Taipei Taiwan Travel: Visitor-Friendly Adventures

We visited Taiwan as a jumping off point to Malaysia. It was absolutely worth it. We've been to China on nine different occasions and seen a lot of the country. China is beautiful indeed. However, what Taiwan is (that China is not) is tourist friendly in terms of clear signage and ease to get around.

We visited Taiwan for six days. That was enough time to cure our jetlag, see all of the major sights in the city, probe the suburbs and take a day trip.

Here are some of the highlights as we experienced them.

A view of Taipei 101 from Nangang Mountain. Taipei 101 stood as the tallest building in the world for about six years. The hike up the mountain was beautiful and you felt like you were in nature.

The impressive Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and accompanying Liberty Square. Massive monuments leave you feeling very small.

Another impressive mega-monument was the National Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall.

Then there were the temples. So many, so beautifully detailed temples to visit. The most impressive was perhaps the historic Lungshan Temple founded in 1738. Surprisingly, most attractions were more recent than ancient.

Our day trip took us to Juifen and Shifen. The main attractions were a waterfall and some very popular local shopping streets. We were fortunate to visit over the Chinese New Year which certainly added energy. One highlights was observing the release of hundreds of hot air paper lanterns (complete with open flame) with prayers and new years wishes written on them. Some were successful and flew high into the sky while others crashed and literally burned up.