I had my eyes set on fish soup for breakfast yesterday but instead opted for McDonald’s. I made it a point of having it today but the shop was closed! I settled for some local snacks washed down with a lukewarm milk tea.
My B&B has a check-out time of 1100 so I continued my admin on my laptop, experiencing a minor earthquake tremor, till mid-morning before packing up. At Tainan train station, I used the kiosk and credit card to buy my ticket to Kaohsiung. I opted for the second available train some 20 minutes later as I didn’t want to rush to the platform for the first departure.
The limited-stop service took about 40 minutes arriving in my last stop in Taiwan which is Kaohsiung at 1205. For this route, it wasn’t worthwhile even considering the High Speed Rail as the station was located out of town.
Kaohsiung station was undergoing major expansion and my hotel just outside one of the normal exits was now only reachable through a long detour similar to a city walk.
The Papo’a Hotel seems to have a strictly-enforced check-in time of 1500. So after leaving my bag, I took the metro to Formosa Boulevard to check out its Dome of Light feature.
I still had more than an hour to kill so I continued to Pier 2 where old warehouses had been artistically decorated and house many shops and galleries. It wasn’t really my kind of thing but it is good for an industrial city and port to make the effort to brighten up the city with colour and create nice open spaces for its residents.
Continuing on, I reached Fisherman’s Wharf where the large warehouse-like building had plenty of food choices and some boutiques. But I wasn’t ready for any food so called it a day in terms of sightseeing.
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- Formosa Boulevard MRT station’s centerpiece is the Dome of Light by Italian glass artist Narcissus Quagliata. It’s nice because of it is Italian, right? Otherwise one would just say it is garish.
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- A low-rise part of Kaohsiung city.
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- Old port warehouses converted into dining and art shops.
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- Kaohsiung is an industrial city and port. Skyscrapers and concrete blocks aside, the city is working hard to put on an artistic face and nice amenities like parks.
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- Kaohsiung is an industrial city and port. Skyscrapers and concrete blocks aside, the city is working hard to put on an artistic face and nice amenities like parks.
After a rest in my lovely room, complete with satin sheets (which get a little sweaty despite the low temperature in my room), I headed out in search for dinner. The south side of the station was certainly nicer and had plenty more food choices. There were a few Indonesian restaurants and the Liuhe Tourist Night Market.
Even though I ate at the Indonesian, it didn’t stop me from tempting myself with goodies at the night market. It was a touristy night market but the supposedly better one at Ruifeng was closed tonight. And the one at Liuhe was near enough to my hotel.