Thursday, August 7, 2014

Taiwan Trip Day 3 - Part 2 Chiayi 嘉義 -> Taipei 台北











Finally after hours of rides, we reached Chiayi Station - HSR (嘉義站-台灣 高鐵). First time was to get our tickets before we hang around for some air.

Spending an hour plus to reach Taipei HSR Station. By the time we reached, it was already 6/7pm+.

The grey route is the way from Taipei Main Station to CityInn Hotel Branch III (新驛旅店台北車站三館)

We had some difficulty trying to find CityInn Hotel Branch III (新驛旅店台北車站三館). Although we manage to walk to Chang'an Street, but it was still not easy since it was dark (and raining) by the time we reach. It can be pretty exhausting when we are dragging our luggage around. Ended up at at this egg tart bakery and tried to get direction but I forgot to check the chinese name of the hotel! But despite that, the lady pointed us to the correct direction after trying a bit of assumption. Really had to give credit to her because she was doing her staff in the bakery when we asked for her help. Not only did she didn't show any signs of frustration, she was very eager to help! Although I don't know your name, but thank you!

With the raining coming in, we hurriedly proceed to the hotel. 

View of our hotel room

Toliet is so clean!!!
 


Can't wait to recharge our phone

I am very impress with the cleanliness of the hotel. Although there weren't any bathtub, I am more excited that it is clean and neat and the glass door helped to partition out water from the shower area.

After a short rest, we went out to explore what's nearby. Just across the streets are KFC and further down there is 7-11 and 50嵐 (bubble tea). I only drank once and it's been so long. So I can't remember the taste.

And further down, there is a stall selling a variety of Gyoza. Must TRY! Nice... (Sorry no photo cause too busy eating!)

After Gyoza for dinner, we went back to 7-11 (it's the umpteenth time to 7-11 if we include the 7-11 visits since Day 1. In Alishan, we keep visiting 7-11 for snacks, dinners and everything else)

After this, it's back to hotel and rest for tomorrow.

Cont to Day 4  <<     ||    >>  Read Day 3 Part 1
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Monday, August 4, 2014

Taiwan Trip Day 3 - Part 1 Alishan 阿里山 -> Fenchihu 奮起湖 -> Chiayi 嘉義











3rd day and last day in Alishan, I woke up at 7+am hoping for a clear sky for a nice sunrise or at least a nice sunshine and I got this in!

Beautiful rainbow that greeted me in the early morning

Grabbed my camera and start taking photos. With this, I woke up completely. Wash up.. check..pack.. trying to minimize the stuffs we need to pack into our luggage since we gonna check out in a few hours time. We headed back to the Alishan national forest recreational park (阿里山森林遊樂區) once again.

It is AMAZINGLY quiet when we reach at 8.30am/9am. Birds chirpings... nature sound... although it was quickly takeover by footsteps in a few minutes time.





After taking a few more shots that we wanted, we took a detour and walked out of the forest where the trail lead us to the somewhere near to railway station.




And it was time to go back to the hotel...
Pretty flowers and leaves on the way to the hotel.




And back in hotel... 

relax... 

wait... 

checkout... 

Back to the main tourist area, we waited for our driver.

Alishan hotel information board

 Alishan map information board
Goodbye to Alishan... 

On the way to Chiayi HSR via our pre-arranged transport, we stopped at Fenchihu (奮起湖). 

Fenchihu Train Station




Had the famous Railway Bento (铁路便当)!


Railyway Bento 

The railway bento consists of 10 dishes @ NTD $100 per serving. Very NICE!

After eating, we walked around for a short while...


Cont to Day 3 Part 2  ||     ||    Read Day 2

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Thursday, July 31, 2014

Taiwan Trip Day 2 - Alishan Zhu Shan (阿里山祝山) Sunrise Trip + Alishan National Forest Recreational Park (阿里山森林遊樂區)



Day 2 - Alishan Zhu Shan (阿里山祝山) Sunrise Trip + Alishan National Forest Recreational Park (阿里山森林遊樂區)







WAKING up in the early morning prove to be a challenge to us all... hm.. maybe not all.

Anyway, we thought we are quite early but we were wrong. When we proceed out to the train station, there were already 10 people ahead of us.

Chao Ping Train Station Signboard

Chao Ping Train Station Platform

The train came totally packed. But luckily they do have crowd management. The train station crew will liaise with each other for the incoming train capacity. So we wait at their instructed location and to board from which train door entrance specifically.

Although we managed to board the train, it was 90% packed. Inside the last cabin, the guide on the speaker explained to us along the train journey for what to look out (such as sceneries)

What they failed to make sure was that the train door could be open manually from the inside. (This lady directly opposite me accidentally open the door. Luckily her partner was quick to help close it up because I don't think she was aware about it cause she was having motion sickness). Anyway, so be careful if you boarded the train.

The red train that took us up to the sunrise location Chu Shan Train Station (祝山)

The very sad thing was.. it was all good and bright sunrise just the day before. So instead of a nice sunrise shot, we had a good air and crowd viewing. The crowd there was surprisingly a lot as it was a Sunday! 
Panorama Shot

A heart-shaped cloud sunrise?

We were told that the train will ends it service around 7am? or 7.30am. So we didn't have much time to walk around (unless we can get around without the train which is impossible)

Spending minimum time walking around the few stalls along the path, we headed back to our hotel once again for breakfast before meeting up with our tour guide to Alishan National Forest Recreational Park(阿里山森林遊樂區) which you can find more information here.

Entrance for food

Breakfast

Time for our Alishan National Forest Recreational Park (阿里山森林遊樂區)!

If you can, engage a tour guide to bring you around because the place is very big and it's very crowded at times. Our tour guide is a  原住民 and he actually live his entire live in Alishan. So he share a lot of stories and tales about Alishan. And because he has such nice view around him, he often took photos and shared with us on where and how we can take photos. My photo might not justify for his guidance since I was snapping away very often. Below are some photos taken





 









 We started our journey around 9am and ended around 11.30am where we took the train (forgot which station is this) and reached the main tourist area where we go for lunch!

Tofu with this special sauce and 山药

Egg omelete

I can't remember if it's prawn
Noodles

Fried Rice

Steamboat style chicken 
(but dunno the name, it was a recommendation by the tour guide)

After lunch, it was back to the same old (no idea what we should do) and it was raining. We got back to hotel after lunch with a lot of snacks, drinks and instant noodle for the night. Basically it was playing cards, watching tv etc and hoped for at least a nice sunset shot from our hotel room but it was cloudy as you can see below




So..due to the weather, I would have prefer to stay in Alishan 2d1n instead of 3d2n.
An attempt at some night shots before end of my 2nd day at Alishan

Cont to Day 3 Part 1  <<     ||    >>  Read Day 1 Part 2
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Thursday, July 24, 2014

Hyundai HYSJ-7220 Slow Juicier



Finally I bought a slow juicer from hyundai! 

Initially I was debating between a juicer or a blender and stumble upon this deal at qoo10.
That's when I bought the slow juicer @ $99 SGD (not inclusive of delivery)

I got to say I love the taste of the juice. 

Pros: 
  • Not so much fibre compared to a blend and with enough juice to make you feel just right after drinking it.
  • Easy to assemble.
Cons: 
  • Faced difficulty when removing the core of the juicer. There was once it flew because I was trying so hard to pull it out (and resulted in a small crack on my kitchen table top...heartache)
  • One part of the juicer has this small holes and it trapped the fibre. A headache to clean this particular part as I have to use the brush to make sure all the fibre are not clogged in the small holes. Hence, cleaning is quite a difficult task.
  • The fruits have to be cut into small pieces and seeds have to be removed which is quite time consuming.

Recommendation:
Neutral. 
Due to cost constraint, with the price of $99 SGD I would say it is a good buy. 
But the cons definitely makes me wonder if other brands' slow juicier would have been a better buy for a less tedious way of cleaning. Especially recently I spotted some models no longer requires the need to cut the fruits to smaller piece and/or remove the seeds.

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Saturday, July 5, 2014

Foodie Times Morgan's Field @ Star Vista (Bouna Vista) - Hickory BBQ Spare Ribs

It's my 4th trip to Morgan's Field and their service never fails to impress me.

I ordered a full slab Hickory BBQ Spare Ribs and requested to change the coleslaw to Mash Potato. When it came...
They forgot to change to my Mash Potato....

So...after informing them about it. The waiter brought me a bowl of Mash Potato and coleslaw is on the house.


Nice! Thanks!
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Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Sample Store - It's the real deal

Joined this website for the sake of "try" as I received the flyer in my mailbox. "Try" because it's hard to get "freebies" for free.

For Sample store, there are 2 categories:
1. Free delivery for sponsored samples. It's the real deal as I did get the sample after a long wait. BUT... there is a limited range of products to select in this category (max of 4 samples for 1 delivery)
2. "Pay your own delivery" for the samples. This is a fixed delivery cost @ $5.99 SGD for max of 4 selected samples. In this category, there are quite a long to choose from. For me, this is good because I can get to choose if I wanted to "try" out the products but don't want to buy the full size product.

So if you are keen, here is the link to the website:


Start getting your free samples now!

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Monday, February 17, 2014

Chemfree Toilet Bowl Cleaner

Purpose: eliminate the need to clean the towel bowl
 
Outcome: If compared to my parent's place, I do think that it did seemed to be effective in minimizing the growth but not to the extend of 100% elimination

I still have to clean but the build up takes quite longer to be visible (around month?). There is a tactic to placing it. so maybe I didn't place it correctly hence not so effective?
 
Price: Bought @ SGD $11.99 per pc
 
Verdict: I think it's still a worthy purchase.
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