Miscellaneous Adventures

I know it's been a few weeks since our last update, so we apologize. Since our last post we've had 3 people come to visit as well as digging into various projects. It's Monday morning before work so I (Russ) thought I'd fire off some pictures to update you all. Enjoy!

 Taipei 101 from the base: this building is taller than the CN tower and just as unnecessarily expensive to go up it

 Some cool structures on Tiger Mountain

 Either the worst sword or the best umbrella ever made

 A staple in our diet. Japanese style teppanyaki prepared right in front of us as we eat.

 A tree with danglies

 The world in tile form

The McMilktea: a Taiwan exclusive McDonald's dessert

 Korean BBQ with Cassie and Byron

 Beitou public hot springs: for $40NT (<$2 CAD) you can enjoy hanging out with a lot of old Taiwanese people and soak in natural hotspring water. The hotter pools are at the top and as the water filters down it gets progressively less hot. After going here we were the most relaxed we've ever been.

 A cool tree.

 A tiny zamboni.

 The view from the Maokong Gondola. This gondola goes from the end of the city subway line, up the mountain to a place that sells very unique and delicious mountain tea. In the picture is Sharon's friend Rose from England. It was great having her and Joe visit and miss them lots!

 More on the gondola.

 Heavenly meat bags.

 The Avengers (and Jason Stathem looking pissed off with a gun)

I woke up one morning at 5:30 and biked to the park. Expecting it to be empty I realized that the park is alive and well at that time of day with people doing Tai Chi. It was neat to see.

BAM! Everybody stretch!

The next day I felt like this egg. Give me warm bacon to snuggle with...

 The best article of clothing yet.

 This board game.

This artist at the market close to our place.

 Lunch: rice steamed in a bamboo shoot, greens and garlic, pork, and river shrimp.

 Wulai Waterfalls (approx 1.5 hours south of Taipei). Wulai is another place with natural hot springs. What is cool about Wulai is that it's not in the city so the riverbed is all hot spring

Cable car that goes up to the waterfall. 

 The view from the cable car.

Sharon in the hot spring. Where her feet were it was perfect bath temperature. If she were to move her feet to the right of that rock, it would be hot jacuzzi temperature, and if she were to walk 3 feet into the river she'd get cool lake temperature. It was an amazing experience that is hard to explain and even harder believe as a Canadian.

It's been a great few weeks and we look forward to taking more day trips and showing you those. Godspeed all! 

- RS=T