Today's itinerary:
- Ximending 西門町
- JiuFen 九份
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| The view outside our window |
Woke up and freshen up before heading out! We did light packing into our bagpack to be ready for the night stay at Jiufen,
Bid goodbye to our first hotel in Taipei, and lugged our luggages to the next hotel which is also in Ximending.
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| The famous KOI of Taipei, 50嵐 (50 Lan), so we had to try. |
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| A cute little car parked in front of the shop. |
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| Eslite Mall. |
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| Beauty B6 Hotel |
So we reached our next hotel to deposit our luggages before heading to Jiufen with our backpacks. And the hotel staff are really polite and keep double checking our items with us before we left.
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| They even used a net to cover our luggaes! |
After depositing of our luggages, we head off to the famous Ay-chung Flour Rice Noodle 阿宗麵線 for lunch.
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| You can squat or stand around the shop to eat and after finishing, drop it off at the bin provided on the right side pillar in front of the shop. |
We heads off to the exit 6 of Ximen Metro Station which you will see the banner below and also the famous Red House 西門紅樓.
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| Red House 西門紅樓 |
First thing when we reach the station is to grab a EasyCard 悠遊卡 for our transportation in Taipei.
EasyCard is similar to Singapore's Ezlink Card and Hong Kong's Octopus Card. It's a 'touch-and-go' ticketing system for the Taipei Metro, bus services, designated car parks, stores (7-11, Hi-Life and Family mart) and government agencies. Just scan the card over the sensor area to make a transaction and avoids hassles with finding correct change.
You can choose to purchase the card over the counter or use the "EasyCard Sales and Add-value machine". If you are worried of language barrier for over the counter, the machine does have the choice of language, in which you can choose English for convenience.
Press along the instruction and drops the correct amount into the machine. You can start off with a small amount and top up as you need, or deposit a bigger amount and refund it when you are done.
However, do note that card have a deposit of NT100 which you will only get back is you choose to do a refund at information counter at any Taipei Metro Station, and there will be a handling fee of NT20 to be deducted from the amount left in the card.
There is a Taipei Pass, which is a "touch and go" ticketing system, holder of the pass can use it for unlimited rides on Taipei Metro and on Taipei City and New Taipei City buses during the period of validity. You can grab it at the information counter at any Taipei Metro Station.
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| 1-day pass (Gondola version) with unlimited rides on Taipei Metro and associated bus services and allows 3 trips on Maokong Gondola. |
The TaipeiPass becomes valid on the first day of use and expires at midnight on the expiry date. For multiday cards, use must be over consecutive days.
We board the Blue Line train that is heading towards Nanguan Exhibition Center for Zhongxiao Fuxing Station.
Use Exit 1 (which leads you to Andong Street), as you are come out of the station make a U-turn.
The SOGO mall (big red letters) will now be on your right hand side and the elevated railway line will be in front of you. Walk forward and take the first left turn and carry on walking. After a few minutes, you will see the 1062 (Keelung Bus) bus stop, it is clearly marked.
However, there will be some touts claiming the bus is not running, the wait for the bus will be very long or the journey up by the bus is long and ask you to take their taxi. Even though the journey up to Jiufen via the bus takes up to 70mins, it only cost a mere NT90 which you can pay using the EasyCard.
Board the 1062 Keelung Bus 「往金瓜石‧九份」 and alight at 《舊道口》站牌下車. You do not have to worry about which bus stop to alight as it is along a slope and most people will be alighted there.
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| Do try to sit on the left side of the bus to enjoy scenic views of Northern Taipei! |
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| You will pass by Rueifeng 瑞芳 TRA Station on the bus which will also stops there to alight and pick up passengers. |
Another way to travel up is to take metro to Taipei Main station, find the exit to South Gate 2 to take the TRA train to Ruifang Station, and take Bus 1062 outside Wellcome Mart to Jiufen. The train journey will take 50mins and the bus ride will take 15mins. However, by taking train, you will risk having to stand the 15mins on the bus up to Jiufen and it could be quite dangerous if you have kids as the bus will travel up the mountain. The cost of this will be about NT80 per pax as there is rebate for changing trains to bus.
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| The view once you alight at the bus stop. |
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| The one and only famous entrance to Jiufen old street. |
It was said that during the Qing Dynasty, the village, which Jiufen is located at, used to be housed nine families and they would request for 9 portions of shipment every time and hence it is known as Jiufen 九份 which means 9 portion. This village used to be a gold mining town, which led to its initial thriving and several of the original houses still remain, furthermore, the building has unique Japanese architecture from the result of being under Japanese colonisation.
After the gold mining business stopped, the town lost its attraction and crowds and the crowds started to return only after City of Sadness 悲情城市, the first Taiwanese film to discuss the politically controversial 228 incident, based their filmingin Jiufen. Furthermore, Japanese animation director Hayao Miyazaki used the area as an inspiration for his movie Spirited Away which once again, started to draw more crowds, especially foreigners
Due to the frequent rains in Jiufen throughout the year, the stores on the street built the rain canopy outside, which formed a faint alley, it is also known as “Dark Alley”. Hence, even if it is raining, you can still carry on with your shopping, however, do bring umbrella or caps along as part of the street is not fully covered and hence, a few drops of rain will still have a chance to get to you.
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| Li Yi Bing Dian 李仪饼店, one of the famous suncake 太陽餅 and pineapple cake 鳳梨酥 shop in Taipei. |
So we started walking the old street of Jiufen. It is a small alley that is filled with shops on both sides and the shops ranges from foods to toys and souvenirs.
However, on the day we went, Jiufen had some event going on for their shop owners and hence, a number of shops are closed earlier at around 5pm when the normal closing time is about 7pm.
Zhang Ji Traditional Fish Balls 張記傳統魚丸, or Jiufen traditional fish balls九份傳統魚丸 which is the same shop. Tables and spaces are limited hence, it can get too cramped and hard to get a table. Do let the shop assistant direct or assign you a table which will be easier and you can place your order first while waiting for an available table.
We tried the Braised Pork Rice 滷肉飯, Mixed Fishballs 混合四丸 which has Fuchow ball 福州丸, fish ball 魚丸, pork ball 貢丸 and cuttlefish ball 花枝丸, preserved egg with tofu 皮蛋豆腐 and special dried noodles 特制干面. We fall in love with the simple but yummy preserved egg with tofu 皮蛋豆腐 and order a few more, till the shop assistant came over to talk to us and also told us the sauce they used and where to get it. (Shows how friendly Taiwanese are!)
After filling our tummy, we carried on walking down the packed street to head for Grandma Lai's Taro Balls 賴阿婆芋圓, one of the famous Taro Ball shops in Jiufen. The other is Ah Gan Yi Yu Yuan 阿柑姨芋圆 which we did not try as it is located up a small stairs along the street.
Grandma Lai's Taro Balls 賴阿婆芋圓 occupies 3 full shops, one is for making and selling the taro balls while the other two shops are for diners to eat. So, if you are travelling with friends, spilt up into two groups, one to grabs some chairs and table while the other queue for the food.
After the taro balls, we were too full to eat on the spot and we ended up packing all the foods away for our dinner at our Minsu.
The first food we packed was Ah Lan Hakka Glutinous Rice Cake 阿蘭宇粿/草仔粿. It is located at a corner of the street and it has a long line of queue which you surely will not miss. There is another one near to this shop which sells the same items, however, this have a long queue and a medal in front of its shop, we went ahead and bought some back to try. They sell various flavours including the signature taro, salted green bean, sweet red bean, dried radish etc.
The next shop is the fishball shop which we packed away beef noodles for dinner. I can only remember that it taste normal and nothing else leave an impression. I prefer Zhang Ji.
By the time we walked to the end of the street, the sky was dark and we head off to find our Minsu of the night.
We went into the house beside ours as we thought the owner will be inside, but nope, he is not. Actually, we met the owner when we reached Jiufen. He came out to the 7-11 area to meet us when we reached and took our overnight bag to our Minsu so that we can enjoy our slow walk to the Minsu. He did mentioned for us to call him once we reached the house, so we gave him a call and he promptly showed up in awhile.
Oh, when we were walking in the house beside ours, we noticed that they indeed have the permit to have Minsu which makes us feel safe. This is because some taxi driver did told us that a number of Minsu in Taiwan are not safe as they do not have the permit which will look into the safety of the environment and the fire escape route in the house. If the Minsu does not have the permit, you are staying at your own risk.
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| The view from the space beside our Minsu! |
So we went in and the room looks exactly like the picture they provided! Really pretty and comfy!
We settled down and had our dinner and took a photo of our goods of the day!
After our dinner, we went out to take a walk and the street is really quiet and empty, a vast difference from the street in the day.
We spotted this lady who is still working away when the whole street is empty and we bought a take-away bowl of dessert from her! It was yummy and refreshing to eat cold dessert in the cooling night weather of Jiufen.
Of course, since the street is empty, the only shop that is opened is 7-11 which is at the entrance of the street and we took the chance to snap the famous icon of the street which is seldom cleared of people.
An interesting shop we spotted around the walk was this shop which sells all sort of funny things which you can play tricks on your friends. Interesting shop!
And, how can we forget to take a picture of the street that "Spirited Away" took its inspiration from! This is the street where the famous Ah Mei's Teahouse is located at, it is also a street filled with teahouses as the view from these shops are amazing, but with amazing view, it comes with "amazing" prices, hence we did not tried any of it.
Jiufen is really an amazing location with views and foods that are awesome! I will like to go again. However, do not try to plan it on a weekend, especially Sunday. We went back to Jiufen in 2014 on a Sunday and it was a disaster, the place is so packed to the point that it is either not moving or you are being pushed along and do not have a chance to look at the shops around.
Just a small note for people heading to Jiufen, there are two main commercial streets of Jiufen 九份 which is Jishan Street基山街 (also known as JiuFen Old Street 九份老街) and Shu Qi Road 豎崎路. These two streets are the ones filled with more shops.
Bid goodbye to our first hotel in Taipei, and lugged our luggages to the next hotel which is also in Ximending.
You can choose to purchase the card over the counter or use the "EasyCard Sales and Add-value machine". If you are worried of language barrier for over the counter, the machine does have the choice of language, in which you can choose English for convenience.
We board the Blue Line train that is heading towards Nanguan Exhibition Center for Zhongxiao Fuxing Station.
Use Exit 1 (which leads you to Andong Street), as you are come out of the station make a U-turn.
However, there will be some touts claiming the bus is not running, the wait for the bus will be very long or the journey up by the bus is long and ask you to take their taxi. Even though the journey up to Jiufen via the bus takes up to 70mins, it only cost a mere NT90 which you can pay using the EasyCard.
Grandma Lai's Taro Balls 賴阿婆芋圓 occupies 3 full shops, one is for making and selling the taro balls while the other two shops are for diners to eat. So, if you are travelling with friends, spilt up into two groups, one to grabs some chairs and table while the other queue for the food.
Of course, since the street is empty, the only shop that is opened is 7-11 which is at the entrance of the street and we took the chance to snap the famous icon of the street which is seldom cleared of people.
An interesting shop we spotted around the walk was this shop which sells all sort of funny things which you can play tricks on your friends. Interesting shop!
And, how can we forget to take a picture of the street that "Spirited Away" took its inspiration from! This is the street where the famous Ah Mei's Teahouse is located at, it is also a street filled with teahouses as the view from these shops are amazing, but with amazing view, it comes with "amazing" prices, hence we did not tried any of it.
Jiufen is really an amazing location with views and foods that are awesome! I will like to go again. However, do not try to plan it on a weekend, especially Sunday. We went back to Jiufen in 2014 on a Sunday and it was a disaster, the place is so packed to the point that it is either not moving or you are being pushed along and do not have a chance to look at the shops around.
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