Monday, 30 December 2013

[Day 2] Pear Picking and Hsitou Monster Village, Taiwan

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]
After a hearty lunch at Yehliu, our day 2 trip continued with pears picking at Xiang Ye Orchard (乡野观光果园), a stopover at Hsitou Monster Village (溪头怪物村) and lodging for the night at Sun Link Sea Resort. And since it takes some traveling time from Yehliu to the first destination most of us on board began to take a short nap in order to refresh ourselves.

One of the benefits of joining tour group is just like what my mum always said; we do not need to worry about the our 3 meals, transport and lodging. We can ease our mind, relax and enjoy the scenery along the way, get to try most of their tourists’ recommended food and stay in at least a 4 stars hotel.

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]
After about an hour plus of coach ride, we reached our first destination at Xiang Ye Orchard. Although it was drizzling but it did not effect our mood and everyone was still full of excitement to explore the orchard as well as the pear picking.


[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)] Demo on how to pick the pear

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]
Above was the orchard owner who gave us short briefing and demo on how to remove the bag of pears from the tree before we were able start off with our own pear picking. Besides that he also shared with us his experience on how they propagate different types of pear seedlings to reproduce new fruits.

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]
Indeed this visit to the orchard was an eye-opening experience for people like us who live in city with high-raise buildings to experience the beauty of country side life. Secondly other than picking our own fruits we also get to learn the process of how they grow pears by cutting and propagate.

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)]
As you could see everyone of us were having fun with the pear picking and my boy was excited with this new experience because these nashi pears are one of his favourite fruits which I always used to make pear dessert for him.

[Xiang Ye Orchard @ Zhuolan (卓兰)] My boy and the pear that he pluck

乡野观光果园
苗栗县卓兰镇上新里二邻6之3号
電話: 04-2589-3471、0931-153-471
网站: http://xiang-ya.com.tw/

On our way to Hsitou Monster Village

At the foot of the mountain towards Hsitou Monster Village

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村]
Hsitou Monster Village (溪头怪物村) is a small Japanese inspired tourist attraction near Sun Link Sea Recreation Hotel that we were staying for that night. This “monster” village features red and black colour themed with wooden building and big lanterns together with cartoonist monsters that resemble Japanese anime.

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] Shops and Restaurants

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村]

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] Eye-balls themed Rice Dumplings

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] Mum and Boy
Based on the photos you would realized that from the outlook and design of the village to its food, beverages and souvenir almost everything was filled with cartoonist “monster” themed. And unless you have tons of photos to take, gifts to purchase or a decent meal to catch up if not you can easily explore the whole village in less than an hour.

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] 久保田烘焙坊
久保田烘焙坊 at Hsitou Monster Village is well-known for their Urtica Bun (咬人貓麵包 @ NT$50 which is soft and fluffy and filled with chicken and cheese filling) and Mountain Celery Bun (山芹菜麵包) which freshly bake twice a day at 10.30am and 2.30pm. And due to its popular demand, each customer can only purchase maximum 2 buns of each flavour mentioned above.

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] Snacks, Candy and Pineapple Cakes

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] 玛德琳咬人猫蛋糕

[Histou Monster Village - 溪头怪物村] Bread And Cake from 久保田面包店
As we arrived quite late in the afternoon around 5.30pm, we didn't managed to get those popular bun mentioned above but instead we bought some of their Cat Bite Madeleine (玛德琳咬人猫蛋糕), Longan Rose Bread (桂圆玫瑰面包) and Wholemeal Loaf. Personally I prefer their longan rose bread which is soft and infused with lovely rose fragrant and longan bits.

Other than bread, the bakery also sells souvenir like pineapple cakes, stationery, candy and etc in different themed designs.

[Sun Link Sea Hotel - 杉林溪] 主题会馆
[Sun Link Sea Hotel - 杉林溪] 主题会馆
Our lodging for day 2 was at Sun Link Sea Hotel ( 杉林溪主题会馆) which located at Nantou mountain area. This retreat hotel consists of 232 guest room and 2 VIP suits with simple and bright design room facing jungle and mountain views which enable guest to enjoy the leisurely of Mother Nature creations.

[Sun Link Sea Hotel - 杉林溪] Dinner @ 满意堂餐厅
As usual, the benefit of traveling with tour group is you get to feast from breakfast, lunch and dinner with either buffet of at last 8 - 10 courses. The food served at the Chinese Restaurant (满意堂餐厅) at Sun Link Sea was much better as compared to our 1st day dinner at Ching Hwa Restaurant (锦华大饭店).

Out of the 10 dishes served, I love their stir-fry mushrooms with  zucchini, sweet and sour fish and the burdock chicken soup

[Sun Link Sea Hotel - 杉林溪] Local Souvenir Shop
[Sun Link Sea Hotel - 杉林溪] Smoke Tea Eggs from Souvenir Shop
Since there were no other shops around the hotel due to its location on the mountain top, we decided to take a short walk to the hotel souvenir shop across the carpark area. For a glance there was nothing much to get in the shop and most of the tour mates just window shop around or get some local snacks and beverages for supper.

[Sun Link Sea Hotel - 杉林溪] 主题会馆

南投杉林溪森林生态渡假园区 - 主题会馆
南投县竹山镇大鞍里溪山路6号
电话:(049)2611211 传真:(049)2611216
网站: http://sunlinksea.hotel.com.tw/


Itinerary of our 8D 7N Taiwan (2013) travelogue are as follow:-
~ [Day 1] Our Family Trip to Taiwan 2013
~ [Day 2] Exploring Jiu Fen Old Street and Yehliu Geopark
~ [Day 2] Pear Picking and Hsitou Monster Village, Taiwan

Upcoming Posts
~ [Day 3] Sun Moon Lake and Formosan Aboriginal Culture Village
~ [Day 3] Feng Chia Night Market
~ [Day 4] Mei Non Hakka Village, Fo Guang Sha and Liuhe Night Market
~ [Day 4] Dinner at Royal Family Steak House and Liuhe Night Market
~ [Day 5] Fruit Farm and Pacific Ocean (Da Niao)
~ [Day 5] Dong You Ji Hot Spring Resort
~ [Day 6] Ku Cha Shu Outlet and Taroko National Park
~ [Day 6] Qi Xing Tan
~ [Day 7] Train from Ruifang to Taipei and Jin Che Orchid Garden
~ [Day 7] Tamshui Old Street and Fisherman's Wharf
~ [Day 7] Xi Mien Ding
~ [Day 8] Zhong Zheng Ji Nian Tang


2 comments:

  1. I am planning on whether to go to Taiwan as there are many who said it is not so enjoyable. But on reading yr blog, I think I will go ahead with my plans to visit there most probably early next yr. Thanks for writing on yr trip for us to read.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is a great blog post on Taiwan. I recently just went for the Taiwan trip with my family and girlfriend. It's definitely great to see there are those who enjoyed Taiwan as much as my family, girlfriend and I did.

    ReplyDelete

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