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Now that I’m back and settled (it took a few days), here are a few parting shots from my trip to Taiwan. Although I did a thematic sweep of the place in my other blog entries, here are some things I wasn’t able to include or just something fun.

Neiwan Bridge

Going through a train tunnel getting back from Neiwan. If you look outside the tunnel, you will notice trees with bits of white in it and those are Tung blossoms (Vernicia fordii), the reason why I went up there that day. Although I didn’t see the trees and flowers up close as I had hoped, it was still a fun day.

A very ancient courthouse in Taiwan. When looking at old buildings like this, you can tell courthouses apart from other buildings by the curved and pointy ends on the roof. You can also spot a Tung blossom tree behind the building.

Even though I wrote about them, I never actually had a picture of a night market in that entry about Taiwanese traditional markets (they weren’t uploaded on my computer yet), so here’s a picture in case you felt cheated.

A cute mural in a cafe in Taipei. An interesting aspect of Taiwanese life: there is barely any need to cook breakfast in Taipei. Many cafes like these offer three-layered sandwiches, eggs, soy milk, etc; each of them being either less or a little more than a dollar Canadian each.

The white hole in the top middle of the picture is a volcano, as seen from Mount Yangming. Although it isn’t active, it still smokes. One lovely consequence of this volcanic activity are the hotsprings that are everywhere on the mountain.

A bride and groom posing for their wedding photos in a field of Calla lilies in Mount Yangming.

Taiwan is a little island, therefore it is surrounded by the sea. Here is a view of the Pacific Ocean from the port city of Keelung.

A flock of cows at Taoyuan International Airport. (It’s the year of the Cow/Ox/Whatever you want to call it if you’re wondering why.)

My uncle, a carpenter, was fixing the cement sides of my grandparents little garden and we all decided to decorate it with shiny rocks. In an unusual fit of patriotism (not to mention I couldn’t think of anything else), I made a maple leaf and stuck a penny onto there. Thinking back, I should’ve used a loony…

Anyways, this concludes my series of blogs on Taiwan. I hope you enjoyed it and thank you for reading!

Pictures by Jess

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 14th, 2009 at 6:22 pm and is filed under General, Wish You Were Here. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.