Joan once mentioned an idea for a book called “Love and Layovers” about a couple who travel the world together and share all of their adventures. While the book still warrants further development, I was inspired to give this post that title since that’s exactly what we did. Our trip to Thailand began with a flight from Portland to Los Angeles. After a short layover, we flew to Taiwan for four days before continuing on to Thailand.

I am surprised that I’ve never found a direct flight from the US to Bangkok given the number of Americans who travel to Thailand. And it’s not because of the distance. The first flight I took to Bangkok went from Los Angeles to Dubai, which is halfway around the world, and then back to Bangkok, which is half way back to LA!

Flights to Bangkok typically go through Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. The one that used the least amount of our airline miles was through Taiwan, so we booked that. Since Joan had never been to Taiwan, and we had plenty of time in SE Asia, I decided to make our layover for a few days. In fact, by booking our airline mileage ticket to Taiwan instead of all the way to Bangkok, we saved about 20 thousand miles on each ticket. That meant we could fly Asia’s budget airline to complete the trip for about $100 each.

Once we arrived in Taiwan, I began to regret that I hadn’t made it a longer layover, but I decided to make the best of it and concentrate on two places: Taipei and Jiufen. Taipei is known for its food and Jiufen is known for its tea. Taipei is actually pretty diverse with lakes, canyons, tropical beaches and more than 280 peaks over 9000 feet.

Taipei

We arrived at 5 in the morning, and I’d booked a hotel for the previous night so we could check in when we arrived. After a short nap, we headed out for a coffee and quickly learned that Taiwan is another country that doesn’t serve coffee before 10am. Fortunately, we found a Starbucks that opened at 7. It was odd to walk what is a normally bustling area and see only a few random tourists, probably also looking for coffee.

After enjoying our coffee from a picture window of a three story Starbucks, we headed to Dadaocheng which is an older neighborhood known for its herbal medicines and apothecaries. It has a charming walking street that runs through the center of the neighborhood. I learned about it from a Netflix TV series called “A Taiwanese Tale of Two Cities”, comparing the lives of a Chinese medicine practitioner growing up in Taipei and an engineer growing up in San Francisco. In addition to the many herb shops, there were several restaurants, and we decided to stop into one for some noodle soup.

Once we reached the end of the neighborhood, we hopped into a taxi and headed for the northern edge of the city. Taipei is the only city I’ve been to with hot springs within city limits. In fact, there’s a stop on one of the metro lines for the hot springs. While we didn’t indulge ourselves this time, we did walk around the park that served as the source for the springs.

I’d visited a couple years before and used the Long Nice Hot Spring Beitou hot springs. It is a private pool, which seemed more appealing than the crowded public facility. The public facility is co-ed so you have to wear a bathing suit, but the private one has separate bathing areas for men and women so you go in the nude. The same ceiling covered both the mens and the womens areas, and you could hear the women chattering away. They must have thought there weren’t any men on our side as none of the men were talking. I guess it was uncomfortable enough that we were all in the same room with our clothes off.

We left the hot springs area and caught the metro back to the windowless room in our hotel. I’d warned Joan that many of the budget hotel rooms in Taipei were without windows, but I thought this could be used to our advantage. Having just flown 14 hours, we were jet lagged and being able to take a nap in a pitch dark room in the middle of the day was a treat.

In the evening, we went to the exotic food night market so I could show Joan the numerous ways you could eat snakes and other critters. There were plenty of other unusual things to put in your mouth, but we didn’t try any of them. In fact, we ended up back near our hotel where we could enjoy a bit of western food.

The next day we had time in the morning before the train to our next destination so we decided to try some mountain climbing. At least that’s what it felt like for Joan. The hike up Xiangshan (elephant mountain) in Taipei is like all the walks I did in Hong Kong: steep. I don’t know why they build these trails at such a steep grade, especially with such an elderly population, but it keeps the people healthy.

The trail is conveniently located close to the Xiangshan metro stop, the next one after Taipei 101, which is what you will see from elephant mountain. We exited the station and walked through a park where people practiced Tai Chi under some trees. The level park gives you a false sense of what you are about to experience. At its far end is a hill that you must climb to the trailhead. From the trailhead, it is 600 steps to the first, and in our case, only lookout.

After taking in Taipei 101 and the city below, we headed down and back to our hotel. A short taxi trip got us to the train station where, for a couple dollars, we took the train to Jiufen town. It is considered a commuter train and is about an hour from Taipei. It was raining when we arrived so we opted for the 5 minute taxi ride instead of the bus.

Jiufen town

Jiufen is my kind of town. It’s built down the side of a mountain so most streets climb up or down. Only the main walking street, and I mean walking, as it is only about six feet wide, follows the contour of the mountain. Along the street there are numerous shops and restaurants, and you’ll usually find it fairly crowded during the day when tourists arrive by the busload. In the late afternoon, however, everyone heads home and you can enjoy the shops or tea houses in relative tranquility.

I can’t quite wrap my head around teas in Asia. While I can differentiate between a strong Chai, with its flavors of clove and cinnamon or an Early Gray which distinctly tastes of bergamot, I find Asian teas to be much more subtle in their differences. It’s like Coke and Pepsi. If a restaurant doesn’t have Green tea, I am happy to substitute it with chamomile. I can’t really taste a lot of difference among the Asian teas so I am always surprised when there are whole shops filled with tea. Are there enough nuances to justify so many flavors?

Adding to my lack of understanding is the fact there are probably 100 tea shops in this town that you can walk from end to end in about 30 minutes. What could they possibly offer that would be different from what everyone else is offering? Aside from tea though, there are plenty of foods to choose from. Taiwan obsesses over food presentation the way that Japan does, and all the goodies are packaged in beautiful boxes.There was fried squid and peanut brittle, all kinds of things I didn’t recognize.

We stopped at a place and ordered what tasted like pork wrapped in a rice noodle. I wasn’t quite sure because all of the menus are in Chinese, and while some have pictures, it’s not always clear what’s pictured. I’ve at least gotten pretty good at differentiating sweet from savory, which is important because there are many bean based dishes that are actually desserts. You’d be surprised how delicious a bowl of red beans and crushed ice tastes, especially with coconut milk poured over the top.

Typhoon Man-Yi

I knew Joan would appreciate the expansive view out of our window having had no window the previous two nights. Unfortunately, our visit to Jiufen was accompanied by Typhoon Man-Yi, and it rained the entire time we were there so we only got a couple glimpses of the sea below, but always in our view was the colorful Daitian temple just across the street.

It was pouring so heavily on our last night that I worried the road might wash out. Fortunately, I could hear the buses running in the morning so I was pretty sure we’d be able to return to the train station. There were no taxis running so we had to try out the local bus system. It was easy with our Taiwan transit card, which can be used on any mode of transportation throughout the country.

The next day we headed to the airport for our flight to Bangkok. While there is enough to see in Taiwan to make it a destination, we were able to make the most of our four day layover together.