Taipei Trip: Jiufen Village and Surroundings

We traveled to the northeast coast, New Taipei City. It was a part of Taipei but now this new city is independent ;) The place offers the beauty of the mountain and the sea at the same time. We can feel the wind, the sunshine and the sea 'smell'.

Not far away from the sea, we were lucky enough to see the performance in front of the temple. This event was not conducted for us, human, but for God in order to ask for the fishermen safety. People wearing costumes, praying and dancing?

Here, we found interesting yet challenging thing! Some men tried to secure the mountain! The rock can fell down during earthquakes so they need to do it.

We continued our journey to Nanya rock's formation. This place is famous as a place taking pre-wedding pics. Actually, it has several spots with rocky area. However, the yellow-brown colored rock, which has pretty stripped patterns is the most well-known one.

We also saw this rocky place near the Nanya's rock. The color is dark grey. We think this place also beautiful and deserve a visit ;) When we went there the weather is really good, we can feel the warm sunshine.

Next, on the way to Jiufen Village, we stop in 'Gold Waterfall'. It does not mean that the color is gold. It just got the name of gold since near this place there was gold mining a long time ago. Now, they do not have gold anymore in this area. When we look around, we could not see many local people in this area. The buildings looks empty, a bit creepy... but I admit that the waterfall is beautiful.

The Jiufen Village is located in the mountain. Therefore, on the way we could see the a good view of the surrounding mountains, sea and buildings. In addition, the temple gives a bit of 'exotic' Taiwanese style.

The picture below shows the entrance to Jiufen Village. So many shops!! We found restaurants sell local food, souvenirs, etc. So, we were not worry about our stomach haha. Happy stomach, happy life! We also found a shop making and selling pineapple cookies there. The nice things about the food shops here is they gave us 'food sample' to try. So, if we like it, we can buy but if do not we can leave :)

We tried these two local food: fish ball soup and tofu with meat filling and sauce. For me, the taste of fish balls soup is quite nice, not too salty, but lack of 'fish' taste. There was salt, chili sauce and soy sauce bottle on the table for self-modifying the soup. However, we decided not to add it. Tofu? I like this better, it is more rich in flavor, and the sauce is not to spicy.

In the village, we saw many old buildings with its old stuff. Some of it have been used to take a movie. There was also an old tea shop selling tea, making tea with traditional way, selling nice ceramic tea pot sets and show to make the ceramic things but it is too pricey for us :(

Walk along the main road and look what we found. Finally, here it is! The main building in Jiufen! Looks like a bit old Shanghai? From mining village into the tourism spot. Beautiful! They preserve the building so good in detail and very clean.

In the end of this journey, this cat statue smiled to us :) Hope to see you again in the future.