If it wasn't already abundantly clear, we really love to travel. (Oddly enough, I'm also a homebody, who can happily go weeks without leaving the house.) While we are living in Hong Kong, we are taking every opportunity to check out this part of the world. We had never been to Taiwan for more than a layover, so we took advantage of a 3-day weekend and flew to the city of Taichung, which was only an hour and 15 minute flight from HK. It was a little rainy, and cooler, but we still had a nice get away. Here's how we saved and what we spent.
1) I used the flymeanywhere.com to pick the cheapest flight for the dates we had, and Taiching won this round! I have used this website for several vacations now, and have ended up in some locations that I never would have thought about. This flight was right around $100 USD round trip on Hong Kong Express, a discount airline based in HK. I can't even fly from Bangor to Boston for that price.
2) I used points with IHG rewards to score 2 free nights at the Holiday Inn Express. The hotel was perfect for us. The beds were comfy (sometimes hard beds are an issue in Asia), the rooms clean, and the staff were all super friendly and spoke English very well. We arrived quite early, around 10 am, and they allowed us to store our luggage while we explored the city for a few hours and then we checked in early at 1:30 pm.
We were given some welcome snacks and drinks, courtesy of my Platinum Elite status with IHG, which I maintain simply by keeping their credit card; at $49 a year, is well worth the price considering we get a free night at any IHG hotel every year.
3) We took advantage of the free hotel breakfast, which had a good variety of hot and cold, Asian and Western choices. We also didn't go to any fancy restaurants, choosing instead to eat at local noodle shops and street food vendors.
These noodles were homemade, and so delicious. Mike got add-ons; I had plain curry noodles. About $3 for Mike's and $1.50 for mine.
These are little baby waffles. They are sold plain, of with filling. They were about $1 US for a 4 pack.
Bubble tea (tea with little gelatin/tapioca type "bubbles" in it) originated in Taiwan and there are hundreds of shops selling it. This was Brown Sugar Milk Tea, and was so creamy and fresh. It was around $1 to $1.5 US everywhere.
4) As usual, we took advantage of our Priority Pass membership (a benefit of the Citi Prestige Card) to check into the lounges before both flights. The More Lounge in Taichung was quite empty, and had a decent variety of food and beverages. We had already had breakfast, but I couldn't pass up the Mango Haagen Dazs ice cream!
I chose to spend money on a day tour to Sun Moon Lake, which was about 1.5 hours from Taichung. They picked us up at our hotel at about 8 am, and delivered us back there at 6 pm, so it was a full day, and included a family style Chinese lunch.
We rode the cable cars.
It was a little foggy at the top, haha!
And we also rode bikes around one end of the lake, took a boat ride, did a little shopping, and visited a Confucian Temple.
It was well worth the $45 US each that I paid. I'm a softy for easy pick up and drop offs.
I can see the current appeal for Taiwan. The people are friendly, prices are great, and it's very safe (recently voted second safest country in the world--Japan is #1) I never felt like people were trying to take advantage of us, and that is pretty rare these days.
Double thumbs up, Taiwan. Maybe we'll be back!
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