutton soup ($70), guava ($50).We also got papaya milkshake ($50) and tea. KT and S bought bubble tea drinks where they can seal their own drinks.

Dragon Phoenix roll

Sausages

BBQ

San Xing Cong Bing

Peanuts Roll with Ice Cream

Mutton Soup

After that, we just walked through the market. However, we can't really find any dustbins around. So when Ss tried to throw away the litter in one of the stalls, she told us the stall auntie scolded her...hahaa... We kept walking until the other end of Min Sheng Road, where we found the Yi Feng Spring Onion pancake. It was shared with a soya beancurd shop, where you will have to buy the beancurd in order to take a seat inside the shop. So we ordered a bowl of cold soya beancurd, spring onion pancake without egg and one with egg. However, i don't find the pancakes (not crispy) and the beancurd (not smooth) that nice, as compared to the those we ate in Yilan. After eating, we walked back to the hotel and rested for the day.

Places Visited:
Tai Ping Shan
Luodong Night Market

Hotel Stayed:
Herb Art Hotel

Cameron Highlands, Malaysia Trip (Day 1)

28th April 2017, Friday

Yeah!! Exams over and it's holidays again....My friends and me had arranged to go to Cameron Highlands and Ipoh over the long weekend (though wasn't involved in the planning...just paid and go...hehehehe). We had arranged to meet at the airport around 7.00 am and one of my friends will meet up with us at Kuala Lumpur airport. I left house @ 6.30 am and had arrived at the airport first. I had to wait for the rest of them to arrive so that they can put their stuffs in my luggage for check-in...hahaa....Col had went off to the lounge while me and Dap waited for Qy to arrive. After Qy arrived, i packed her stuffs in my luggage and went ahead to check in the luggage. After that, we went for breakfast in Burger King. After breakfast, we proceeded to the boarding gate. We had to go to the washroom first as we were not allowed to go after doing the custom scans. We arrived at the waiting area, however, the plane was delayed for 10 mins. We only boarded the plane at around 9.15 am.

After we settled on the plane, there was still a delay on the taking off as there were 3 or 4 SQ planes waiting to take off on the same lane too. Our plane eventually took off at around 1 hour later, there is nothing to do on the plane. We landed in Kila2 airport around 10.45 am and cleared the customs. We met up with Deb once we collected my luggage. Then we bought some char siew baos and exited the airport to meet up with our driver.

We had booked a minivan to bring us up Cameron Highlands and Ipoh during our trip. The driver's daughter was also joined her dad along the trip. Although the driver had told us that her daughter will be a tour guide for us, but i think she was kind of shy throughout the ride....hehee....So we headed off on the road....long long ride....It was raining at the start of the ride too...i was hoping that it won't affect our whole trip....Dap went to sleep during the first half of the ride, Qy and Deb were chatting non-stop and i was snacking during the trip....Col tried to sleep abit but think we were too noisy too...hahaha....The driver stopped at a rest stop for a toilet break and it was still raining heavily....think we were all lazy to go out, so the driver and his daughter went down to get some food...

After that, we continued on the journey and the driver took the new route (via Tapah) up to the highlands. The route was going round and round and round in the second part of the journey. The driver stopped at Lata Iskandar waterfall. It was still drizzling, i ran off to the waterfall once i got off the van. There was a stall selling BBQ corns in front of the parked minivan...Deb had bought one corn with the intention to share. Once we got on the van, Col took the corn first to eat, then Deb was just looking and waiting for the corn to be passed back. Then Col asked back to us was the corn meant to be shared among us.....whahaha...priceless look on Deb's face....so funny....

So everyone got to try the corn..the rain was raining and stopping throughout the whole journey. We passed by a settlement of kampungs along the way....We finally reached the hotel at around 4pm plus, we thanked the driver and went in for check-in. Our apartment was located at a block further down the road....the staircase down was narrow and i was carrying the luggage down the stairs....tiring....lol....Then we need to climb 2 or 3 levels up in the block. Finally reached the apartment....It had also started to rain heavily again....

Hotel Lobby

Bedroom 1

Bedroom 2

Kitchen

There was a kitchen, two bedrooms and a living room in the apartment, Col and mi would sleep in one bedroom with two single beds, Dap and Deb would sleep in another room with a double bed and Qy will be sleeping in the living room with the TV....kekeee......We called the room service to bring us an additional mattress and slippers. We rested for some time while deciding where to go for dinner. As it was still raining heavily, we called for a cab to pick us up. We left the apartment around 5 plus and we arrived at a steamboat place called Cameron Organic Steamboat. We ordered a set with chicken, seafood, a lot of veggies, eggs and mee sua. The steamboat pot had a long funnel to it (using charcoal) and the soup smells nice....

The staff attending to us was also telling us the food was enough for the whole group of us and didn't want us to order more although we wanted to order more meat. He also challenged us that if we can finish everything, he would provide us with....more veggies....hahaaa...but Deb was not really happy on it as she wanted more meat.... :P.....I like the soup and the veggies too....very refreshing...the chilli was quite tasty too...After the nice dinner, we took a short walk along the streets and called the taxi driver to drive us to Brinchang Night Market (pasar malam). The taxi driver let us alighted and told us to give him a call once we were done. The ground was still wet after the heavy rain....

There were many stalls selling foods, honey, corns, fruits and toys...we bought some snacks too like fish chips, fresh corns and crispy pancakes....tried sampling the raw fresh corns...can taste the raw taste...we bought some raw corns back...I bought some keychains...We walked till around 8 plus, then we called the taxi driver to pick us and return to the apartment. After which, we all took turns to take shower. Then we just sat around to watch tv, Col tried to plug her thumbdrive into the TV. However, the tv would hang each time it tried to read her files....hahahaaa.....

I tried to sleep early, just managed to sleep for an hour or so...Qy was still watching TV in the living room. Didn't manage to sleep until Col played her sleeping meditation audio guide. Guess i really did sleep throughout the night after that, cos i don't remember where i had stopped when Col asked me the next morning....hahaha...

Places Visited:
Lata Iskandar Waterfall
Brinchang Night Market

Hotel Stayed:
Copthorne Hotel

Himeji 姫路, Japan Trip (Day 7)

10th March 2017, Friday

Today was a travel-alone day for me as i had planned to head down to Himeji from Osaka. As my friends had not decided where to go, so i went ahead to prepare my day trip. I left the hotel before them and headed down to the main train station. The train staff had gave a 10 mins later train, which i hurried to buy my breakfast and rushed up to the platform in time. It was a 45 mins ride from Osaka to Himeji, so i reached there around 9.45 am. Then i went to the tourists information area to get some travel information.

From the train station, i could the super white castle, which is the Himeji castle from a distance. Then i walked to the bus terminal to get the bus tickets to Mt Shosha. From the bus terminal, i had to take a bus to the ropeway terminal and from the ropeway terminal, i had to take the ropeway up to the top of the mountain. All in all, it took 1 hour plus to reach the mountain. When i reached the ticket counter, there was one monk to ask the visitors whether to take bus or walk. It costed around 1000 yen for the bus ride up to the temple. Alternatively, it cost 500 yen to walk on your own up. So i chose to walk on my own up.

It was quite interesting to walk on the path up, there were many Guan Yin statues in different forms along the path and each of them had a donation box in front of it. When i reached halfway, there was a spot where i can see Himeji city below. It was quite a great sight and the best was it was super quiet on the mountain. There was not a single soul or car around (but it can get a little scary)...hahaaa....I could only hear sound of some birds and wind blowing. I took a long time to reach the first hall. There were many different rooms along the way, however, the rooms were not opened. There was also a hall with 33 buddha statues in it. There was a small shop selling some food and there were a small group of people around. After which, i continued walking for my exploration. I reached an area where there were 3 halls sitting side by side. One of the halls was a student hall and there were 2 students studying there. One hall had some exhibits on the 2nd floor and oh man, it was cold with my shoes off. Beside it, there was a tomb of hondas, where there were about 6 shrines in it.

After that, i tried to walk to the highest peak and i should have taken a walking stick with me. It was quite tiring hiking that mountain. Luckily, my friends didn't join me today...think they will start scolding me...hahaaa....I spent my whole morning walking around the mountain but i think there were many places i had missed it. I headed back to the ropeway station around 1 pm and there were a group of children waiting for the ropeway. So i waited for the next trip, by the time i reached back to the bus terminal, it was around 2.30 pm.

Shoro Bell Tower

Hokke-Do

View from the Peak

Only eating place

As the closing time for Himeji castle was around 5 pm, i had to walk quickly to the castle. I bought the ticket and went in for my adventure. It was grand and it was very white, with the blue sky in the background. And it was very big...even bigger than Osaka castle. It consisted of 1 big keep and 2 small keeps and a super long corridor surrounding the castle. The main keep had 6 levels and i had to take off my shoes to go up each level and carry my shoes around. It was crowded inside too and saw a drunk uncle on one of the floors. There were plenty of history on the castle and its ground. The surrounding walls had triangle, rectangle and circle shapes and it was meant that the holes are meant for weapons like bow & arrows, guns to attack the enemies. There were also stories like a grandma had donated her hand mill stone to the Castle Lord, Hashiba Hideyoshi at the time of building the castle. There was also a stone coffin whereby it was unearthed from a burial ground and used in a stone wall during the original construction of the castle. Inside the main keep, there were rooms to keep their weapons and a super small warriors hiding room.

Himeji Castle

To defend the castle

Hand Mill Stone

Stone Coffin

Weapons Shelfs

Warriors Hiding Room

After which, i headed to one part of the corridor where there were rooms showing the life of Princess Sen but there was not enough time for me to complete all as it was almost to the closing time. After the castle tour, i walked back to the train station and bought a few of souvenirs at the shops opposite the castle. Bought a lot of the gold coins there too and missed my return train. I wasn't sure the closing time of the JR office, so i was rushing back to the train station to get a return ticket to Osaka. There was a ramen shop that looked nice but was unable to try it. When i finally reached the JR office, it was still open and managed to get a return ticket.

So i ended up eating in one of the eatery in the station. I reached Osaka at around 8 plus and my friends had not returned from their day trip. I finally bought the famous Osaka gyoza to try....hohoho....They had actually traveled back to Kyoto for shopping....hahaa....Hence, i reached the hotel earlier and had my hot shower. When the two came back, they had bought a lot of goodies back...heheee

Hotel Stayed:
Yamatoya Honten