Category Travel
The first time I stood on a pair of skis I was only three years old and I have gone skiing pretty much every year since then; that is, until I moved to Taiwan. Though it does snow here, it is very rare; and while I can cope with it most of the time, I sometimes feel a deep need for strapping on my snowboard and hitting the slopes. At the end of last year I felt that need kick in so I decided we should go for a skiing vacation in Hokkaido, Japan. Since Renegade Wife is not quite … Read the rest
When I went to Hong Kong back in October I thought it would be the last time in quite a while. Turns out I was wrong, about two weeks ago my brother messaged me to let me know he and his friend were going to Hong Kong and later to Kuala Lumpur. Of course I had to take the chance to see him, and at first Renegade Wife and I planned to meet them up in KL. Sadly, she couldn’t get the time off so I ended up going back to Hong Kong on my own to meet up with … Read the rest
Like I mentioned in my last post, the wife and I went from Singapore to Hong Kong to meet up with my parents for a few days. We’ve both been in Hong Kong before and we’ve checked off all the standard tourist stuff like Victoria Harbour, the Star Ferry and the peak. However, my parents have been in Hong Kong a number of times before and my mom, ever the travel agent for the family, had found a number of places slightly off the beaten track for us to visit.
The Hong Kong Heritage Museum at Shatin supposedly has a … Read the rest
National holidays in Taiwan largely follow the lunar calendar, and this year the mid autumn festival fell on October 4th and the National day is on October 10th. With a weekend between the two, it means a lot of people only have to take a few days off to get a full week’s vacation. Naturally Renegade Wife and I made use of this opportunity.
My parents are going on a tour in China but will stop in Hong Kong for a few days before it starts. We wanted to see them but we couldn’t spend an entire week in Hong … Read the rest
Today we spent most of the day out at the coast at Long Dong. Long Dong is pretty popular, every parking space along the little street leading off the main road down to the beach was already taken when we got there a little after 10 am. That wasn’t a problem for us though since we could squeeze the bike in easily enough. Down on the beach there were plenty of people and the amount increased as the day went by, but it was never so full that it felt crowded.
Here in the north east there are very few … Read the rest
A while ago my colleague mentioned that he would go to Long Dong over the weekend. His description of the place made me interested, and this weekend me and the wife finally had time to go.
For the sake of added adventure I decided we should go by motorbike and while there are fairly fast routes, they largely go through urban areas which is not much fun. So after a bit of playing around in Google maps, i deviced a route that would take us through the mountains out to the north east coast. Here is roughly the route I … Read the rest
Always on the lookout for places to go and things to do my wife recently used her googling skills to find a hiking trail and waterfall in the nearby mountain area that we hadn’t been to yet (good work Honey). It seemed like a fun trail, so today we decided to go there. We took the motorbike up to the mountains and parked at the trail head; from there it was only a few hundred meters to the waterfall. Since it was a pretty hot day, the pool of clear, turquoise water at one the steps of the fall looked … Read the rest
Last week one of my best friends got married so of course I had to fly back to Sweden to be there for him. Renegade Wife and I spent the week before the wedding in Göteborg meeting up with old friends in lots of different constellations which was great fun. In fact, I had too much fun chatting with them to remember to take photos.
Anyway, the wedding was on Saturday last week. The ceremony was a bit unusual compared to most Swedish ones I’ve been to since the bride has polish ancestry, but beautiful all the same and the couple looked very … Read the rest
A couple of Taiwan’s major country roads (road number marked by a blue shield) go through the mountains. Last year, Renegade Wife and I rode across the island on one of them, number 14 – often referred to as the Central Cross-Island Highway – and despite some rather miserable weather, it was a fun little adventure. There are a few more that look very tempting to a motorcyclist studying a map of the country and as it happens, they are connected in a big loop. With Tomb Sweeping day extending the weekend to four days, and the weather finally becoming … Read the rest
Many companies in Taiwan have a (for me) strange practice where, if there is a work day squeezed in between a national holiday and a weekend, they will give their employees that day off. As compensation, you have to come in to work on a Saturday, usually the week before or the week after. This Tuesday it was the 228 Peace Memorial Day which commemorates the February 28 Incident. Due to the squeeze day policy this meant that we had a nice long four day weekend. It is still winter here in north Taiwan with bone chilling temperatures of around … Read the rest