Kaohsiung and Kenting

On Tuesday morning, we ate a somewhat absurd breakfast at the Fleur de Chine, and I started hoarding water like we were in a post-apocolyptic scenario, storing it up for the day ahead. I had something like 3L when I left in the morning, which was about right for the day.

It was a great breakfast. Afterwards we wandered around the hotel a bit more before leaving, and found this pool, with a nice view. The visibility was a lot better than the day before, and continued to improve as the day went on.

Before entirely leaving the area, we went on a quick walk on the bike path around Sun Moon Lake, and I got this picture of Chris.

We also stopped for an absurdly short time to see a collapsed temple, which was left untouched since 1999.

On the ride we stopped for lunch, which was a mediocre beef noodle soup in a rest stop. Not worth the stomach space it took up, which is definitely the thing that's in short supply on this vacation. Next we went on another Buddhist temple tour, this time in the Fo Guang Shan temple near Kaohsiung.

In the downtown of Kaohsiung we went on a riverboat cruise, which was extremely relaxing. I enjoyed being able to see the skyline of the city. We also went down to the port area of the river, which was significantly under construction.

I was still full and tired when we hit the night market of Kaohsiung, and we got a much better beef noodle soup to share, along with stinky tofu and papaya milk. It was a shame we were both so full.

There was a ton to explore at night, which I completely avoided by sleeping 11 hours from 7-7. I guess I was still jetlagged? Our hotel in Kaohsiung wasn't as nice as the Fleur de Chine, but I barely noticed, since I was asleep the whole time. (Chris has been going through and grading the rooms we stayed in, which has been extremely entertaining for me.) We then hit up the hotel breakfast, and continued our journey.

Since i'm running out of time to write this, I'll summarize our Wednesday pretty fast. We went to Kenting National Park, on the southern tip of Taiwan. The area was really cool, and we stopped at 3 different viewpoints along the route. We had a good seafood lunch in there. The wind was incredible, and my beard was sideways for a good bit of it. The drives were also interesting enough in their own right, but pictures out the side of a bus never look as good as you hope they will.

 

I'll write up last night later, since I need to go get breakfast now.