Welcome To Taiwan
Elephant Mountain (aka Nangang District Hiking Trail) Lane 150, Songren Rd., Xinyi Dist., Taipei, Taiwan
Elephant Mountain is the most popular of the mountains for a good reason. Being the closest to the city not only means easy access, but it means stunning views of Taipei, especially Taipei 101. While it is a short hike to the viewing areas, I’ll warn you that there are a lot of steps involved in getting there. If you’re fit, you can make it in 15 minutes. If you’re not, there are some places to rest with benches and nice views of their own.
The highest point of the mountains around Elephant mountain is only about 350 meters (around 1000 ft), and the main hiking trails are mostly paved and quite easy to walk on. There’s no need to have super professional hiking gear. And this is a 24-hour mountain for a 24-hour city, people start hiking by three o’clock in the morning, and some lovers are still embracing each other on the big rocks after midnight.
National Palace Museum 221 Chih-shan Rd., Sec. 2; Shih-lin, Taipei 11143, Taiwan (Shihlin District) The National Palace Museum is an antique museum in Shilin, Taipei, Taiwan. It is one of the national museums of the Republic of China, and has a permanent collection of more than 696,000 pieces of ancient Chinese artifacts and artworks, making it one of the largest in the world. The collection encompasses over 8,000 years of Chinese history from the Neolithic age to the late Qing Dynasty.[4] Most of the collection are high quality pieces collected by China’s ancient emperors.
The National Palace Museum and Palace Museum, located inside the Forbidden City in Beijing, People’s Republic of China, share the same original roots, which was split in two as a result of the Chinese Civil War.[5] In English, the institution in Taipei is distinguished from the one in Beijing by the additional “National” designation. In common usage in Chinese, the institution in Taipei is known as the “Taipei Gugong” while that in Beijing is known as the “Beijing Gugong”
Taipei 101 No.45, Shifu Rd., Xinyi Dist., Taipei, Taiwan Taipei 101 formerly known as the Taipei World Financial Center, is a landmark skyscraper located in Xinyi District, Taipei, Taiwan. The building ranked officially as the world’s tallest from 2004 until the opening of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai in 2010. In July 2011, the building was awarded LEED Platinum certification, the highest award in the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system and became the tallest and largest green building in the world.
Taipei 101, like all skyscrapers, participates in axis mundi symbolism where a pillar, ladder or plant serves as a world center to join earth with sky and bring the four compass directions together.[19] The height of 101 floors commemorates the renewal of time: the new century that arrived as the tower was built (100+1) and all the new years that follow (1 January = 1-01). It symbolizes high ideals by going one better on 100, a traditional number of perfection. The number also evokes the binary numeral system used in digital technology.
Taroko Gorge
The Taroko Gorge is composed mainly metomorphic rocks, such as marble,gneiss, “schist”,etc. The name, Taroko, means the “magnificent and splendid” in the language of Truku, the aboriginal tribe who resides in the area. The park has 144 species of birds 10 percent of which are indigenous to Taiwan. It also hosts over 30 large species of mammal including deer, boar, and bear. 251 species of butterflies, 32 species of reptile and 18 species of fish are also known but considering the rugged terrain of the park, this is probably only a fraction of the species that actually live in the park.
The most phenomenal aspect of the park is the amazing relief. In a single afternoon you can travel from rugged coastal cliffs through a maze of subtropical forested canyons to high elevation subalpine coniferous forests.
Chiufen (Jiufen Old Street) Ruifang District, Xinbei, Taiwan
The name, Chiufen means nine portions in Mandarin. According to the references from Taipei County Government, there were only nine families lived in this village during Ching Dynasty. Due to lack of resources, whenever one of the nine families went grocery shopping in the market or purchasing goods from freighters, they would purchase nine portions; this is how Chiufen earned its name. Until 1893, gold was found in Chiufen, large numbers of gold miners entered the village and brought prosperities to the area. During World War Two after restoration of Taiwan, gold fever subsided, gold mining industry officially ended in 1971.
Today, Chiufen features historical sites of Japanese styled architectures and Chiufen Old Street that offers abundant local snacks and exotic traditional stores. Famous Chuifen snacks include sweet taro balls made by tapioca starch and taro, rice cake with Chinese herbs, red vinasse Taiwanese meatball; Red vinasse is the vinasse of Shaohsing Wine, and many others. Moreover, enjoying fabulous mountain and sea views with great teas from teahouses are popular among tourists and locals.
Sun Moon Lake
Nestled at 760 meters, this lake is famous for its clear, sparkling blue water set against a picturesque mountain backdrop. This is the largest lake in Taiwan and a traditional spot for newlywed couples to take their honeymoon. It has also been a center of aboriginal life for thousands of years, with aborignal people involved in its tourist industry since the 1930s.
Sun Moon Lake surrounds a tiny island called Lalu.[2] The east side of the lake resembles a sun while the west side resembles a moon, hence the name.[3] Contents
Yeh Liu Geo Park No.167-1, Kangton Rd.,Yeh Liu Village, Wanli Dist., Xinbei, Taiwan
A cape in Wanli, near Taipei, famous for its hoodoo stones, thin spires of rock formed by sedimentary stone. Many rock formations have creative names, including the most well-known “The Queen’s Head.”
A distinctive feature of the cape is the hoodoo stones that dot its surface. These shapes can be viewed at the Yehliu Geopark operated by the North Coast and Guanyinshan National Scenic Area administration. A number of rock formations have been given imaginative names based on their shapes. The most wellknown is the “The Queen’s Head” an iconic image in Taiwan and an unofficial emblem for the town of Wanli. Other formations include “The Fairy Shoe”, “The Bee Hive”, “The Ginger Rocks” and “The Sea Candles.”