My husband and I had our vacation in Taipei for the first time early February for 4days/3nights, before Chinese New Year We had a great time. Here's a little report.

Airport, money, hotel transfer
At the airport, before you pass through immigrations, there's a currency exchange booth at the far right. This booth is said to have a better rate. If you missed it, there's one more exchange booth after customs before you exit the restricted area. You should exchange all the money you need at the airport because once outside you can only exchange at banks and hotels with worse rates. There's a small fee if you use traveler's checks. The information counter was where we headed next to get some free maps and info on the city. It's expensive to take a taxi to town from the airport (US$3X-4X) but we found out there're coach services that will take you to almost any hotel in the city. I remember it cost about NT$140 per person one way. That's less than US$4! The coaches run every 20-30 minutes and has storage space for all your luggage. Traffic was quite busy in Taipei but we got to the hotel in less than an hour. Our hotel was the last stop on route.

Hotel
The Grand Hyatt Taipei is located next to the new Taipei 101, within walking distance to several shopping malls including NY NY, Mitsukushi, and Warner Village. The closest subway stop, City Hall station, is at least a 15 minutes walk from the hotel. Checked-in around noon. Our room was pretty much a standard 5 stars. The bathroom was spacious, with separate shower and tub. I didn't like the low ceiling, and it's a huge contrast to the tall lobby. It is well known that this hotel is rumored to have spooks because it was built on a mass execution/burial site. There's even a pair of seals, hung in large frames in the lobby, to seal off the spirits. This didn't bother us but might deter superstitious people from staying at this hotel. Our room rate did not include breakfast so no comment on that. We did try their Shanghainese restaurant. For lunch they had an all-you-can-eat menu. The food came in small portions so we could try lots of different things. It was pretty good.

Overall, their service was good. The bellhop was quick to help with our luggage when we arrived at the hotel. Staff members were friendly and efficient. Late checkout wasn't a problem. Complimentray bottled water refilled daily, in the bathroom and also bedside. Turndown service included a fresh bucket of ice.

Will continue...

looking forward to more

I too look forward to the continuation of your report. Sounded good so far! Thanks for sharing. I'll be in Taipei also for my first time in mid-May for 4 nights. All info you provide will be appreciated.

Hi travelmug and others, I hope that I am not intruding on this thread. Here are the sites and notable Taiwanese restaurants that i recommend in Taipei. I wrote this to help a visiting friend from Japan. Email me so I can give you a PDF document with Chinese characters. It will help you find these places when asking for directions. email: [email protected]

*note: you may see some jumbled characters which are supposed to be Chinese characters. Just ignore them.

Sites to visit in Taipei (city area):
1. National Palace Museum - Probably houses the finest Chinese art and artifacts collections in the world as the KMTs moved everything out of Communist China when they fled. One advice, yoou should start from the top floor and work your way down. The most interesting things are at the top floors, the 1st and 2nd floors are mostly stone and copper utensils so after about 5 minutes they all look the same. I would allot about 2 hours for inside the museum (3 ~ 4 hours if you�re a real museum lover). The museum is about 25 minutes outside the main city by tax
2. Chiang Kai Shek Memorial (C.K.S. Memorial) - This would be my second choice for cultural activities. Go there if you have time in morning or late afternoon. You can get there via the subway (MRT). I don't think much of the person CKS, but he does have a fairly nice memorial. The national theater and opera house are there as well. I would only spend about 30 minutes here.
3. Longshan Temple - I believe this is the oldest and biggest temple in Taipei. Can be reached by subway there should be a station called Longshan Temple. IF you do go to Longshan temple, then you must go to a shaved ice store called: (meaning Dragon City ice store). It's been there since the 1920s. We personally like the '8 combination ice' which is their specialty and has the old world taste. However, some foreigners don't like this so check around also some people may have some concern about the store cleanliness (beware). If you don��t like it, then you can just order another thing because it's so cheap (~ 200 yen or $2 USD per bowl). You can try the mango ice. By the temple, there is a night market which is okay. You can visit if you happen to go at night. (Also, by the Longshan Temple is where the Taipei snake alley is)
4. Ximen Ding 西門丁 - Ximen Ding (西門丁 meaning west gate section) which is a popular young people hang out. It's a section of town that is pedestrian only and some roads are closed to car traffic. Some people have compared the crowd there to Harajuku. Can get there by Subway (Ximen station). In Ximen Ding, you may see people lining up for some food stall. There is one in particular that I think it's quite good. It's called 阿宗麵線. This place sells 1 thing only which is a type of rice noodle soup. There will be a long time and you will see many people eating this right on the street. The line goes quickly and will only take a few minutes.


Places to eat:
1. (Din Tai Fung) Original store --(02)2321-8928
http://www.dintaifung.com.tw/
Get there early otherwise line gets long (lunch before 11:30am and dinner before 6pm). Here are the things I recommend:
a. pork dumpling with soup in filling (only available on weekend mornings. I��d say you have to get there by or before 10:30am otherwise this item is gone).
b. pork dumpling with crab.
c. Chicken soup steamed in ceramic bowl. Very good. (I also like the beef soup, but not everyone likes it)
d. Shrimp shu-mai
e. (sweet) red bean filled bun. I don��t usually like something like this, but this is really good (for dessert).
In the side street (next to Barista coffee) about 1 block behind the restaurant, there is a very famous shaved ice store called Ice Monster. Their mango shaved ice, strawberry shaved ice, and their combo mango/strawberry shaved ices are famous.

2. Shin-Yeh Taiwanese Food - Popular Taiwanese food restaurant in a clean well-lit environment. Diagonally across the street from the main SOGO department store (Chung Hsiao East Road store). Close to the Chung Hsiao Fuxing subway station.
(02) 2752-9299
http://www.taiwanfun.com/north/taipe...aiwaneseTW.htm (Chinese).
http://www.taiwanfun.com/north/taipe...nTaiwanese.htm (English)
Apparently they also have locations in Japan: http://www.wonderland.to/pc/shinyeh/

3. ��¤p¤ë�á¥JÄ&Nti lde; -
a. �G¥x¥_¥�©����F�ô¥|q170� Ñ5�Ë26��
http://www.ezhotel.com.tw/taipeifood/ee/e_2_5.html
Central location. Close to both SOGO stores in central Taipei. Taiwanese food in a clean environment. The store size is small so it can fill up quickly. Close to the Chung Hsiao Dun Hwa subway station
b. �n�O�á¥JÄÑ - ¥x¥_¥��N�L�ô79�� (�øK�ô¤f)
http://www.ezhotel.com.tw/taipeifood/ee/e_2_3.html
I really like this restaurant as it��s a very traditional Taiwanese food in a traditional Taiwanese setting at a very reasonable price. This restaurant is more difficult order as there is no menu. The food is displayed in the front of the store and it can be overwhelming because you can be rushed. This restaurant is also tougher to get to (you will probably need to take a cab).

3. Taipei 101 also offers a variety of dining choices for those who want to visit the current World's tallest building. On the 4th floor, there are several nice restaurants: Shanghainese (Jiu Ru), Thai (Crystal Spoon), Fusion Japanese (Wasabi Restaurant), Japanese all-you-can-eat buffet (Wasabi buffet), New styled Japanese (Daikanyama), Italian (Diamond Tony's Italian Restaurant).

In addition to the sit-down restaurants, there is a huge food court on level B1.


4. Night Markets (Most active after 7pm). When deciding which food stalls to eat, look for the lines. As a rule of thumb, if people are lining up or if the store is crowded it��s a good sign.
a. (Zao He Street Night Market) - I like going to this one the most because it��s fairly large and it��s easy to browse (just 1 long street).
I can�t remember the names of some of the stands, but you should definitely try: �Ö�{¥@��*J�Ô�æ (it��s a charbroiled bun filled with peppered pork that�s really good. It�s on the end of the night market with the larger temple.)
b. (Tung Hwa Street Night Market) �V .
c. (Shi Lin Night Market) �V This is the largest and the most famous night market, but it can get confusing because of its size. Now the food stalls are separated from the shopping so this is unlike other night markets. You can go there by Subway (station name: �C�æ. Jiantan station)

(If you get tired of Taiwanese restaurant, then let me know and I can give you recommendations of Japanese, Italian, and Thai food around the city)

Thank you, LazyPaul, for your suggestions! Yes, I must visit Taipei 101; it sounds grand. Would you know if there will be any cultural or artistic performances at the theater or opera in mid-May?

Thank you LazyPaul for your input. I'm sure they'll be useful to many future travelers to Taipei. I think the Tapei 101 is no no longer the tallest building, but the elevator to the obersvation desk is the fastest in the world. It has air pressure controls so your ears won't feel uncomfortable during ride.

Report continued

Eat
The whole point for us to visit Taipei was to try their food, especially street food. Food is an important part of Chinese culture, and in Taiwan, you cannot escape from it. There're food outlets everywhere you turn. The night markets around Taipei are famous for their variety of foods ranging from fried chicken, grilled squid, noodles in thick oyster soup, to wilder things like stewed pigs ears and knuckles. We had the best Shitake mushrooms, fresh and grilled right on the spot. Shilin night market is the most well-known but there are many night markets around Taipei. The street foods are generally safe to eat and I had no stomach problems whatsoever. Many people count on these night markets for delicious inexpensive foods. We were not
disappointed. My only regret was that I had only one stomach. Night markets usually open around 6pm or 7pm till midnight or 1am, depending on which market.

See
We went on vacation to relax so we only do one or two things a day at most. On our first day we strolled around the hotel and found some small eateries serving beef noodle soup and xiao long bao (pork dumpling with soup filling). Delicious and cheap! After that went to visit the Sun Yat Sen Memorial. It's within walking distance from our hotel. We got there at 3pm and the changing of the guards had just started. The two guards were moving like mirror image! When they finished, we were allowed to take photos with them but just for a couple minutes so if you go there, act quick. There were art galleries at the memorial and on the day we went there was a musical event.

A place definitely worth visiting was the National Museum. It housed a great collection of artifacts from imperial China. Many items were once used inside the Forbidden City in Beijing. I've already been to Beijing so this enhanced my appreciation of the history. English guided tour was provided. I don't remember the times but there was one at 3pm. The museum also housed newer works of arts like jade carvings. The place was being renovated but our ticket stubbs would allow us to return once within this year for free.

Another place we visited was Danshui. It's an old town on the northern part of the city. We got there by subway, the end station on northbound line. There was a short ferry tour of the coast there but we didn't try it. It was nice to walk along the old streets. Food was again a major part of this place. There's a store famous for selling something called "Metal Egg" in Chinese. It's actually pigeon or chicken eggs, marinated and dried a number of times. The end result was an egg almost black in color. It came in packs of 10 or 20 eggs. I bought one pack but haven't tried it yet!

Thanks LazyPaul. Please continue travelmug. Did you stay in Taipei the whole time? How was the weather? How did you get around? Were you there for New Year's, the 9th wasn't it? I suppose that it is a busy city? Polluted? Want to know all that stuff.

Last Day
We had an evening flight so we spent our last day doing some shopping. After our late check-out, we walked to Taipei 101. There's an observation deck but the weather wasn't great so we skipped it and decided to have some cakes and coffee at the atrium near Page One bookstore. There were plenty of tables and chairs and it was very relaxing. After that, we strolled our way through NY NY, Warner Village, and Mitsukushi. The Mitsukushi is a Japanese department store but the building also has upscale fashion houses like Dior, Dries Van Noten, Prada...etc. So many all in one place. After all the window shopping, we slowly head back to the hotel, collected our stored luggage, and left for the airport using the coach service again. Tickets could be purchased at the hotel or when you boarded the bus. Plane ticket included airpot tax. We had some NT$ left over but it's ok because we know we'll be back again!

mrwunrfl, we only stayed in Taipei because it was a short trip. Next time we plan to travel down south. We were there from Feb 4-7. We chose that time because we knew any Chinese city would be in a festive mood on the days leading up to Chinese New Year. The weather was a little gloomy and the temperature was cool which made it pleasant to walk around. The pollution was probably the same as most cities and it was fine. The night markets were a lot cleaner than we expected considering all that went on there. We found the subway and buses to be clean and comforatble but we got around mostly by taxi since they were cheap and easily available. People were friendly. We had a good time.