Sun Moon Lake in One Day: Must-See Sights | TAIWAN

Yo, what's up everybody? We hope you're all doing well. Since our last vlog, we travelled from Taipei to Taichung via the high speed rail. And today we're doing a day trip visiting one of the most popular attractions here in Taiwan. And that is Sun Moon Lake. Yeah, but before we get over to the exploring, we have some really useful information to share with you all first. So we caught the 6670 bus from the Nantou Ganseng station. And that ensured that we had a seat. If you caught the bus from the high speed rail Taichung station, which is a little bit further away, then you don't get guaranteed a seat because we saw quite a long line of people and our bus got incredibly full from the first bunch of people who got on. And there were still some more people waiting in the line so they had to catch the next bus. But yeah, the ticket price for us was 84NT and we had the easy card so we just needed to tap on. But you can also buy a single paper use ticket which is 193NT. And there was also a little discount that you can get if you purchase the ticket through Klook as well. Another really good thing to note is that the bus took us about 2 hours and 20 minutes. But there are multiple different versions of the same 6670 bus and they take different lengths and different times depending on which one you catch. And we'll leave a little picture of the timetable here as well so that you can have a look yourselves. Yeah. So with all that in front of the way, let's go check this place out. Let's do it. Exciting. As soon as we got off the bus, we were approached by people who wanted to sell us tickets for a boat ride around this area. And we actually went with an old guy who was in a yellow vest and he sold us the tickets for 250NT per person. Yeah. He was trustworthy. Yeah. We do know that quite a lot of the places were trying to sell the tickets for 300NT. But yeah, it should take us from Soi Sur Pier over to a couple of different stops along the lake and all the way back again. So they are return tickets. There are three piers on this lake. We started in Soi Sur which I mentioned earlier but currently we are in Xuan Guang. And this is the stop where you get some famous tea eggs. There is also one more pier which is Ita Xiao and we are going to head to that later because there is an important pagoda that we want to check out here. It's got a great view of the lake and that's called Si En. And I think the lady told me it's a five minute walk up this way. But when I was checking Google, it was saying 38 minutes. So we are going to see which one is right. I hope it's the right one. I hope it's five minutes too. But it's a nice vibe out here. There is some music playing and some tea eggs to eat. Peter has already peeled his one. Yum. Nice salty little snack for the walk. So the lady that Peter spoke to who said it was five minutes must have been talking about this Xuan Guang temple because that was a very short walk up the stairs. Lost in translation. Si En Pagoda is the one that we really want to go to though because that's meant to give us a really nice elevated view of the lake. But even from here we've already got a very nice view. Yeah, I really like the little Lalu island that we can see from up here. It's very cool. Okay, I think we are going to be in for a bit of a punishing walk here. Oh no. 850 meters for this Qinglong mountain trail. And then that only gets you part way. You are still not at the pagoda yet. We still have to do a pagoda trail too. So Google was always right. Let's start the walk. How are you going there little buddy? I'm doing okay but sweating quite profusely. Because it is pretty hot out here. There are some giant butterflies near you so I'm just going to keep a safe distance for now. But yeah, the walk is fairly peaceful because we have barely seen any other walkers along the way so far. I think we are just suckers for punishment because I'm sure there's got to be an easier way to get to that pagoda. I'm pretty sure there's a bus route as well. Hey, we got the scenic, beautiful route. Yeah, that's true. More stairs. The next mission is to get up there, that pagoda. 570 meters and we'll be there. Look at this cricket. It's shaped just like a leaf. Whoa, look what Yen found. There's a monkey over there. Wow, that is so cool. Good spotting, bud. Thanks. Totally weren't expecting to see monkeys out here. My goodness. I think I can hear them rustling all around in this forest as well. And just in time too because as we got here it started pouring down with rain. Lucky. Yeah, so we've taken refuge under this tree. In the meantime, while we wait for the shower to hopefully pass I thought I'd share a couple of facts about this pagoda that's towering above us. It's so cool to see as well. It was built in 1971 by the former president Chiang Kai-shek to honor his late mother. It's an octagonal building, 9 stories high and it's 46 meters tall. It sits on top of the Shabalan Mountain which I think was 954 meters high so it rounds it off to a perfect 1000 meters above the sea level. So you can imagine when we get right to the top and see the view I think we would have fully earned it because we did that hike. Yeah, it's going to be a nice one hopefully. The first part of the hike took us about 20 minutes and then the second part to come here to the Si'en Pagoda was about 25 minutes and that also included that short stop to go check out the monkey too. So yeah, hopefully this rain will lift soon and then we can make our way up. This view is absolutely stunning, eh Bo? It is remarkable and definitely worth the climb up those 9 stories to the top here because you get 360 degree panoramic views of the mountains that stretch out as far as your eye can see as well as the beautiful lake with its greenish hue. Sun Moon Lake is the largest lake in Taiwan and it got its name from apparently the island that we saw earlier Lalu Island, it splits it in the middle sort of and the east side of the lake is supposed to resemble the shape of a sun and the west side resembles the shape of a moon. But honestly, I don't really see it. We've seen aerial shots of the lake before and I can't quite picture it but maybe at some stage in time it did resemble more of this shape. Yeah, we've been looking at it like Oh, is that the sun? Is that the moon? We're not quite sure. But yeah, beautiful, beautiful view and I'm so glad that the rain stopped so that we could see even further out. And that we don't get soaked on our way back. That's where we started this journey and we made our way through all of that just to go there. More monkeys that we found in here. We were originally going to catch the bus over to Itasha but it was so infrequent the times that we decided to do the walk again and head back down to the pier. So yeah, we're going to go wait for our boat now and then hopefully it'll come soon. Yeah, the bus was like an hour away. What's Yin found here? Well, we're in the gift shop and I already found some black tea chocolate. Oh, I heard black tea is famous in this region. Oh, well that's cool. Oh yeah, it's really nice. It says Sun, Moon, Lake, Black Tea since 1938. I think we'll pick those up for our parents. I think that'll be a nice gift. Walking down the street we are overwhelmed with food choices as well as drinks and shopping because there's a lot of souvenir shops along the way too. And Itasha, where we are is where the Shao people live or the Shao tribe which are the earliest settlers of Sun, Moon, Lake an indigenous tribe. But yeah, right now we are trying to look for a place to eat. That would be good. I think Peter has somewhere marked on his map so yeah, hopefully we'll find a place soon. Unfortunately, both our restaurants that we wanted to eat at were closed even though Google said that they were supposed to be open. So we decided instead to just look at what most people were sort of eating around in the street stalls. And this seemed to pop up a lot. So we asked a few people where they got it from found the stall and got one. It's called Xiao Mi Gao which I think is a sticky rice cake or a paste. And then there were a few options for coatings and we went with condensed milk. So let's dig into this. It's on like a bamboo stick. And it looks very chunky. It is like a chewy sweet cake. But very much more a dessert I would say. Starting with dessert first today. And one of the specialty things that you can eat here at Sun, Moon, Lake is wild boar. And I really wanted to get a wild boar dish but I'll settle for the next best thing which is a wild boar tung yau bing. This looks really interesting. First time having that inside a tung yau bing which is normally just a spring onion pancake. So let's give that a go. How is it? It's nice. Honestly, I can't tell the difference between the wild boar meat and normal pork. But that's really tasty. It's a little bit sweet. And of course you've got the spring onion flavours coming through as well. Okay, so we've just purchased some bikes for the next hour. This is an electric bike. I'm going on a practice run first because the guy is like you need to do a practice run before you go on your proper run. Because we don't really go on scooters all that much. So let's see how this goes, eh? Good luck. Okay. I think he's done just fine. And he's back. I think I'll be alright. Good job. And we're off. Here's the start of the trail. Go slowly. Don't drop me. Let's see if we can get us to the nine frogs stack. Yeah. Checking in on Peter. I think I'm doing pretty well if I do say so myself. I think you are too. Well done. It's pretty easy to ride though. It's a great way to get around after we've been walking so much today. Yeah, treat to ourselves. So guys, I just want you to know Yin has been talking about these frogs for the entire time that we've been here. Well, I really wanted to see them because I thought it was such a clever little invention to measure the water level of Sun Moon Lake. So there are nine frogs and this place is called Nine Frog Stack I think it was. And so you can see more frogs if the water level is low. Right now we can see three of them stacked which I think seems like a pretty good amount, right? It has been raining a lot so that would probably mean why. Yeah, but sometimes if the lake is really dry then you see all nine of them. How clever is that? Very creative. It's very cool and there's a lot of people here because they all want to visit the Nine Frog Stack. Yeah. I think it took us maybe roughly 15 or 20-ish minutes into our e-cycle drive-in. Yeah. We have come back full circle at Soi Sur Pierre and I just got to let you guys know if you want to come here and do the entire loop yourself here at Sun Moon Lake it was pretty easy. It was definitely doable. But if you want the convenience of joining a group tour that's fine as well because you get the bus from all the different locations as well as taking the boat. Yeah, or if you had your own private vehicle that probably would make things way easier. But this was totally doable and in a day as well. I think the one thing to keep in mind is to be aware of the timetables for both the ferry and the bus so that you don't miss things. Yeah, or you end up doing a 4km walk like Yin and I did today. Fantastic. Well, we hope you guys enjoyed this vlog and found it useful too if you're planning on coming here yourselves as well. And if you liked this please do remember to drop the video a thumbs up. Leave us a comment. We love reading them. And if you haven't already please do subscribe. We'd love to have you join our community. And if you can share this video as it does also help our channel. Really appreciate it. Catch you on the next vlog from Taiwan. See ya. See ya everyone.