Taipei Day 3: Shifen Waterfall, lantern release, and Ningxia Night Market

Part 1: Modern Toilet Restaurant
Part 2: Taipei Story House, Jiufen & Northeast Coast, and Raohe Night Market

Day 3 of our Taiwan trip turned out to be very rainy. We were supposed to drop by Houtong Cat Village before going to Shifen, but we decided to skip the pussies in the end because it was too wet. Pussies tend go into hiding when it's too drippy outside, so we figured there'd be no point. Anyway, I've been having my fair share of Eraser and the Neighbourhood Felines (sounds like a band name LOL) so I didn't feel too sad about missing it.

Luckily it was en route to Shifen anyway so we didn't have to make any useless detours.

~ Shifen Waterfall ~

Getting to Shifen was quite a pain in the ass. You can't take the normal MRT, you have to take the railway train (like those choo choo trains) from Taipei Main station and change trains somewhere. The schedule is pretty complicated and railway trains don't come as often as the MRT, and not EVERY train arriving at your place of departure will head to the same areas, so you really have to make sure you get your shit together. Obviously, we didn't have our shit together cos we're not well-travelled people, but the locals were nice enough to help us out.

There's a row of food stalls right at the station so you don't have to worry about getting hungry

It was still raining when we reached Shifen and it only got heavier as we were walking up so we sought refuge at a little old beef noodle shop further down. YUMMY.

Looking handsome but very tired. Probably tired of my bullshit HAHA

After that we trudged along up a hill to begin our trail to Shifen Waterfall. You'll encounter a visitor's centre, and shortly after, a rope bridge.

Teehee cheena eyes 👀

View from the bridge

This was taken from the other side of the bridge, and that's the visitor's centre in the distance. The outside of the building looks very crumbly but it's actually alright inside, there are water coolers as well

Past the rope bridge is a small waterfall. This is NOT Shifen Waterfall, so don't be fooled. Keep going!

After that you'll see another cluster of food stalls, some seats, and a mini garden. We took a rest here for a bit, to wait out the rain.

Shifen Waterfall can be seen from afar, from various viewpoints, but to make the most of it you should go all the way down and see it up close. What's the point of coming all the way here only to not give yourself the full experience? The route down is very safe and there's a proper path, so there's not going to be any arduous muddy hiking. It's just a lot of steps. Our journey was made more "eventful" no thanks to the rain...AND LACK OF CLOTHING.

No, we weren't naked. But we were horribly under-dressed because SOMEONE *glares at Nicholas* claimed that it was going to be a hot and sweaty hike and didn't want us to have too many layers on. So I wore a suspender dress with a thin t-shirt inside and left my jacket back in the hotel.

Turns out this "hike" took us up in the mountains, not through some sweltering Bukit Timah-like forest. IT WAS FUCKING FREEZING.

Taken from one of the viewpoints

Reality

But after a lot of huddling we finally made it down and it was so rewarding :D

OKAY I know the above photo looks almost like the one taken from the algae-laden viewpoint BUT as you can see this one isn't being blocked by trees. It's a way more majestic in real life and of course appears a lot more close up. YOU HAVE TO BE THERE IN PERSON TO EXPERIENCE IT FOR YOURSELF IN ORDER TO FEEL THE AWE. Really, the trip down will be worth it!

There's also this vantage point where you can see the top of the waterfall. I love how the surface looks like glass!

Check out my shitty panorama

Reality. Everything is fenced off so you can't actually go right into the waterfall.

Rewarded ourselves with some wild boar (???) sausage. It's nice!!! We were supposed to share one, but I liked it so much that I bought one for myself.

I think this was quail?? Didn't get any, just thought I should snap a pic of them dejectedly lying there in a pile

~ Releasing lanterns at Shifen Station ~

By the time we walked back to the Shifen Station area it was early evening, just nice for our lantern release. The ENTIRE street is lined with stalls selling lanterns and they all go for about the same price so just pick any one and don't bother haggling.

We picked one of the first stalls we saw, which happened to be at the furthest end from the station (because we were coming out, not going in). Lucky us, because that meant that we had the luxury of space for better photos instead of being surrounded by people left right centre.

Each colour of the lantern is supposed to symbolise something different, I think ours was like Happines, Love, Career, and Money, or something like that. Who knows, who cares, so long as the lantern looks good. We're not the superstitious type nor the cheesy type, which proved to be a little problematic when we were thinking of what to write on our lantern. We looked around us and EVERYONE WAS TAKING THEIRS SO SERIOUSLY, and we were just there like, "Erm...okay how do we do this...? What do we write...?"

We ended up drawing a whole bunch of ugly pictures depicting our wishes instead HAHA. On one of the sides I wrote "become a rich housewife" so I guess my fate is sealed ;)

"Many meows". Looks like we're getting 4 cats!

Am only going to post this side of the lantern because the rest are ugly and/or too embarrassing to be on a public platform.

Actually if I could do this all over again I would have copied some proper "meaningful" Chinese phrases from the lantern keychains they were selling. Chinese "calligraphy" would probably have looked better too 🤣 Well at least ours had a personal touch HAHAHA.

The 大哥 at the store was super helpful with the photos, before the lantern was lit up he helped us take pictures with ALL sides of the lantern, and after the lantern was lit up he helped snap a shot before we released it into the air. 

In fact, he even helped us get video footage of the release even though we didn't ask him to. I DIDN'T EVEN TEACH HIM HOW TO SWITCH TO VIDEO MODE. So glad this experience got captured!!!

Another photo which he helped us snap along the train tracks after the lantern disappeared into thin air and contributed to the depleting of the ozone layer before landing up as trash somewhere.

Passed by a drink stall on the way out and I got myself a cup mainly because it came with fruit jelly spheres which looked super interesting.

Kept the jelly for the last

~ Ningxia Night Market ~

Ningxia Night Market is pretty small and you could probably walk through the whole thing in 5 minutes (if not for the bottleneck of people), but it's apparently less tourist-filled than the others because it's more frequented by locals. The single aisle is really quite squeezy but the good thing is that the other sides of the stalls are lined with tables and chairs so you can get a breather and eat in peace.

Smelly tofu!!!!! Not as nice as the one at Raohe though

Stuffed squid. I don't eat squid (Nicholas does) but I just wanted a photo of them all stuffed and lined up in a row. They look kinda grotesque but also cute at the same time???

The Devil's Chicken (that's the name of the stall).

There are franchises for this all over Taiwan, and I decided to go for it because a friend recommended it and also because I couldn't be bothered to queue for the famous Hot Star. I remember this being spicy and juicy enough, but there could have been more flavour I think. And I think I'd prefer something that's breaded, this one just came with its own fried skin.

Now we kinda regret not queuing for Hot Star :( But there's always next time!