Round Eat Up in Taiwan! Part 3

Day 3: Elephant Mountain - Shilin Night Market - Bye Taiwan!

Our original plan was to go to Elephant Mountain late in the afternoon to evening as you can see the view with lights and all but, we opted to go early morning instead. After taking off the bus, the prelude to the trail itself was a few meters walk on a slope going to the trail entrance. It should give you a good warm up and at the same time a hint on what to expect going up. 

20 mins they say, but we did it in 60

The first few meters was easy, but as we ascend further, it became much more exhausting. The steps are uneven which made it much more difficult. 

The view halfway is already breathtaking. You can actually stop at this area and not go to the top as the view is more or less the same, it's just that there's a big rock wherein you can sit and have your photo taken without any obstructions on the background.

But, we decided to proceed anyway. It only started getting harder as the steps went steeper as we get close to the top.

This is me with sweat dripping all over my face

 We were finally able to reach the peak after more or less 1 hour. I can say that the perfect view is at the middle of the trail. Aside from exerting less effort trekking, there are also less people that gets in the way of the view.

Candid shot of RJ taking a photo of the view

It was already lunch time when we decided to come down and it's food time again. Our next destination, Shilin Night Market. 

We were able to reach Shilin Night Market around 1:30PM. Almost all stalls are closed, true to it's name of being a night market. After walking a few blocks, checking out the side streets, we found the One. It's our last day in Taiwan and what a better way to end it than tasting that famous national dish of Taiwan; the beef noodle soup. We already tried taiwanese sausage, taiwanese sausage on a rice sausage, drank a lot of milk tea, which Taiwan is known for but still we haven't tried the most famous of them all.

Having that first slurp of broth, it's like you're in heaven. It tastes very meaty, flavorful, with a mild sweetness to it and it doesn't taste salty at all. It also comes with those tender, all most melts-in-your-mouth chunks of beef, and that chewy noodles, and you're like in food heaven. My mouth is watering right now as I'm writing this blog. You guys really have to try it. I bought root beer and they became the perfect pair.

Since we were told that most stalls open at 4pm, and it was scorching hot outside, we decided to wait and rest in this quaint but cozy restaurant. 

It was almost 4pm, so we head out to the streets of Shilin Night Market. See pictures below of the foods and an overall feel of Shilin. 

Our flight back to Manila was scheduled at 130AM so we went home around 7PM to prepare our stuffs. This concludes our Taiwan adventure. We know we didn't cover as much ground, there's a lot left of places for us to visit, foods that we haven't tried yet, so we'll definitely be back. What I loved most about the country is its people. They are super polite, always wears a smile on their faces, very warm and friendly, and we even noticed that they seem to be more relaxed in general. This is a breath of fresh air when comparing it to its neighboring countries we've been to like Hongkong, Macau, and Singapore. 

Until our next travel and food adventure.

Travel TIP: There's a bus going to the airport from Grand Hyatt Hotel until 11pm I think. It costs around NTD135. It's very cheap and convenient since it only makes stops at some hotels in the city then goes directly to the airport. You can buy the bus ticket at the reception of the hotel.