The Curious Lark: BeiPu Old Town in Taiwan!

Hello everyone!

Our Taiwan adventure was... so incredible! It's been about 2 weeks since I've gotten back, and as I was going through the photos today trying to decide what to document in this blog, I realized just how glad I am that David and I are such shutter-bugs. Of course, I remember most of what happened during our trip, but the little things get fuzzier and forgotten soon after the trip, and it was so nice to be able to see and remember so many things from the photos!

It was a pretty short trip, well shorter than we would have liked, but it was packed full almost every day we were there. The first day, we went to visit BeiPu Old Town; a town famous for its 'one-bite bun'! Apparently, each town has at least one temple, and since I had never been to one before, we decided to stop by this one which was located at the center of the town.

Such a beautiful photo of David and Mama

and.. of course, the odd one about to lose her hat to the wind haha

and then we walked inside to experience the Taiwanese Motherly Sky Temple!

It was actually surprisingly crowded, and we got to observe many different people worshiping in their own way =)

In front of so many wishes

After leaving the temple, we joined in with the flood of people strolling around the market.

I was so surprised the market was so busy! It was a weekday, and during the afternoon, so... maybe the kids and the parents were on break? maybe they were also tourists like us? Either way, it was fun to see so many people engaging the sellers at all of the different stalls =)

I didn't know what most of the stalls were selling, but as soon as I realized that this stall was selling fruit (guava), I ran straight over with more confidence than I had shown all day wandering around the market haha. This was still an adventure for me though, because I had never had guava before, and it was interesting!

oh, and look! I was so happy to see this stall! Peaches! one of my favorite fruits! and let me tell you what, I am in LOVE with the fruit in Taiwan. It's just so much better than the ones we find in the states, and this was of no exception! sweetest, juiciest peaches ever! ok, so that was a lot of exclamation points, but it deserved it =) I'm salivating just thinking about how yummy these were.. ;)

All of the stall vendors seemed to be a bit confused about my nationality, and we (David and his mom) had 'where is she from?' conversation with what seemed like every one of the sellers haha. I guess I don't look Taiwanese? =p

Anyway, we moved along to look at more stalls, and we found this one who had his pet rabbit keeping him company! Don't worry, he wasn't selling the bunny ;) he was pretty darn adorable, but seemed like he really hated the heat.. poor guy..

One thing I noticed a lot during our trip in Taiwan was that there are dogs everywhere!! Dogs who have owners like this cute little thing were numerous, but also seemingly stray ones were also everywhere as well...

As we strolled some more, we actually came upon vendors selling two of the few Chinese dishes I knew! the chong-tze, or rice wrapped in bamboo leaf, was a favorite of ours in Houston for a couple of weeks, and we would go to 99 Ranch every weekend to get some.

and the ball-tze, or the one bite bun, was popular between us as well, but this one was different than the ones from Ranch... I have to say, the ones we tried in Taiwan were soooo much better than the ones we had at Ranch ;) haha

I feel like 90% of our time in Taiwan was spent eating, much like our time in Korea, haha, so after walking around a little bit, we went to try some Haka (native people of Taiwan) food items.

It seems that this is how you order food at almost every restaurants in Taiwan, so I had no idea what was being ordered, but I was content to just sit back and enjoy whatever came out =)

Food adventure is the best kind of adventure! =) and it definitely was an adventure for me seeing as I had no idea what any of these were haha but we tried a little of everything, and it was so much fun! I'm sorry I can't tell you what they were though haha you'll just have to enjoy through the pictures! ;)