Another complicated logistics day, we woke up early to pack up our tents and wait for the once an hour bus from our campground to the main terminal on the other side of Sun Moon Lake. From there, we took another bus to the Taichung High Speed Rail Terminal, just outside of town. From there, we grabbed one last bus to the historic town of Lukang, where we found the visitor information centre within a temple where we had read they had luggage storage. Turns out the luggage storage was just the two people working there watching our bags- for free!
Free of our big bags, we wandered out for lunch and a walking tour of alleys and temples, including gentleman’s alley where men let women pass through first as it was so narrow only one person could go at a time and breast-touching lane, also narrow as you might expect.
Once Taiwan’s second largest city, it was bypassed by high speed rail and connectivity to the rest of the country and somewhat forgotten for decades, allowing the town to be more preserved than many other places. Recently, it has been invested again for tourism, capitalizing on its heritage. Local delicacies like Phoenix Eye cookies tried and tested, we grabbed our bags from the visitor info centre and waited for another bus to take us back to the High Speed Rail terminal. From there, we grabbed a local train to Taichung main station, where our hotel was just across the street. Another long day complete, we ventured close by to the Vietnamese area where we had fantastic pho for dinner before collapsing into bed.
Taichung
With the weather in Taichung back to overcast and being a bit exhausted from Sun Moon Lake, we slept in and set out for a chiller day. We walked a while to grab YouBikes to ride up the river to Costco. Yup, Costco. There are quite a few in Taiwan but like home, are usually out of the centre, so we hadn’t gotten around to going. With little on the agenda for Taichung, we had fun checking out the local specialties at the store, sampling local beer called Super Drunk, having toffee bubble tea and seafood pizza for lunch, and picked up a decent bottle of wine for later.
We grabbed the bus back towards town and explored more around our hotel and the main train station. Jon bought a needle for his record player and i got a new long sleeved shirt after leaving mine somewhere in Tainan.
We went back to the main train station which was a hub of activity with live-music performances, gift shops, pop up stores and a train museum housed in an old train. Later we wandered over the old tracks through a park. Taichung knows how to do public space.
We sought out a Michelin-starred cheap local restaurant for smoked goose and noodles before wandering the river walk all lit up for another hour before bed.
Somehow, our chill day turned into another 30 000 steps day.
