Taipei: First Impressions

We’ve been in Taipei for 2 days, and so far we like Taiwan. Yesterday we happened upon a big celebration for a Taoist god named Baosheng Dadi.



He was a Chinese physician who lived in the 10th century. We think he is represented as this statue.



There was a boisterous parade with traditional music with double reed horns and drums.

  

And there was a wonderful fabric dragon that 8 men swung thru the air, making it swim and swirl and dance.

  

These dancing figures were 10 feet tall and could swing their arms.

     

This dragon float looked like it had poodle hair.



The parade culminated at the Baoen temple where the figures, statues and dragon were all brought inside and blessed. This is the view of the flower offerings inside the main gate, looking towards the temple.



Taiwan is known for wonderful oolong tea so we went for a tea tasting. Here’s all the gear we needed to make high mountain oolong tea.



On the way to the teahouse we saw this spray-painted stencil.



This is the tallest building in East Asia named 101 Taipei. We opted to save the $27 it would have cost us to ride up to the 89th floor. The elevator takes only 37 seconds to go to the top.



For dinner we enjoyed niu rou mian, 紅燒, beef noodle soup for $6/bowl. The beef was unbelievably tender, as it had been treated like corned beef, and the stock was rich and delicious.



Taipei has a bike rental program called UBike. When we come back here in a few weeks we will try renting some bikes for a city ride.

Hanoi: Hanging Out

After two weeks of traveling through many cities in Vietnam, we were ready to settle down in Hanoi for a week. We stayed in the Old Quarter because we liked all the activity. It was fun to spend time wandering through the small streets, checking out the scene.



There are a lot of street vendors who walk around to sell their goods, often shouldering a bamboo carrying pole to support two baskets filled with food like these vegetables. The shape of Vietnam resembles the iconic carrying pole and baskets, with one basket representing the large area in the south along the fertile Mekong Delta and the other basket for the north along the Red River. The slender pole in the middle spans about 1,200 miles north to south and Vietnam at its narrowest point is less than 25 miles wide.



This woman will sell pho, beef noodle soup. She carries everything she needs to set up shop on the side of street.



We were eager to try bia hoi, which is Vietnamese fresh beer. It has about 4.5% alcohol content, contains no preservatives and costs about 40 cents a glass. Served fresh from the keg and very cold, it is a tasty and refreshing drink!



Peak time for bia hoi is 5-6 pm daily. We tried half a dozen places and found a friendly scene close by our hotel.



We also found that the best bia hoi was served at places that had high volume. As you can see in the background, all those empty kegs means plenty of bia hoi had been flowing that day.



Most bia hoi joints serve snacks. This is dried squid. To eat it, you tear it into strips, as it’s quite chewy. It is barbequed right before it's served.

  

Our favorite snack food with bia hoi was bo xeo tay, dried beef. It too is barbequed right before being served with a horseradish sauce for dipping. It’s also quite chewy, so we’d tear off a small strip, dip it in the sauce and enjoy.



Another snack food we tried was Vietnamese sausage. It’s served cold and wrapped in banana leaves. This was a favorite amongst the kids who were hanging out with their dads.



Our favorite bia hoi place had a full menu. We loved the pork ribs that are served with fresh mint or basil, lime, chilies and fried garlic. And we also ate fried tofu with salted duck egg that was served with a dipping sauce of lime juice, salt, pepper and chilies. Both taste great with bia hoi!

   

They also had a good selection of stir-fried vegetable dishes. We enjoyed bitter melon (pictured below), morning glories, and pumpkin vines. All are cooked with generous amounts of garlic and served with chilies and soy sauce - yum!



The Women’s Museum was outstanding for showing the culture of Vietnam. The portrayal of the women soldiers in the Vietnam war put faces to acts of bravery and sacrifice. We also read When Heaven and Earth Changed Places by Le Ly Hayslip, and learned how hard life was during the war.



The Women's Museum had a special exhibit on the Mother Goddess who, as part of folk traditions, is worshipped for protection. This elaborate altar includes three mother goddesses: in the middle is heaven, on the left is mountains and forrests, and on the right is the water goddess.

  

We enjoyed an evening at the Opera House (which was built during French colonization) where we heard the Hanoi Symphony perform. The soloist was Do Hoang Linh Chi playing Chopin’s Concerto #1 for Piano and Orchestra – she is 16 years old and a true prodigy on piano.



And we went to water puppet theater, which was created in Hanoi. Originally performed in a lake, it is now done in a theater with the puppeteers standing in a tank, up to their waists in water.


This is Tran Quoc pagoda, the oldest in Hanoi. It was built 1,400 years ago along the bank of the Red River. When the river encroached in 1,615, it was relocated to Hanoi. We visited at dusk before trying a new bia hoi place nearby.

  

We have had a great time exploring Vietnam! Next we head to Taiwan.

Around Hanoi: Daytripping

After the cycling tour ended, we enjoyed a day trip to the Perfume Pagoda with two of our fellow riders. Pictured here are Allison on the left who is English and Grethe who is Danish.



We hired a boat and oarsman to take us an hour up the Yen river to the complex of temples and shrines. The boat ride was quiet and peaceful, and we enjoyed the lush greenery covering the limestone hills.

  

Nestled in the Huong Tich mountains, we think the perfume name comes from the many Frangipani trees that have been planted through out.

 

The scent of the trees was lovely as we came to the first temple, Thien Tru, which means "heaven's kitchen". It was still decorated for the Buddha's birthday celebration.

 

This is Quan Am, who is a Buddha in Vietnam. We know her as Kuan Yin, the Boddhisattva of Compassion. Legend has it that she stopped at the Perfume Pagoda as she traveled south, leaving a footprint in the limestone.



We climbed for an hour to get to Huong Tich cave. The mouth of a cave is said to resemble a dragon's open mouth.



There were a series of altars inside the cave, but we read that the stalactites and stalagmites are the big draw; each are named and can grant prosperity or a child to a pilgrim who rubs the stone.



On the drive back to Hanoi we saw rice being harvested. Rice has two crops per year in the north of Vietnam.



Cars and buses help with the threshing, by driving over the rice plants spread across the road.



The rice grains are left to dry on the side of the road for about 3 days.

  

And the fields are burned, so that the remaining rice plants are turned to ash which helps fertilize the soil.



A second day trip was to Cuc Phuong National Park, the oldest national park in Vietnam that was established in 1962. To fuel ourselves for the day, we started with a delicious bowl of pho, beef noodle soup.



In April and May there are millions of butterflies in Cuc Phuong park.

  

We hiked through the jungle, which was hot and lush.

  

The sign claims that this Terminalia Myriocapa tree is 1,000 years old, with a height of 135 feet and a diameter of 17 feet around.



Visiting the Endangered Primates Rescue Center was a highlight. Funded in part by the San Diego Zoo, this center has a successful breeding program. These are male (black fur) and female (blond) Gibbons.

  

We also went to the Turtle Conservation Center. This pond turtle looks like he’s smiling, perhaps because he escaped being put into a soup pot!