Precious Memories: Visiting Southern Taiwan

Monday, October 31, 2016

Visiting Southern Taiwan

Places near Yichu

August 28~29, 2016

We only had a couple of days in southern Taiwan, staying in the 'village'. We had the opportunities to savor some specialty dishes in this area. Here are some of the places we visited on this trip.

Spraying Water Chicken Rice Restaurant (Exactly what the sign says), Chiayi

I was told that it is actually turkey meat that they serve here. I really couldn't tell because the meat was juicy and tender, unlike what we usually have for Thanksgiving. Apparently they have several branches of the same restaurants all over the city of Chiayi and this one is spacious and clean. We were here in February and really looked forward to coming back for a repeat.

Order at the counter

Bamboo shoot salad, one of our favorite dishes.

boiled pork with garlic sauce

turkey (chicken?) meat

Milk fish soup, wonderful!

soup with baby oysters

Chicken (turkey?) rice

This location is right across the street from the Chiayi Hospital Department of Health

289 Beigang Road, West District, Chiayi City, Taiwan

Night market at the village--only one night a week, on Sundays. I remember it used to be very busy with many vendors selling all kinds of wares but it was very quiet this time around with less than 10 vendors opened for business. The busiest stall was this bean curd pudding stand.

We just had to get some bean curd pudding with peanuts. Yummy!

Green Space, Yujing, Tainan

We were invited to have lunch with our travel-mates from last year trip to Japan on a late morning while in the village. We drove from Chiayi to the mountain area of Tainan near Yujing, somewhere I have never been before. It was a nice drive out to the countryside and the view was just spectacular!

Our destination was a restaurant called "Green Space", which is near the monument of a local hero named Yu Ching Fang. We had to hiked a little after we parked the car along the road which was not too bad really. A couple of photos showing what we saw as we walked up to the restaurant that sits high up on the mountain side.

Everything was so green, comparing to the vegetation in southern California.

A magnificent view of the Chiayi-Tainan area. Not the best weather, but at least it wasn't raining.

Similar to the restaurant we went to in Gukeng last February, a relaxing atmosphere.

We thought it would be good if we continued our hike up to the monument before lunch.

The story of Yu Ching Fang was carved into the monument to remember his sacrifice against the Japanese.

Here are some pictures of what we had for lunch that day. My order of an aboriginal meal set.

Rice covered with yam, an interesting presentation.

Some wild boar meat.

MOR's whole fish with mango sauce.

Hot pot soup

ChC's order of some fried chicken or pork steak with mango puree.

Apparently, mango is the main produce in this area.

Our generous hosts.

It was a weekday so we were able to enjoy a quiet lunch.

Excellent view!

http://www.greenspace.tw/

台南市玉井區沙田25-66號(余清芳紀念碑)

I ordered a mango ice cream to share. Absolutely delicious!

After lunch, we went to the produce wholesale market in town to see what they have for that day.

baskets of longan (dragon eye) fruits

Vendors selling dried fruit of all kinds.

Gigantic mangoes and pineapples.

We stopped by this lady's stall for some dried fruits. It turned out that she is a Christian also.

Always nice meeting other fellow Christians on the road.

"High-heel Wedding Church"

This is a new attraction in the nearby town of Budai. It's not a church, really, but a tourist attraction. I guess newly-weds would enjoy having their wedding pictures taken here with the unusual building. I believe there is a love story behind this high-heel church but I forgot what the story was about. Here is the posted script about the site. Not sure why they called it a church when there is nothing relating to a place of worship.