Day 4: Taipei - 10 Aug 2013

We woke up at 4am, not because of Benji, but deliberately to prepare ourselves to witness the sunrise at Sun Moon Lake - an activity that almost all tourists will not miss to make the entire stay at Sun Moon Lake worthwhile.

The group gathered at 430am and we set off and walked in the dimly lit roads for about an hour plus. I really applauded my parents especially my mum and despite her legs condition, she prayed and asked God to give her the strength to complete the arduous trek. It was really challenging as we walked up steep slopes and when we reached the vantage point...

What we saw was like a 3-dimensional oil painting of mountains, clouds and lake displayed before our very eyes. Some of the mountains were covered by the clouds but the overall experience of witnessing the Creator's masterpiece left me awe-inspired. Just when we thought that was it, someone within the group exclaimed "Look at the sun". I saw the shy little yolk, that was hidden beneath the mountain, taking a peek and gradually showing itself and rising confidently to light up the entire sky. It was beautiful and needless to say, we snapped away ceaselessly but nothing could beat witnessing the grandeur in person.

We walked back to the villa and it was about 7am when we arrived back at the villa. We rested for about an hour in our room before we met again for breakfast at the villa itself. After breakfast, we went back to our room to start washing up and packing up to get ready to check out.

After checking out, we had lunch at February cafe. We had Italian food. We then went to Moon cafe and I had to seize every opportunity to drink red tea before we leave Sun Moon Lake. After having almost the entire pot, I had to order takeaway to drink it while on our way to our next destination - Taipei.

The driver picked us up at 2pm outside Laurel Villa. He drove us for about an hour to reach Taichung train station. I was asleep most of the time and Emma and my mum told me that the driver drove extremely fast and zigzagged across lanes as if he was in a race. Thank God that we arrived safely at Taichung station. Next, we took the speed train at about 340pm and reached Taipei main station at 430pm.

After we had all checked in at our respective hotels (my parents and us stayed at different hotels but they were near each other), we went to have dinner at Shin Yeh at 新光三越. It was very satisfying and all of us enjoyed the dinner.

After dinner, we took a leisurely stroll and headed towards Taipei 101. My parents had not gone into the building before and they just wanted to experience what it was like to walk inside the iconic building of Taipei. After that, we had wanted to eat mango desserts and called it a night only after that. However, we were all exhausted from the travelling and mostly because all of us started the day extremely early. It was a wise choice to go back to have an early rest. Well, not so early because by the time that we were all washed up and after penning this entry, it was already 1130pm.