Taiwan 5-Day Tour 2023

We spent a bit of time around Sun Moon Lake as well. The lake itself is quite nice, and the sun moon lake temple is just insane. There are quite a few things around that area to see also – the wood museum is a must imo. There is a big district there that just sells wood carvings.
The flag carrier of Taiwan, China airlines, is best avoided in my opinion. A day trip to Sun Moon Lake is highly recommended. I visited from Taichung but there are trips from Taipei. Tainan is a cool and delicious city, Kaohsiung is hot 台東 伴手禮 but slightly more boring but nice enough. Breakfast with a view again at a B&B in CingjingShortly into the drive, it started drizzling. By the time we reached Hehuanshan an hour later, the weather was still bad with on-off rain .

The Dandy Hotel, Tianjin Branch was very comfortable and a great base. After visiting Taipei Main Station and Ximen, the other big areas for hotels, they did not appeal as much. Otherwise, Google Maps had super useful live times for buses and  which carriages were least crowded on trains.
That was a bad decision because the mountain road was badly jammed due to road construction work and the influx of holiday domestic travelers. Use the hotel finder to search for the cheapest hotel deal for all major destinations around the world. HotelsCombined searches hundreds of hotel booking sites to help you find hotels and book hotels that suit you best. Since HotelsCombined searches many hotel sites at once, you can find discount hotels quickly. Discover hotel discounts now and make your hotel reservation today. City buses offer transportation around the city, while the East Coast Scenic Area shuttle covers surrounding areas.
We made a wrong decision to have our lunch at Shuishe Pier and were put off by how touristy the place was. Even before we could get off the car, we were approached by two touters asking us if we wanted to buy ferry tickets.  View from Ci En Pagoda at Sun Moon LakeThere aren’t a lot of things to do at night in Sun Moon Lake. Even at 6pm, most of the street vendors have closed for the day. We bought a grilled sausage and mushroom bun and strolled to Yidashao Wharf.

An important bit of information for those travelling to Taiwan soon. There a ban in place now for foreigners arriving through Hong Kong . There's a really big tech mall known as "Guanghua Digital Plaza". Get off at Zhongxiao Xinsheng MRT station and you can check it out. It's something like 8 floors of computer hardware sellers, there's also another building for consumer electronics thats also quite large.
Juifen we did a different day by bus – up the mountain – and got heavy rain – which was very exciting on steep mountain road flooding with torrential flowing water. My Taiwanese partner just told me Pingxi is for the lanterns – but we did this at Shifen – so have not been to Pingxi. I had a private driver for that next day though. You can't go to Taiwan and not visit a few of them. It's a foodie's paradise and it's quite cheap, too!

Has anyone done the Jiantan Mountain Trail, or the Jinmianshan trail, or the trail to Battleship Rock? If so, which 2 would you recommend to someone of below average fitness and stamina? I would like to do short hikes that are easily accessible via MRT.
To help you organise your Taitung City trip ideas, this Taitung City visitors guide provides travel information and trip tips about how to get there, where to stay, what to do, where to eat and more. I'd check Google Maps for your hotel and see what it suggests. Your hotel might even have a shuttle bus pickup and drop-off service. There are lots of great places reachable from Taipei.
Good place to walk around if you like art sculptures. Was reading about it, and sounds like an interesting place to walk around. I'm still trying to work out where to go in Kaohsiung, as the main attraction seems to be Dragon Tiger Pagoda.