johansvennung(臺灣) -

A trip to Jiaoxi

A new day in Scooter world...

Convenience first, environment last...

Omg...a parkinglot for pregnant women...

And a parking lot for people with high heels...so funny...usualy people who are handicapped have their own parking lot...seems like taiwan qualify women to this :S

I wish it could be more equal one day...and parking lots for guys will exist...

So funny...

Even id it was only 10-12 of them...

Omg..french croissant at 7-11...

Usually the toilets are naimed Toto, but this one was nemed Alex...

In Jiaoxi a visit to Yilan Beerbar was paid...

Its the 3rd of 4th time im here...

They only had 3 flavours this time...

But still free hotspring...

Which most people come here for...

Its more like an outside bar than a restaurant...

With a big poster...

Minimum charge 100nt...

And in nights they have a dancefloor here...

"Yilan Maitian" in chinese...

More people using the free hotspring...

and some "hotspring fish"...

And nice sound system...

They ahve both Wheat and Barley beer...

And some take away barrels...

I also had some french fries (what did johan eat today)...

Even from the street they promoted...

Nex tstop was a Houdongkeng Waterfall...

Due to rain it was not super many people there...

They had some ditch for water tansportation...

And some small waterfall at the entrance...

And then some bigger one...

And even huger uphill...

If one dared to take this slippery stair...

Some small creek...

And locals swimming...

Pretty steep...they better watch their step...

Luckily it was only a 5 minutes walk from the road...

this place must be on www.taiwanswaterfalls.com...

Omg...I held on tight when walking down here...

Later on the scooter was heading north...of jiaoxi...Omg..many new houses...

And later on this place...

Many people wanted to take pice in here...

On anything...

Omg...a turish waterpipe...

And free coffee machine....

On a telephone booth...

Omg...a german sticker...on a car,..as a decoration...

Wellcome to Jiaoxi...Taipei is some 5km on the other side of these mountains...

I also passed by this famous place...atleast for me...everytie i go around taiwan i see this "rotary and lion"-watch...

I ended the stay by do some geocache search...on Toucheng...

2014-08-09 @ 18:21:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

A visit to Tzu chi in Hualien

Me and my friends went to hualien some days ago...

After a visitn in hsinchu...we went to KFC....and made an order.. but theres seldom 100% translations in taiwan...they tranlated the "order here"-sign...but the didnt have energy to translate the "pick up here"-sign...

We later on took the train east..I dound a small space to sit in the ground...not sure why the placed a cup holder on a 0.5 meter luggage area...

Many people took off at hualien train station...

Aomse local brand imitation "twinings" tea label...

We started by going to a japanese restaurant...I have a "pizza", but it was a chicken, with tomato sauce and cheese on...so creative, that they replacd the bread with meat...

It was very good...

"pork cutlet pizza set"...

At this restaurant we also changed out clothes...since we couldnt wear shorts at the monastery...

...i visited this place some half year ago too...

Out at the ocuntry side of hualien...

With 2 swedes, Love and Kris...

we went her to find inner peace...

Our local guide showed us around...

And we was set off to work...

The munks here meditate by working...and so did we...

I was even offered a coffee...

And some taro-soup...

Perfection is the only way...we were told...

We also found some "socke-plast" in their local store....

And Kris found some combat chopsticks...

After som trip to the garden we found aloe vera...

The grass here looked like golf greens...

Omg...dragon eye fruit...they had soo much of them...

I also got a rare banana...

In the night we participated in some night activity...(night means around 19-20...)...

Omg... a frog...no animal can be killed in the monastery...so we had to watch our steps by night...

We had this nice dormitoryto stay at...it reminded me of the japanese saloon in NCTU library...

Some volunteer doing his laundry...

After some nights sleep we woke up at 03.30 something...

We staied in line with some munks and volunteer for morning pray...some bakgorund drum was making the atmosphere feeling like an indiana jones movie...

After some hours praying...we had breakfast...which means "no talking"...it was intersting...

...we later on went back to work...

Some buddha statue....

We also got a friend...some local kid who lived in USA for some years...he was interested in trains..and took pics of each train that passed by the monastery...

Not sure which this was...but he knew all names...

We got the chance to pack rice this morning...but in the afternoon we went back to the soap station...(they send alot of food and toilet articles to diffferent areas with their organasation)...

The mountains are high near the monastery...

Love and Kris ready for rice packing...

High tempo...it felt like some munks wanted to show the high tempo...but we pretty fast catched up...

Kris was always full...after breakfast we had some noodle snack...and then it was lunch....

We also got local corn...it was pretty sweat...

Some girls from mainland china was there too...and wanted to take some pics...

...our local friend still prefered to take pictures of the trains passing by...

Some mingleing in the dorm again...

Our sleeping space...it was pretty cosy...

We also got more dragon eyes before leaving...

We also pased by the store...I missed to buy some sockeplast...but got some tea and rice instead...

And some lucky lottery "wisdom words":..

We later on took the bus back to the train station...

But before that we went to some Tzu Chi museum...

Pretty big...

And talked to some organsiation memebers..over some coffee and chocolat.e..

I been here before but it was a nice reminder of how big this organisation is...

They also ahve many recyling stations...(just like i visited last year in Yongher, pulling of rings from PET-bottles)...

Some earthquake safe pelar...

After the visit i put on my shorts again...

vefore leaving the central hospital in Hualien that was sponsored by the Tzu Chi foundation...

Omf...a "coin laundry"...suitful for local maffia guys...

I ended the stay by passing by a very nice japanes/local restaurant...I havnt been to hualien that much so its always nice to drop by...

2014-08-08 @ 04:01:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

A day at northeastern Taiwan

I met Karate kid and Captain Haddock yesterday...

Dressed for success as usual...

We planned to see some water fall in the north east of taiwan...

Omg...Puyuma train is the fast one...but it doesnt stay at that many stataions...

Its hard to find the right train...some random police helped us out...

Then we went for beer...

Alfred had his tourist bag with him...

Omg...a fjällräven on the platform...

They are more often promoting taiwan destinations now on the trains...

First stop was Shifen...for some waterfall and night market inspectations... (and I took the karate kid role)...

Its pretty chaotic on the rail...

Train arrives...feels like in india...very crowded...losses are expected...

"JS"...thats me!...

This place is famous for the flying lantern, I bought one here last time i visited...

Itw a big industry...

People writing wishes...and taking pics...

Strange but funny...when the train comes everyone moves...then they get back on the rail again...

Even the pavement decoration have flying lanterns...

We went on a path fo see the waterfall..but it as very crappy, since the locals want to earn money...they more or less blocked the view...

...so that people, after walking 1-2km had to pay to see tha waterfall...

...taiwan turns touristic....

We went on some bridge back...

This is tha waterfall on a "nice day"...

Since im with the swedes, they have a different way of thinking aobut spending money...a "cheap" taxi took us 700m for 150nt...

But we still had to walk 500m since the driver wanted to save time...

Taxi drivers here act like in vietnam och main land china...

Back to the night market...

The train was pretty full back to Ruifang...where we started...

But we squeezed...since it leaves like once or twice per hour...

Once down at ruifang we took andother bus up to another village...

With nice view...

Its near Teapot mountian, which i wanted to climb for a long time...

We also had some coffee there...boosting my caffein level...

More picture taking...

Kodak moment...

It was an inferno of taxi cars driving up and down and people running back and forth...

This is the old main street...

It reminds me of italy here...

...and this town was used as model for the best anime movie ever..."spirited away" (based on imdb ranking i think)...

Many slized ice stands...

And some peanut in dark sugar cubes...

And other things you didnt knew you needed...

Anothe coffee store...

The guys wanted stinky tofu...

Every now and then one could see the view...

Funny soap store...

Slow spring roll stand...

This guy didnt want to recommend any of his products...or maybe its my chinese that sux when it comes to the word "recommend" (Tuidian)...

Asian style red balls...

My friends wanted some beer...

We got this balcony...it seemed like a coffee store...

But the view was nice...

Omg...halloween decoration...

And keelung island...the island i spent 1 day trying to get to...without result :S

The waiter spilled half our beer on the table....

...but greedy resturant owner, gave us the rest of it in glasses, pretending that nothing happened...and later on charged us full price...the consequence of tourist industry...

Alfred was enjoying his snus...(tobacco), which he brought from sweden...

Pretty interesting.....he use to buy it online in taiwan to save money...

The rest of the team also tried...

Keelung by night...

And fishing boats with strong lights to attract squid or something...

More beer...

And Monopoly deal...

Alfreds favorite game...

It was a pretty fun game...

Easy to play...

And based on taiwanese sites...

The owner didnt want to be on picture...maybe since he charged us over price and cheated us...

They had funny spelling on the places...

I might buy one of these games...

We continued on the small path through juifen...

Many people taking pics...

They even had this "selfie stick"...seems to be the new thing...

We tried to catch a cab..but it was hard.. .

After some negotiation we found some guy, he had nice music in the cab...

Then we went back to taipei...

Many people to mingle with...

Omg...the Q-square elevators had their own life...

The "le blé d´or" had hawaii theme again...

Pretty expensve,...1 beer and 1 pizza was more expensive as an "all you can eat and drink" price...

They als told us that we cant play monopoly there...strange...

Thats ok...we didnt understand chinese for a while...

It use to be my favorite beer after all...

2014-08-04 @ 20:48:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

A trip to Taidong

I did some interrailing this weekend...

Started by taking the MRT to Taipei city...and aw this disco-wheel chair...

Omg...the toilet flush sensors were sometimes put upside down in the toilet...welcome to a "never 100% country"...

Strange sign...looks like a face...

I spent the first part sitting on the floor...

Omg...in Hualian I found a Amei- store...

"Saopu Stonehenge"...I wanna go there...!

I paid a wuick visist to this place...it was close to the trainstation...

They had "deep water beer"...interesting...

And an aboriginal waitress...maybe AMai tribe...

The trip continued in early morning...

I could see the new rail way...

And the mountains never ending...

After some time I came to taidong...and observed many red flowers on the trees...

And uncle Pete s Pizzeria to be closed as usual....

I also passed by the book store...where people read books, instead of buying them...

And they recently opened a ned pizza hous called "Big Ö"...but minimum charege was 350nt per person...not usful when you just look for some snack...

Plan B was this burgerbar...last time I Was here it was closed...

It looked prettymuch like any other burgerbar in Taiwan...USA 1959-influenced...

Johnny also had a system camera...he was currently hosting his polish friend...

I wanted a beef burger...but accidentally marked chichen burger...

Noooo!, it was suppose to be a "huge burger", but the only thing that was big was the bread...then it was fille with smal pieves of meat...just as the burger store in Shilin I visited some years ago...

Well...since the peices fell out when trying to eat with my hands...the bottom bread layer was left when the burger was done...what a pity...(.it was a big bread with 4 peices of chicken separated to cover the bread)...

After this I passed by a sweet potato chips place...

And some hotel that closed...

It was said to affect the corals...

Over there...I should be able to see Green island...some 35km away...

But not its a ghost house...

I also met a super funny Amet guy...in this car...I sang some Amet music that I heard...he seemed to like it...

Next stop was some bridge in 8 parts...

Conecting Taiwan to a smaller island...

It was especially forbidden to defraud people here...su strange...(why just here)...

HEre is the brideg...

"Sansiantai island"...

And some cluffs reminding me of that its a vulcano island...

I like the east coast..and that they offer small sites for people to visit...and its pretty concentrated to Road 11 or road 9...

Many steps to walk...it was not until I reached the bridge that the wind came...it was a sweaty walk...

Hualian is there somewhere far away...

I saw that they had a light ouse here somewhere...

Omg...after beeign out in the sun, and missing a spot with sunblock or clothes...I needed to suffer with pain...

Burning myself on random places...

Reality chech, am i really at the east coast? -Yep...no helmet...

Yep!...

Nice sunset...

Next stop was Uncle Pete´s pizzeria...

I ordered some Mosambique pizza...it was as close to hawaii pizza that they had...

And i also got sauce...

Omg...there was a Motor bike festical here..so many motorbikes...(monkey bars equiped Harley davidson´s etc were here)...

Even the host "pete" was entertaining the guests with guitar playing...

I got best friend with this old lady...

I think its my 5th time to pass by, and now, after 3-4 years its was finally open when I came...

A big crew was baking...

They had some shelf for already made pizzas...

And surfing boards as decoration...

The locals wanted to go to a japanese resturant...so this was the next stop...

But they seemed to be out of many things...

By some strange reason, I got a huge glas of saké...the others got warm sake in small shot glasses...strange...

We alter on visited some Motorbike expo...

Many clubs from all around taiwan was represented....

Pretty cool...especally when they were cruising on road 11...along the coastline...

Omg...I also saw this transformer car...so cute...

And a vespa...original italian...might have been only for decoration..

And some tree house in the middle of nowhere...

I made sure to get som local frui before I took offf...

I was forced to take the slow train...so I spent some half day enjoying the view of eastern taiwan...

And observed that the warning signs for construction workers had some thai language on them...maybe thais come here to work...

I ended the trip by seeing an "H&M" bad in the MRT...omg has H&M finally opened in taiwan!?!?! congrats!

2014-08-03 @ 19:39:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

A trip to Jiayi

A trip to Jiayi was made...

...some random stop near a freeway on the taiwaense west coast...

And some nuns...omg...so intereeting...

...some stop was made at a potterplant where they made flowers on the wall...

...and where they had this old japanese railroad...

This was the station...I think this is an acient artefact on the taiwense landscape...

Omg...and aboroginal knife...

Later on I had some local food...

Nice windpower...I will make a similar one soon...

Later on in Jiayi, I saw this gay... /guy with tie), I was told that he was famous...

...all u can eat later on...

And a quick stop to this railway station...

This was near Alishan...

Where they have aboriginals...

The Tsou tribe...

Omg, I will make one of these later on...pretty cool...

3.4 different kind of bananas...I think the one to the bottom right is not that sweet...

A bridge heading to alishan...maybe broken...

But still worth walking on...

Pretty high...

They also had some temple...

And alot of dry fruit...

Omg...in Jiayi city everyone wanted grape fruit...is it good? - doesnt matter...becasue it is "famous"..the only reason to buy things...

Famous drink...

Next stop was heading to alishan...

But heavy rain was making the tip slower...

Many huge puddles on the road...

Later on it stopped rain for a while...

This is the entrance to alishan...

Jiayi is down there somewhere...I remembrer from yushans peak one could see jiai and the ocean...

A strange looking cloud that I found...

Next stop after this was a big pond...which I ran around in february in jiayi marathon...

Since lakes are rare in taiwan (atleast natural ones on the west coast) this becomes a huge tourist attraction...

Later on a new mountain area was visited...

This city was famous 10 years ago...before some huge earthquake...

"Shiau" instead of "xiao"...its noteasy to be a foreinger here when try to pronunce the chinese...since theres no conistency in the pinyin...

Local food...shrimps...like the amis (aboriginals) they fish them from the river...

What did Johan eat today?...

This bus should take us to other famous spots...

Some rural waterfall...

This use to be a lake right after the earthquake...

long time ago...

After earthquake...

They still restore the road...but its not easy, since the mountains in taiwan are said to be the steepest in the world...with earthquakes and typhoons regularly...

Some famous temple...

Tea plands...

A huge oyster...

High heel shoe and pipe...and we know the gender...

Next place was said to be a "power spot"...

With steep roads...

And a stone henge-lookalike area...

WIth many rituals...like touching the trees from bottom to top...

They also had a place that reminded me of the first cabin of the jiaminghu trail...

With local coffee...

It was pretty expensive...

We continued up to a mountain...

Some "luck"-tags...which people could buy...

This place looked like machu picchu...

Another waterfall...

Then the trip headed back to civilasation...

And the guide wanted to sell his oil...pretty touristic...

It was said to be better than enythign else of its kind...

Omg...Scania busses...

The road was still during contruction since 10 years ago...its not easy to manage mountain roads...

And this was to manage the water...

Some more tourist spot...

Cake store...

Free tasting...

Very popular...

I ended the day with a Wisby beer...

2014-07-19 @ 16:43:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Jiayi marathon and some scenic sights in middle west taiwan

On a journey at the middle west of taiwan...

This place was told to be "Famous"...

Some guy dressed like a chinese doll...

And inthe building they had reconstructed some old street for 500 million taiwan dollar...

It was called "Taiwan Times Village"...

Omg, penghu cake...

People were taking pictures everywhere...

Old Budweiser...must have been before the alcohol monopoly...

And some performance...

Omg, so many people...

An old transtaion...

And super heroes...

And Märklin...thats cool...

Many old objects...

And medicine to get bigger boobs...

And how a hooker house use to look like...

Difference girls with ranking and outfits...

"Do It Youself" machine...

More stores...they better sell alot, to cover for the 500 million NTD...

An old wagon to collect shit...used in China and Taiwan...

And alot of aboriginal stuff...

And local coffee from Nantou...

An ATM machine...so that people can spend more...

And more aboriginal stuff...this one from Orchid Island...

And information about the tribes..

More photo shooting...

After this some geocache hunt started...

At some nice garden...

Next one...the position was not 100% correct...

But found it...

This street reminded me of when I lived in the USA...

Omg, interesting tree...

A bunker...

Where the next chache was found...

Next one was in a park...

Interesting things...but no travel bug...

But strange paintings...

The ride continues...this place had just like Keelung and Hollywood, some sign on the hill with the name of the town...

Wellcome to Taiwan...a nazi logo...with "superior" on it...the political symbol has no meaning...

And in Doului, somce store with gay flag...

Next stop...a local burger bar...

So many different kinds of burgers...

And nice interior design...

We got brownies...as snax while waiting for the burger...

I had their largest one...

They also had meatballs and mashed potatoe...

Next stop...some sugar plant...

Next cache...was magnetic...

It was small and cointained just a list...

After that, near Jiayi...andother cache...

It was hidden in a pipe...

The tour continued south...

To Tainan, and a local beer bar...

5-6 different kinds...

"fest beer" with extra alcohol...like in the october fest...

And Beer Parwn...

And that classic christmas decration...

It was made in Tainan...

I wonder if they had a german owner...

all the 5 kinds of beer...

Sweet and sour sauce...

And beer prawn...

Some malt...

"German Beer Brew inTaiwan"..."Des Beer Restaurant"...

Some cache hunting, bur found drugs...

And also a visit to the tropic of cancer...

The day after I started the day with a marathon in Jiayi...it was ok...we ran around a lake...2 laps...it was surprisingly easy, I havnt ran a marathon since 2012...but could still keep a good phase...maybe my recent mountain climbing events was a good preparation....

Then heading back to taipei...seeing many bikes on road 1...

Not sure why...maybe some group race...more than 500 people...or something...

On the way back, more caches were found...

At some temple...

Interesting gas station on road 3...

I ended the day as cosbys at ximen in Taipei...

And picked a last cache...

2014-03-09 @ 05:47:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

The last 2 days at Orchid island

Time passes by fast...

...even on orchid island...its not many things in english here...this is a sichuan noodle...that i got to try at on of the villages with many restaurants...

And beef noodles...

Only one store on the island have fresh milk...

I also passed by a light house...

And walked on a path...

...that was pretty narrow...

...to find...wops..wrong way...

...some strange sand...

...ah...here the second largest lake on orchid island...

This is the chinese name...

My hostel has a terrace on the roof...put ging up there is pretty dangerous...if u fall, its 10 meters down...

But its nice...imagine a BBQ up here...

Many cars without regstration sign..I wonder if any car has a valid sign...I also was told that no one have driver license here...

Many old houses use to look like this...build upon stones...

These old houses even had postal address...

A lady from the hostel hosted and told stories about these houses...

With fire place in side...

And horns from goats and jaws from pigs...

They also had armor...when peopel trhew stones at them...

And the floor was tilting, if the kids peed, it would go off...naturally...

I later made a run to a peak...

The weather was bad...but it was the last day o the island...

No parking it saidm but firther up, I found a parking sign anyway...

Pretty strong wind...and high up...

Just like in tainan, they had a house that was old with trees inside it...

But this was build by the japanese...

Some earthquake station...

And a triaditional rest place,,,

They had arrows on the street, in case some one wonders where to go...

Later I had some rise meal...

Not many tourists here...only the local people...

And sweet and sour fling fish...the season just started in the south part of the island...

A short night visit to the local bar also...it was the only one I could find...

I had a baileys...

They give u alot of side dishes...thats nice...

And crabs...

There is the owner and a dutch girl who was doing some culture report...she stayed here for 2month...

We were treated budweiser by a local....it was nice...

Next day it was cloudy again...up there somethere is the highest peak of orchid island...I tried to go up there...but it was rainy, so I was advised not to...

The breakfast place also had diving activiites...according to new your times orchid island is top 11 diving place in the world...

A taiwanese hamburger...they are common for breakfast...

A traditional suit among the locals...

Many hens and pigs running around on the street...

I wanted to hide a gea cache...so i needed to find a jar...

And some paper...and pen...

Water proof...according to geocaching.com there are nogeo caches on orchid island...yet....

The flight was 13.40...i. think...

Omg...the highest mountain...i will for sure climb that if i return...

Even the airport was shaped as a traditional boat...

I decided to hide the geocache near theairport...

Down here...

i think its protected form storms...and goats...that walk around the island...

omg...here comes some...

These are the koordinates...

Many fligths today...

When i arrived to taidong...i started to prepare my next hike...

It was to Jiaming lake...at the northern part of taidong county...

I also tried to find a place to eat...

But usualy in taidong, things close after lunch...

But i found a nice cafe with cool interior design...like this...

Some crack in the wall, that they made art of...

Its common in taidong...art...i feel like in the south of france when im here...

...absolute vodka bottles...

Cheela, the place seems to be called...

It was just near the bike stroke that I went on last year...it was nice...

And a cosy taoilet...

And some pizza oven...I wonder if they even use this...

The tab was also interesting with a cat that u flip...

And some pulp, that was used for the plants...

I had some ice cream...

The tea spoon was a cinnamon stick...

I also had yoghurt...

Later I went to buy a lamp, in case the hike tomorrow would take long time...

I later on went up north by scooter...to the police station on road 20, near the 153 Km mark...

Some constrution workers from taizhong were also here...

It was a littelc hilly, I think we were up 2500-3000 meters hieght...

They were nice, and treated me some food...

I need carbs, for tomorrow trip...at around 22 I went to bed...

2014-03-05 @ 15:39:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Days go by on orchid island

Yesterday I went for a run around orchid island...it was ok...i started rather late...so I though a about taking a shortcut after 12km, to bad that I went the wrong direction and had to run 27km...
But its good exersice...I plan to run a marathon next weekend.
Its not the main season for tourists right now, not that many lying fish nor cultural activites...
I also planned to climb the highest mountain, but some locals advised me not to since "there are some mysterious things going on up there...", so exciting,..

It seems like they adapted to the big rubber duck even here on orchid island...

They have many stores...but this one is most commonly open, and they ahve fresh milk...

Pretty sunny...on the road that takes you around the island...

And taiwanese coffee...

Omg...no registration plate...

Epic boat...

And a colourful breakfast restaurant...

Seems like the nly one open on this low season...

More boats...

And some milk tea...

Not sure what this is, but as long as its a local speciality, its ok...

I also asked for a burger...this is pretty similar...

Some other tourists...most of them are here for diving...

Omg, harpune...some countries still have courses....I think this sigb, asks not to use them...

This cliff looks like a boat...in the second world was, some american ship were shooting towards this boat for many hours...thinking it was a japanese boat...

Omg...a cave...

Pretty nice...

And some cosy gardens...

And some art store...

He seems interesting...making his own things...

They also have many owls here...why they often have paintings of them...

Some waves...

Ths highest mountain is over 500meters high...impressive...

More boats...

And some graveyard or something...

And more caves...

Ha, they even make the benches look like the boats...

Omg, a car without sign again...

And another one...with a goat in front...

They also had some cool graphics of the aboriginal life and how to live here...

More anonymous cars...

And some boats...

And another art shop...

This is a museum...so I can take some pics...

And later we headed up to one of the lakes that they have on the island...

I better watch my step...the bridge was about to break...

Ops....here it did...

Some students climbing...

Wow...here is the lake..finally...

And a nice view of the ocean...

This is a sign regarding the nuclear waste is out in the ocean or something...

I later on planned to run around the island...or atleast half of it...

I think it was 27km, or 15km - something...I decided to go for the short alternative...

Hmm..wierd...after 10km...i didnt see any trace of comming back...

Some interesing house...

I asked the local where I was...she wasnt sure...but it seems like I went for the long alterntive anyway...

When I came back...I was introduced to the washing machine...it was pretty funny...

And we went for a local resturant...no all you can eat...actually, since it was low season...there are not many places open...

Some rice...and vegetables...

Omg...another car without sign...

Wow...they have pinyin...

When I ran around the island...I found this bar...

So I had to try it...

IT was pretty nice...we even got some flying fish...

And some other snax...its by far the best (and only) on the island...

They dont like nukes here...same as in taidong...they see taidong as the "big city"...thats pretty cool...since taipei people see taidong as a "middle on nowhere" place...

They even hace a couch here...outside the bar...but in high season there are many people around here...

This is the place...the only place on orchid island...

Some more fish...yummy!

Omg, so cute...a girl who was there showed here Paiwan outfit...she use to work in sileng...sileng...a place where I passed not so long time ago...they have a wild hotspring there in taipei...very interesting girl...

2014-03-02 @ 03:02:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

On a quick visit to Orchid Island...

Im on a quick visit to orchid island...it is interesting...many things reminds me of green island. But here they have neither hotspring nor 7-11/family mart. By some way, i feel like in sweden during summer...maybe due to the temperature and humidity, its around 20-25 degrees....

But first...train was taken from taipei...

I love the east coast...

It taidong it was raining...

And an interesting taxi driver drove to one of the only burger bars in town...

I had not only the biggest burger but also peanut butter fries...

It was pretty big...I had it last time i was here also...

"an awesome flavor of taitung"...it has an american owner...

Next stop was the airport...many surfers were here...

But most fligths to orchid island were cancelled...actually all so far...

Here is check-in...

They also ahd a museum at the airport...

And some souvenir shop...

And even taidong was decorated witht he orchid island boats...

They didnt checl much at the airport...liquids etc were ok to bring...

I used my ARC...instead of apssport...

This plane is heading to taipei...

And this to orchid island...

19 people can go per plane...and 6 depatrures were plannes originally today...

Taidong form air...

And here it is...orchid island...

And this is small orchid island...

By some reason, no one goes there...

Here is a place for nukelar waste from taiwan...

...someone has to take the shit...

Most people here are aboriginals...

We got a map...and the chance to rent a scooter...

it was ok...the island only has 1 gas sation...and no 7-11...nor hotsprings...

But alot of pigs, goats and cats running around...

I wonder how it is in typhoon season here...

This boat was also common everywhere...

I was told that pictures cannot e takes eerywhere..but when i was here...not one rejected me...

One of all the goats...

And also no helmets...

after a while, neither i was wearing helmet...

This pattern is common everywhere...

even on the gas staion...

also the stores has alot of jars without expire date...

Omg...Yushan vodka...thtats cool...

Some shop owner is buying beer...

Its also famous for the flying fish...but in the northern part of the island the seasons hasnt started yet...its 35km around the island...

They had a few specialities...

Seaweed etc...

And peanuts...

not sure...since it wasnt tourist seasons not that many places were open...

This BarBQ was open...but were selling sausage and chicken skin...not my favorite...

Many houses were only for "resting"...thus not that wind protecting...

They also ahd some churches..since many aboriginals are christian...

At the village where I stayed many houses looked likethis...pretty modern...

2014-03-01 @ 01:22:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Thursdays trips and trekking...

Taking the first MRT at 6, I had to wake up even earlier...

In a dark Taipei...i walked to JingAn MRT Station...

I lated joined the car taking us eat...

I got some nice coffee...

Nice mountains at the east coast...

And the "ghost village" near Juifen, itwas built during the gold rush...

More narrow woars in the djungle...

And some garden work...

My friend had nice plans...he already had some plants there...

We also got sandishes...so professional...

Even if we were far up inthe djungle innorthern Taiwan...there were many houese here...

Omg, Keelung island...the one I wanted to go to some weeks ago...

I later visited a recently opened café...

And made a new batch of beer...

Before I went for a hike near Taipei 101...near where I did a trail run some years ago...

The first place was called the "elephant mountain"...

Impressig stone plate...withinformation...

Anders joined up, and showed some hip mobile apps...

This is a famous spot where people take pics of taipei 101...

We also found some strange machinery...

Some cable car...

More people enjoying the view...

Sexy...

Photo shooting...

It was easy to get lost up here...there were many pathes...

What does this sign say....no pics?

Near this sign...pics?

As usualy, they were doing some constructions of the trailll

Among the people enjoying the view...

ämy friend Anders likes this cap...its common that tais wear strange words on caps...

We found many maps...but not many that showed our location...

More construction...

And some holy buddha...

I think this is the character my teacher gave me some month ago...

We were getting further and further away from Taipei 101...

Sometimes it looks strange..with the gray colours of the building...

We had some cookies during aquic break...

Andmore app sharing...

Anders has been here some years ago...he could recall...

Somered plants of a temple in the mountain...

And some old folks...drinking tea...just likethe mountains at the south part of taipei...

Some christian room...

The sun was setting...so we started to return...

Many times her in taiwan, the sun sets over the horizon.-..due

to fog or something...

We checked how far we went as welll...

Except some minor GPS errors...we could conclude our distance and speed...

Later that night I also met an aboriginal from the Bunun tribe...they are famous for archery and hunting...so cool...

I also made a quick visit to my negihbours neighbourhood...

I passed by many times but i never entered...

We had some Weissbeer from taiwan here...

And some meet...it was pretty slow kitchen...

And some salty shrimps...

The waitress was also half aboriginal...her father was Amis...

2014-02-27 @ 16:45:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

A visit to north eastern parts of Taipei...

I paid a visit to the north eastern parts of taipei today...

I took the MRT...and saw a girl with a Fjällräven bag...

People were also dancing salsa or soemthing at Dahu MRT station...

They seemed to have many hiking trails here...

And nice bridges...

I met up with Anders and Nils...

And later went up hil...

Anders were filming...some short clips...

It was a nice view...

Many locals were here to exersice...

Not sure why...I guess its the fresh air that is nice...

It was warm...I like...after some weeks of raining...

They seemed to have many hikes in the area...

Omg, somce cool wall...Anders is an expereinces photographer...he saw this was...and had the sense that it will be a cool pic...

He is using both a normal camera and his smartphone...depending on...

Nils fell asleep later on...

German cars...so many in taiwan...

Omg...a fishing store...never seen that before...here in Taiwan...

We later on headed to a dumpling place...

With hot drinks...it was hard to carry the cups...

Nice food...

We later on went for geocaching...its a fun website, if you have nothing to do...to go for a world wide treasure hunt...

One of the Geocach treassures were near this lake...

A guy who doesnt want to get wet on his head...using a plastic bag...thats good...reuse!

We had some problems with finding the coordinates...and to match them with google maps...

Here is the place...

Later we found the place...

We also found a mobile pizzeria...

And some nice park...

Maybe this could be the tressure...

Omg, many bords at this place...

Even Anders were taking pics of the birds...

Omg, Anders are sitting on the priority seats...thats the beneits with having a kid...

Welcome to taiwan...They hae "Anti-spy camera detactors"...not sure how they work...but the Tais surely figured this one out...

Next stop is the ferris wheel in Neihu...

We went to Le ble d´or...

For some honey beer...I can tell that it tastes better with some side dish...but it was still ok...

Another interesting sign...it reminds me of the "area for girls at night"-zone and the pink whistle in the bus...it makes taiwan a more interesting place...

2014-02-18 @ 10:51:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

An attempt to visit Keelung island

There are 2 island in the north of taiwan thats on my bucket list...

A sunnt day (finally), heading to those islands...

Keelung harbor...

Many traffic lights...

I love the windmill/solar panel things they have here...

All info to find the islands were not in english...but some where...so once ina while its easy to get lost...

Omg...

Once again...omg...

This is some mark from a giant rock that fell down last summer, after that I went on the caoling trail...

Look at this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xG2DgEcxEw

Some trace from where the stone slided down can also be seen...

Shit, the ferry to Keelung island doesnt go today :(

Many boats are out...but they seemto be fishing or diving boats...

This is as close I get to see the island...

I saw some other people glancing at the board...maybe more people wanted to go there...to bad...

They also had a fish market nearby...

I thoguht about having deep fried fish with mayonaisse...but they didnt have it...

Omg, a boat with the name "lanyu", it means orchid island in chinese...

More trip boats...

It looks a little bit like turutle island from here...

Heading back to the Heping island...

Many people park where there is a red line...I think its forbidden...

But who cares...

Omg, so much trash...thats what the ocean have to offer...it reminded me of indonesia...where the ocean was a place to dump trash...

Heping island was connected to land...

It was a park with some regulations...

And some smaller islands nearby...

It seemed to be like a big tourist attraction...

They heven had some duck- traces...

And some cool path, but due to some stones falling down, they blocked that road for visitors...

The cliffs here were pretty cool...

Omg, people seeing to warning signs and road blocking as a recommendation...that seems to be common here...

More cool cliffs...

ANd some military houses...

This cave was build by dutch people some hundred years ago...they still have some dutch paintings and text in the cave...

It was made as a cover when trying to conquerer the island...

More cool rocks...

And Keelung island....

It feels like a failure eeytime I see the island...I have to come back!

Other people so saw "recomendations" or "decoriations" when seeingthe signs...

Wow, they have a big spa here too...

...with showers...

400 years ago...this is what the spanish, portugese and dutch people saw in the horizon...I guess...

Omg, bepemefe (taiwanese pinyin) in the toilets)...

With some beach...

And more energy stations...I like...

Omg, Keelung signs as in Hollywood...

I remember when I cycled around taiwan, it was hard to find road 2 in keelung...it was all a mess...

Can you find the sign dor "road 2"?

Omg, family mart have strawbery flavoured ice cream now, everyone wants to try...

"its famous"...but limited...

This machines was working hard...

And many people waiting...

It was ok...

The trip continues...and I can still see keelung island...

Except the pier...im still thinking about how taiwan looked 300-400 years ago...

And keelung island :(

This is a new house near the northest point of taiwan...

Many people are enjoying the warm weather...forst day without rain...

Next stop was a harbour...where boats had lamps...

I think its to attract squids or something by night...

I can recall that I saw them when I cycled taiwan as well...

"Tsunami evacuation route"...I feel safe...

Twin Candlesticks...next stop...

like Swedish Raukar...

There are alot of hotsprings here...not tat far from Yangming shan in taipei...

Some happy buddha was also resting here...

"This volcanic group contains the est preserved traces of volcanic activity remaining in Taiwan..." better than turle island (thats classified as an active volcano I was told)...? strange...

The Rauk in a circle...

Interesting...

Omg "JS", my initials...

Many people were also taking pics on the island and ocean...

And some monument of the Rauks...

Passing by the mountian, on the way to Taipei (8km from there)...

Next stop was at JB´s Diner, a recently opened place...in Tianmu...

"Satisfying your burger"...what do they mean?

The prices were ok...

6 people were working in the kitchen...

I had a bacon burger...

They also had some lantern festival event near the old flora expo...

NExt stop...some japanese restaurant at Q-square...

Japanese salad...

...soup...

And sushi...

Next stop was Ireland´s Potato...

They didnt have mashed potatoes, witch cheese...not sure why...

But I ate them while watching the Lego movie...

2014-02-17 @ 04:41:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Taipei Beer run

I came to taipei today at 6...

Back in taiwan, the heaven for scooter lovers...

And where birds are not allowed to take bus...

Directly when I arrived to went to the beer run near guring riverside park...

Many people were there...

My friend christopher was promoting it...

They didnt have any beer at the start, so many people went to a local 7-11 to buy some...

Many foreingers there...

The queue system didnt work totally...some queues were 1 or 2 people...

Long queue here...people prefered line up on this one...

I haf a Gold medal Taiwan beer...

They started people every 20 minute...

And we needed tattoos and an age check before we could start...(but they never checked it for real, i guess anyone could have started and participated for free)...

Many people taking pics...

And alot of light beer waste...but this we could not drink...

Everyone needed to wear the "beer run" t-shirt...

Some people ran, some walked, it was 3 km in total...

At many places they already wasted all the beer...I guess the early birds had more fun...

The first pitstop...

I felt sorry for people try to cycle here...so crowded...

And no strucutre...the kids working here did now know how to manage it...they asked everyone to queue somewhere else...(i guess its a consequence of the high power distance in this culture), since no one came with any good solution, just do as they were told...(barely anyone got to drink here...(when I passed by)...

They had this malt drink at the first stop...

The ran continues...

Ukulele performance...

I use to run on this field...its close to zhonghe...

Some maze that the participatns needed to passs, mad upon beer cans...

They were all full...

Some people took the bottles....

After a while everyone ended up stealing cans from the decoration...

After onther 10 mins we came to the end...

And got a medal...

With super long queues for everything...I alwyas wonder why they dont have double instead of single queue system...chalmers often has it, it speeds up the distirbution by double...

This was some competition, that people lined up for...not sure what you could win...

More queing...

Another queue...

I won a beer helmet...

And tried some peanuts, with malaspices...it makes my mouth go numb...not a good idea to eat if i want to be able to drink...

The queue were very slow, many foreingers blocked the entrance...since they didnt display who won, except on internet, they wanted to ask if they won, befoing queuing for 20 minutes...

But if they won, they took the prize directly...it was irritating for those who lined up...

But drunk foreingers dont care about others...

This is the prize...

Omg, a guy sneaked a whole box of beer...

I had my beer from the maze...some nice guy shared...

Else everyone got 3 cans...

I went back to the maze to see if they had any cans left...but it was all gone...

Some guys took a box of beer...and so did I...they had soo much left over...

Later I went to an all you can eat and drink...

It was with hotpot and sushi...

And Tsingtao beer...

Joel was amazed by the fish...

We also went by costco...

And tried local whisky...

And checked the wine...

Omg, christmas is approaching...

Later we went out drinking...and catching up on time...

Many different kinds of beer...

I also brought my glass from the oktoberfest in Munich...

To get the real beer feeling...(but it didnt taste better)...

They restores the hi-life near Joel...not sure why...but it was a face-lift...

2013-10-20 @ 08:33:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Rafting in Ruisui

I went rafting in Ruisui today...more pics and story will come later...

Early sunday morgning. looking north on road no 9...

The only burgerbar is closed...

At the local 7-11 they have Ruisui milk...

The fulong lookalitke trainstation is empty...

My breakfast for the day...7-11 coffee and some european chocolate cake...au usual I wonder if they even had this in europe...

The local TV showed some canadian having a bread store in hualian...I missed that...

100km to Taidong, and 27 to Fuli, where they have a high waterfall I want to see...

A taxi helped with transportation from the train station to the rafting area east of the village...

Xiuguluan River...

The rafting is heading to the museum i visited this february...

Some days one can go further, maybe all the way to the ocean...

It is a long river (for beeing in taiwan)...

Many ppl come here for rafting....even munks...

Omg, a universal advertisement...just change the product in the girls hand...

Our group was special, hosted by aboriginals (Qimei/Amei tribes)...with local food etc..

The big tourist groups are going extra fast down hill...

First an interoduction movie...

The heading to the river...

Many boats were waiting...

So touristic...

Our group had 3 boats...

This guy is an aboriginal...

And this guy too...a leader in his tribe...

We were suppose to wear clothes...and still walkin the water...

Bettercover up, the sun is strong...

And some gray helmets...

We started a little earler...than the other groups...

Paddling, paddling...

This guy was from main land china...

The stream wasnt that stron yet...

But there were some waterfalls ahead I could hear...

And the middle range...

We had this rope in the middle, to hold on to, in case of a bumpy ride...

"Zuo hua" (left side paddle) or "You hua" (right side paddle) were things i heard fromthe guy in the back, who was incharge of the boat...

Many other boats were approaching, Ruisui was in the background...

I think out boat was the fastest...

"Hold on to the center rope!"...the ride is getting bumpy...

Another calm area...

We had a motor boat following us all the time...

Monkeys in the terrain...this is the same area as the "monkey bridge", which I visited last year...when I went to taidong...

The sun was strong, I had to put on more sunblock every 30 mins i think...

Tired boats...

This guy looked like my old classmate Henry...

We got stuck on a stone, so the other boats passed by after a while...

The ride was like4-5 hours maybe...

Buffalos at the river bank...

Waterfall...

This guy fell in the water twice...not sure why he never held on the rope...

More waterfalls...

The season for rafting is in the summer...

The assiscance boat took a break...driving up on the bank...

More buffalos...

After a while we went up on land...

The aboriginal guide wanted us to show some stones that we needed to pick...

A member of the Qimei tribe...

Tis boats guide jumped into their water to push the boat into the side...

Everyone were wet...

The stoned we were suppose to pick were volcano stones...since they survived heat, and can stand temperatures up to 500-700 degrees...

Some other assisstance boat...

Suddenly many boats passed by, and i realized how touristic this thing is...25 million taiwanese ppl, and if jus some percent wanna go rafting on this small island, these aboriginals earn alot...

This is the black stone that we needed to pick...

Yep...it passed the smash test, no cracks...this good to heat up...

More by passers...

Some people didnt find any black stones...

More boats...

They did barely pabble, their assistance boat were pushing and pulling them...

But i guess these people are not used to exersice...

Time to continue...

More sunblock on...

But this time we did some floating exersice...

A floating train...

It ws fun...and went as fast as the boat...

Pretty fun...

An aother aboriginal...so cool...

Paddle time again...

After another 30 mins of paddling, we did another stop...

This was some qimei camp...

They just adjusted the boats first...then we were suppose to se how they catched shrimps and eat fish...

A shrimp trap...

Omg, alot of shrimps...

More boats passing by...

Pulled...by a boat...i wonder if they call this rafting...?

After the shrimp trap checking, we headed up to the camp...

Muddy...but interesting, it must have been fun, living here 500 years ago...

More ppl, most probably from taipei I was told...

The hosts prepared some food...

No one saw us from here...Its prettyy cool to be in the jungle of taiwan...

The taipei people were very noisy...

The guide spoke chinese...

We got some bambo mugs...

More noisy boats pulled down the river...

By some fast motor boat...

We also got some flower juice of some kind...

The instructor told us about how the aboriginals use to do...

I later got to keep my mug, finding out after some month that it was a worm in it...eating it up from inside...

Some fresh water fish...

So professional, river tracing shoes...these guys had the right equipment alright...

Then they showed us how to catch fish the old style...

It didnt seem that hard...

But no fish in the net...

More boats comming...this is surela a big business...

Our group were more for aboriginal culture...theirs were just "going down the river"...

Many people...

Once in a while people fell down...

These guys were more combat with helmets...they were heading further down than others...in the future it will be possible to go all the way down to the ocean...they told us...

Now we coulod try to catch fish...

Another poor guy falling from the boat...

City people...

Back on our boat...

Omg, the river speeds up...

We also tried to just go with the stream...

floating by ourselves...it was fun...

especially since we were paddling, the other boats that were pulled passed by, over and over...

I just tried not to get un burned...

Yingxiao...

Some animals along the river side...

More bumby road...

Some animal again...

This was the end...

It was the same village I passed when I drove scooter aroung taiwan...i visited an aboriginal museum here...

Most boats stopped here...

Then the boats and visitors drive back to the start...and new visitors comes...

Some aboriginals helping us out...

This guy was funny...

Amis...the chinese name of their sub tribe Amei...the japanese people forced them to wear special colours of their clothes...long time ago, to separate them from the south people...

More city people who were pulled down the river...

It was a fun ride...

But I want to go all the way down to the ocean...

So many boats...every day...this is an intersting place...however, taiwan has more people than scandinavia...so i guess its not that many visitors, from a national point of view...

Everyone has to stop here...

Some organisor telling the city ppl what to do...

Qimei, is the name of the tribe in this village...

We later on took a shower...

Omg, leaking...

My shoes and sox were wet, but in 30+ deg, they will dry pretty fast...

Here is the museum I visited before

Binlang trees...

At the museum we had lunch...

Some nice food...

Not sure...but i guess its aboriginal food...

but it was pretty similar to normal food...atleast most of it...

But this was not...

This i tried some time before...

We also revisited the museum with a guide...

This guy is from mainland china...but studies in singapore...

This guide is aboriginal...

Somedecorations...

This is an instrument...

And some necklaces...

The black one belongs to a shaman...they dont have a shaman here anymore...but north of hualian there lives one...

This is some other tool...

And some clothes...

And the codex of how to wear clothes...

Depeding on age...they have differnt dresses...

They are mostly very colourful...

And also some traditions...

These guys are also on the pics...

It seems to be a small society after all...

This guy is also in the tribe...

This girl is some admin, she collects money...

This pic I like...i think i took a pic of it last time i was here too...

On the way back, we could se the river again...I remembered that i went here by scooter before...

A bumby ride...

And alot of landslides...

Some cool antenna...I wonder hoe they put it up there...maybe by helicopter...

Another slowdriving tourist bus...

And the reef vally between Hualian and Taidong...

I like this place of taiwan...pretty isolated and peaceful...

And untouched, taiwanese people prefer city life...and convenience...

Kater at ruishui I found a giant store...nice...

The ticket system is in chinese...

I treid to find out how far the waterfall is, in Yuli, that I want to visit so much...or luoshan waterfall found at http://taiwanswaterfalls.com

The trainstation of Ruishui, they dont have any electrical trains here..from hualian they only go by diesel i think...but they are currently building a new railway to change that...

Nice view of the valley...

Not far on the other side is the ocean...maybe I will buy land there in the future...

I later passed by some local ice cream store in hualian...

Tomato or something and chocolate...not important, i just to supposrt local production...

It was close to the trainstation...

I also went for a walk, trying to find a burger bar...but without result...

Back on the train I saw the road up to taroko gorge and also the place where my counsin johan lives...

Its a very peaceful place, he told me that I could live there from some days if i want, and I might do it...its fun with new perspectives of life...

I also bgouth a beer, for the train...i like going by train...

And some peanutbutter M&M´s...the day is saved...

2013-08-04 @ 17:43:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

A visit to Hualian

I paid a visit to hualian ths saturday...

Early morgning train leaving 06.30...thats usually the time, to make it to the east coast in time...

Equiped with pants and shoes...

The trainstation in Hualian was full of information about things to do...its a tourist place...even if i seldom come here...

My double cousin Johan picked me up...its the first time I meet him here in taiwan, even if both of us leved here for a long time...

It was nice, we were heading to a Buddhist hospital...

IIt was the largets hospital in Hualian, sponsired by Tzu Chi Foundation...a super big foundation world wide...

They even had an intersting information section, like a museum about the foundations history...

A cool piggy bank...

They explained how they worked and their porpose...this are shoes that they sell...

They have alot of volunteers...

It was a problem, that money was such a critical factor to get medical treatment, but the foundation managed to get sponsorship by super many volunteers...here are pictures written by members who couldn not write, wo describe their names, or theor profession etc...super cute...

here is a sponosret house built in iran...with the same cooling system I had as a business idea in the hult cometition some year ago in shanghai, its a traditional technology, that is kind of rare nowadyas since many plp want AC instead...but by far more reliable...

Here is an earthquake room...a soft floor is used to simlulate an earthquake...

They had many volunteers, thats one of their strenght...

This is a modelof earthquake proof houses that they built in the south of taiwan...

And here are actovities in china...its the first organsiation that was accepted by the chiense government....

Recycling efforts in taiwan...

Recycling reults in taiwan, T-shirts made of PET bottles...

And some buddhe picutre, reminded me of a pic I saw north of Kaohsiung at the big buddha statue...

Omg, swedish activites...they have some representation in gothenburg...

This is a method that is not erthquake proof...

Tha this is an earthquake proof construction...

We continued to the hospital entrance...after the guided tour in the musem area...

Some jesus look alike painting...

Looks like anormal hospital...

Even if it was Tzu chi...

Hualien by bus...

Next stop the monastery north of hualian...

The dorm...

Johan himself...we found a lizzard on the path...

And the main building...

This was the oldest house...

We also passed through the garden...

So many plants...this munk seems to be an expert...they have ecological:ish methods...

And many kinds of vegetables...

I was offered to work here for some days, it sounds tempting...

The toilet...super intersting construction...usable in many ways...I wish we knew this on last years housing competition in Hults business school...

Many people lived here ...more than 100...

It started with this small house...

And then it grew...they had some models showing the history...

And other peices...

Johan has some nice bracelet...

It had a buddhist message on it...

Here is the research department, instand rice was invented here...pretty cool...

We continued to the shop...many books with the message of the master munk...

But i wanted to buy the instant rice...just add cold or hot water...and its done...

I said "xiexie" when I left the store...but Johan corrected me, teaching me "Gan en"...its a more polite way to say thanks...

More parts of the monestary...japanese influenced?

Even if they had many floors, it was energy efficient.with wood and deep light corridors, to minimize the need for lights...

And tha main hall...looks a little liks christ on the statue...

East pillow had a speaker near it, so that everyone could hear...

No AC; but many fans...just like i like it...energy efficient...

Later we went to eat in their dining hall...

The food was prepared by the munks...we did the dishes ourselves...I could take picture of anything, except the master munk...

I thought about what I shoud give my second cousin, since he invited me here...but I realized that it would be better to donate money to the foundation, so that it did good...

I had to fill in a form, and got a receipt for my donation...

We coninuted to the cafeteria...mostly in wooden interior design...

And some cool bonzai tree...

Peanut cookie...typical taiwanese...

And some TV show, created by the foundation, about intersting situations that happend in life...

A big bell...

Many ants...some vision the master munk had about her standing at mount everest...many supporters participated in creating this sculpture...

We continued to the garden...

Johan had to continue to work...

It was relaxing here...

Just th ekind of garden I wanted to have at home in sweden...

I was taught that one difference between a buddhist place and taoism, or any others...is that the buddhist place doesnt have dragons...for instance...

The mountains or hualian...

Many people were walking around in guided tours here...

We took the shuttle bus donwtown after the monastary visit...

The roads of hualian...

They had some ceremony at the hospital...

Buddhist Tzu-chi volunteers...

We coninuted to a local burger bar, but it was closed...

So was the toursit place...

And the beer bar...even if they was said to be open 13-01...hmm...

Yilan beer bar, in Hualian...

At the trainstaion many aboriginals were dancing and singing...pretty good...i liked their songs...

They had pretty dresses...

Probably the Amis tribe...the most friendly among the aboriginal tribes, they told me...

And some leader...

And girls...

I also went to have some local ice cream...

White and milk chocolate...

Homemade ice cream...i forget to ask how they transport the icecream to ths store...or if they live in the store...

More dancing...

This is how you decide if you are an adult in taiwan...my lenght...

Discrimination...no waiting zone for male...at night...

Ruisui was the next detination...

Omg such a big waterfall...it was listed on taiwanwaterfalls.com as one of the highest...but its some 35:ish km south of ruisui...

It was dark by now...

Not to many trains stops here...the trains going here on the east coast are driven by diesel...since they dont have and electrical wire on the rail...south of hualian or something...

The trainstation itself looked alot like ths one in fulong...

First stop a food place...since the dinner resturants in hualien were closed...

This was nice...fried something...

And meat...

And my choice...sweet and sour sauce...

Aborignal pattern in the resturant...

This was the dinner resturant...

Heineken adds. I wonder if heineken pays for this...

Also a stop was paid at the local tea bar...

The day ended with passion fruit juice...

2013-08-04 @ 17:04:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Mudrun

I went to a mud run yesterday...and some beer bars...

The race was in the middle of taiwan...so we took the bus from taipei main station...

Many people were there...

We got some free things...like a scarf...it reminded me of the scarf I got from ABB when I did a company visit there some years ago...not sure about this one..the difference between "scarf" and "scarf" and how the first "scarf" was designed...

My friend recommended Catch 22, its s good reflection about some cultures, like the taiwanese one, once in a while...

Many people were sleeping on the bus...but we had a nice chat...

Well at the race area we had to walk to some hill...

Some international company "merrell" were you hosting...

We had some tattoos that we needed to paste...i had some problems with mine...

Oskar was prepared for the mudrun...

I made some "ones" by myself...

It was interesting, they had some numbers "0-800" "800-1200" etc, but only for decoration...people were sorted by distance in the race...

Oskar had a lunch voucher, i did not get one...but they said I could take the food anyway...

Nice view of the city...

And many freebees...

No trash cans...

People were getting new tattoos...as well...

It was a big city...

And some common warm up...

Just like Goteborgsvarvet in Gothenburg...

And many hills around the city...

Now the race was starting...

After some hour it was over...covered in mud...

More freebees...

It was hard to get clean...but we felt clean enought to pay a visit to the city...

Just had to finish the lunch box, consisting of some interesting bread...

Oskar was streching...

Here in the mud, people were suppose to clean themselves up after the race...

We asked some random people for a burgerbar...

And headed downtown...oskar fell asleep...

Or almost...

Omg, a flajjraven bag...mopre and more people are using these nowadays...

In this city in the middle of taiwan, one can use the bus card from any other city in taiwan, thats pretty conveinient...

We were recommended this burger bar..

Atleast it was central...

And famous...Oskar was not impressed...

The menu was all in chinese...

I met a friend who was christian, so interesting...

I ordered the biggest burger they had...

It 4 meat patties...

Oskar had some pineapple burger...

But the meat patties were kind of crappy, we both agreed upon...

Next stop a beer bar...

Omg, a hocker house...

This was the beer bar of the day..."Deluxe brewhouse"...

It looked the same sine I was here last time...

They "amerian eagle" logo...

I started with a weissbeer...

They charged us 250nt, ans claimed it was "salsa night"...so we had to pay extra...so useless, the onkly difference from other nights was that they had salsa music in the background...

And that some local people were dresseup up...

Some guy looked like Ironman...

And some people were dancing...

I had some barley beer later on...

And got some chichen nuggets...

Oskar was headingfor a girl looking lake laura croft...

Hmm...slowly approaching...

And makeing contact...

They seemed nice...

Even the guy at the cachier was ok, but he told us different things than the waitress about the price...travelling in asia for some years u know all their tricks...

Anyway, I refused to accept anything else than the offer they first told me...

I also passed by Mcdonalds for a Mcflurry...after the beer bar...

Taixhong train station...

Late night in Taizhong...heading back to taipei...

2013-07-21 @ 18:30:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Hash run in Fulong

I went to fulong today...

I took the train...passed by a 7-11 where i met a local who dont know what lining up means...she just sneaked ahead so interesting...

THe ticket machines at the trainstation only took coins...

"extra cool tshirts"...maybe I need those...

Oskar was prepared, for the "freedom hash run", since it was USA´s national day some days ago..this hash run was a Freedom run", oskar was thus wearing swedish cloloures shirt and brittish sox, to show the americans that history comes from europe...

He also studies chinese...

And played some saxophone...

Finally at fulong...

Sunny day...

Many people met up at the meeting point...

It was a temple near the beach...

Signing up...it cost 200nt...

Many foreigners....

Oskar was preparing the run...

Many old men were also there...

This is Anders from Sweden...he use to come here once in a while...

The beer truck arrived...

And the people creating the track left...

And then we took of...some girls started earlier as well...

Oskar told me to run slow in the beginning, and faser in the end...

We went in the forest...on pathes many times ppl were lost trying to find the right path...

On mudd etc..

And some creek...

And a river....

And on a wall...

Finally after some hour, I saw this sign, i was told that this was the end...think it was about 10km...

Then it was beer time...

Many people discussing the day...

And they played some american songs...

I had some snacks,,, they were good...

Some dogs were also playing in the area...

More drinking and mingeling...

And more snacks...

And then people were heading to the beach...

Oskar thought the americans were interesting...with their mindset...

Clouds in the horizon...

Some were talking about a ceremony...

But most ppl were heading to the water...

Firsti didnt want to swim...

But everyone else went there...

Even oskar...so i joined to...

The rain never reached us...

It was a nice evening...

They had somestage on th other side of the beach, for next weeks beach party here...

More music...

And beer...

And american flag...

They were interesting...

And some ceremony...

With firecrackers...

For freedom...they said...

Omg, someone hadaFjällrävenbag...

Oskar was mingeling...

A guy Chris joined us back to taipei, he has only beenintaiwan for 4 month, and works as an english teacher in Miaoli...

We later on headed to 1885 burger...oskars favorite place...

Nicewith koppargerbs cider...

Oskar showed me his favorite...

It was nice...

But the frenchfrieswere fake...

Not totallyfulll...thats a minus...

Tomorrow is monday...hao3

2013-07-07 @ 17:25:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

quarter ironman

I did an quarter ironman yesterday...it was ok, i burned my skin...on my right hand, i missed a spot when putting sunblock all over my body, several layers...
I took it rather easy...might have been the last one up from my starting group after the swimming part...

We swam in a river...

Slow Johan, enjoying the stream...

but I catched up on bike and by foot...as usual...

No running in the transit area...

It was warm..and sunny, I drank 2 liters of beer the night before...so i had plenty of carbs in my body...

After some 3 hours...I finished...

I also passed by a steak house/burger bar...it was ok, they said they had a "big burger"

however, the big part with it was the bread..the meat was like a BK whopper size. (Cowboy station)

I also lost my camera...somewhere...hmm...

But managed to take this pic, I was treated some snails ata local resturant in taipei...

I ended the day with some beers, with my friend Joel...he just fixed so that Pripps Blå, a famous swedish beer will be sold in 7-11 this summer...what a man...here he got 1000nt from me...

Last years swedish beer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=romxzHyGufQ

2013-06-03 @ 05:28:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

Beer safari in Taizhong

Taiwan has many cities...today im visiting Taizhong...almost 3 million people live there...even if its just 150-200km from taipei, the cutlre is totaly different regarding consumer behaviour...I also think the maffia is stronger here...

From taipei I took train...and found a paper plane compeitoin at Taipei main station...

I also had some korean food there...

Before taking of...to Taizhong...

In taipei main station they sell alot of tourist things...as well as alot of snacks from all over taiwan and near by countries like japan and korea...

It took some hour by train to get to taizhong...

From the train station it is about 3-4km to the first beer bar (walking distance)...however bus number 5 takes you there too...

I got some traffic card that I could use in the bus...

The first visit was paid at Deluxe Brewhouse...

It was pretty big and reminder me of Beerworks in Jhubei...

They had 3 different kinds of beer plus many flavours...and some 50% off, on the second glass offer...

Weissbeer, pilsner and some dark draft...

They had service charge, and as usual, when they have service charge the service is a little worse...

They also used the german theme....with many flags...

Second round was Weissbeer vs Strawberry beer

They have some factory in Tucheng, taipei it said, but i saw alot of brewing equipment in the resturant too...

They even had their own toothpick paper...

Pretty big...

And coffee grains in the toilet...i guess for people to smoke here, even if it is illegal...maybe a requirement from the maffia...

Many couches were blue and white...like the colours of Gothenburgs football team IFK Göteborg...

The trip continued2km north east...to the next destination...

We passed many resturants (famous ones)...it was about 2km to the next brewery...

Wow, this pace if famous from Lonely planet...(A random resturant in taizhong downtown)...

Interesting architecture...the elevators are seen as two lights going up and down on the dark wall of the building...

Omg, I use to have a friend in the swedish marines called Bellini...maybe his family owns this pasta place...

Here is the next place...(a little dark)...

Their toilet door was fun...you locked it in an old fashined way...

They had 4 kind beer, and since they ahd anniversary, 500ml beer were only 100nt...

else this are the original prices...

They had many pictures from germany as well...

And just as the other place, this showed baseball...

We got the beer in plastic glasses...the green on is some algea beer...

these are dark beer, weissbeer, and the one in the middle is just a mix of the dark and light one...(so in theory they had 3 kinds of beer)

This was the name...

I bought a pizza...the other place "deluxe" also offered hamburger...but i didnt try it...

The green one left...

I took it with me for the third brewery...

Taizhong nights...

RuiDeBao...is the third place name...

A little bit smaller that the two first....

Also with german inspiration...

And some instruction about how they brew...just like the Barshi place in Beitou has...

Omg, they serve "dolphin" or something...or many just a wierd translation...

They had 2 types of beer here...one weisbeer and one with more hops...

The dark one tasted like the beer i make...thus a very standard flavour...

All places i visited offers the plastic cylinger tap...

It is easier when you are many people...to buy that one...

Reichburg is the name of this resturant...

German sausages....and sauer kraut...

And some kebab without kebab sauce...

Seems like they got some award...

I also got a voucher...on which I could collect stamps...

The last train back to taipei leaves around 21...the last High speed rail train as 23 something...

And the last busleaves at 23.30 and 23.40...

So bus was the best choice...

The bus leaves nearby the Taizhong train station...

A maffia guy or something...he let me take a picture of his face...he had tatoes all over it...

The bus had toilets...so i could save a beer for that...no need to waste it...

Omg..."Please dont hand on your leg"..."dont sit for children below 145 cm"...its always interesting to travel in taiwan...i wonder what they really mean....

Taipei was raining...super slippery with my flipflops...since the pavements have very slippery stones...and my flipflops is made of a weird material...

2013-03-31 @ 06:20:00 Permalink Allmänt Kommentarer (0) Trackbacks ()

In taidong

The following night was spent at Johnnys house...in taidong...

He had Ikea things in the room...

And he insisted of driving the car...omg...

And we went downtown...to some stores...

And played at an arcade...

The games ended pretty soon...

This fighting game was fun...

Wow...a famous place...it must b good...(tai logic)...

A tree house in central taidong...

And some art...

This house is super central...I was told that the restaurant is not that good...

"An introduction to logic..."

Nice interior design in the house...

This is interesting, the closest Mcdonalds is to the right, but they promote a more remote one...for some reason...

We also headed a bit up on the hill that we skipped last time...

Just some temples...

And old people playing karaoke...

We continued to eat lunch...and parked tha car near this nice house...

Sams burger, the resturant thats open in theory 11-22 but in reality at lunch, and after 17-18...

Some blackboard paintings...

"sams f**kin hungry now"...seems bug...i will have that...

It was pretty big..

Later on we went to johnnys again and ate some local fruit...(the one i bought last time)...

Its a very local fruit...

There after we went to a hot spring...

We could cook our eggs there...

It was not that big...and not that structures in the sense of temperatures...(200nt)...

Rain was approaching, so the trip continued north...

A police controling the traffic lights...

Omg, a bike kit at 7-11 so professional...

Road 9 seems nicer thatn road 11 on the east coast...both has plenty of 7-11 stores...

I saw some fireworks later on that night...

Ath this elementary school, where I slept...

They had english translations of almost everything there...

In guanxi they hace a famous bike way...

Omg, road 20, I was very close to climg jiaming moutain, to go to jiaming lake...but ppl said it might be hard, due to the weather...(i planned to do it over the day, since I know some people who has done that)...

It goes cross the island, to road 3 where I went yesterday...

I went a while on road 20...and passed a Bunun museum...to bad that it was closed...

I wanna learn more about aboriginal culture...

This is as far as it gets...almost...

There were many statues like this, here at the road 9 valley...

A sign saying that the raod is closed after some 500k or something...

These "hand in hand" paintingis are very common in taiwan, it seems to be a symbol of aboriginals (as well as the diamond shaped pattern)...

Here goes road 20, I hope to be back soon, and climb some moutains here...

Most roads in the mountains follows a river...

Some aboriginal photos...

More paintings...

Bad weather...

I had breakfast in Yuli...some toast...

And "brownish" milk...

It was said to be 100%...

Omg...seeing this at home, one would think it was something bad...here in asia this (most often inverted) symbol has a positive meaning...

A new railroad is beeing built...

Omg..."warning for birds" thats rare...I never seen that at home...

I also passed by a coffee plantage...

A japanese guy cane here some centory ago and made these plantages...

They had many products...

And equipment...

ALot of coffee trees...

Like this one...

With the red coffee bean...we were told that we could eat them (the visitors were guided)...

Hmm...I brought some beans home...to plant...

Some beans were brown and dry...

They also had facilities to camp...

We also got some tea and coffe wjhile there...

They had many products...

The coffee I liked...

I bought this...it was pretty expensive 1000nt for a small package...they had one for 600nt, with another bean....but i prefer arabica...and i like to support locally produced items...

Omg, the tropical of cancer...

They had many sites to visit on the east reef valley...

And the road I wanted to go on...

Next stop was Ruishui milk farm...

SImilar to the one I visited when I did my ironman in taidong 2 years ago...but this was bigger, since they sell their milk at 7-11...

I bought some pudding, ice cream and milk...

Local produced they said...but they only had 300 cows here, I doubt that this is their only faciility, since they are selling their milk at the 6000 7-11 that exists in taiwan...