Taipei Revisited 2011-Lunch @XMD,Bank of Taiwan, National Palace Museum (国立故宫博物院）

 It's our last day in Taipei and I did not planned anything in the morning. Woke up, took breakfast and went back to our room to rest after 3 hectic days.

We checked out at 12pm and decided to pamper ourselves at the buffet restaurant we saw during our 1st trip here. Went to Rakuya BBQ restaurant located beside Rainbow hotel. Its at level 2. I forgot the prices we paid but it is not expensive at all.

At 12pm, the restaurant is pretty empty. Besides us, there is another Singaporean family having their lunch there too. There is however a time limit for the buffet, 2hours were allocated. We struck to the time limit though I don't know what would be the penalty for taking longer time.

Hotpot and BBQ

 The food selection here is pretty good. I loved the BBQ but not the hotpot though. Soup base tastes pretty bland no matter how much ingredients we throw in.

Mr Love looks like he is clapping. Haha

 By 12.30pm, the restaurant is filling up with locals and tourists. Am lucky that we came early and ordered whatever we want already.

There is a list of things you can order from and some counters that serves desserts and ice cream.

Hot pot

 Speaking of ice cream, this is the 1st time I've seen Haagen dazs ice cream served in a buffet can? I was so excited that I tried almost every flavour available. Haha Sua Ku.

Meiji ice cream

My favourite part of the buffet

王子面- Taiwanese maggie mee

 We took exactly 2hours to finish as I was keeping track of time. It is pretty stressful to eat within a time limit and I am not exactly very pleased with it.

Had a good and fulfilling lunch here and the price is reasonable.

Round 1 of the food we ordered

 After spending the most of our leftover for this buffet, we realised we need to serach for a money changer to buy more Taiwanese currency since we still have half a day more in Taipei. Asked around for the nearest branch of Taiwan Bank where they will accept Singapore dollars and walked in the direction of it.

Taipei hospital

 We then realised the bank is no where near XMD after walking for 10min. It is no where in sight and we came to a small neighbourhood. I didn't even know where we were. But there is no way we can take a cab since we did not know the exact address of the bank.

Thus I went into random shops along the way to ask for directions to the bank. We spent a good 15min trying to locate the bank all the while don't where the heck we were. The surrounding building look kinda old too. Its like a local neighbourhood instead of a tourist area.

Buildings near the bank

 Its a different Taipei that we seen. Though am not happy for taking so long to locate the bank but we are glad to have another feel of Taipei. The reason why we are searching for Bank of Taiwan is because the smaller banks do not accept Singapore dollars and there are no moneychanger in XMD or Taipei Main station area as far as I can see.

The only downside of Taipei as compared to HK is this. Nearly every where I go in HK, I can see a moneychanger accepting major currencies but not here in Taipei.

We finally found the bank after much asking and realised they closed at 3pm.Lucky for us, we reached at 2:45pm. Was directed to 2nd level to change the currency and were pleased to find that their rates were even better than Singapore. The only thing is, you must provide your passport/IC as proof.

Location of bank from XMD

I think checked with the bank teller on how to get to National Palace Museum(国立故宫博物院) from here as I had initially planned from getting there from our hotel. She gave me the most easiest way out, to take a cab. Haha. I told her I didn't want to, else will not need her help already. I can go on the street to flag a cab down.

I was hoping that there would be a direct bus from here. Either that or I could catch a bus to the MRT where I can transfer to Danshui Line. My biggest problem now is, I don't even know which part of Taipei I am in and the nearest MRT. Cannot be walk back to XMD right?

Turns out, there is a direct bus 304 at the nearest bustop to the bank. We were warned that the journey is pretty long but decided to push thru anyway. Another option is to take a bus to ZhongShan MRT station where I can take the train to Shihlin station where I will have to catch Bus R30 to the museum. Either way will take equal time we reckon.

1st look of National Palace Museum in Taipei

The bus journey was about 1hr plus and we slept all the way to the museum since it is the terminal station.

No phototaking is allowed in the museum and thus explained the lack of pictures in this post. Tickets are priced at NTD160 and I overheard some neighbour country citizens commenting that they still have to pay to see exhibits of their country. Hur Hur.

 National Palace Museum boasts the world's largest collection of Chinese art & aritfacts. We randomly went around the exhibition halls checking the exhibits out and stood near to the tour group to hear what their tour guide is explaining hehe.

But it was impossible to cover all the halls in the 2hours we had there and we skipped some of the exhibits. The museum also changed their exhibits periodically since they had some 655,000 pieces with them. I think it is quite impossible to display all out at 1 go.

 The must see collection piece here would be the jade cabbage, pork belly jade and passenger boat craved from an olive pit.  When we realised time is runing out, we went around the museum seraching for these. Haha

I even brought a replica keychain from the gift shop.

We then took R30 back to Shihlin station where we transferred to Jiantan to visit Shilin night market for 1 last time before departure.

It has been a good 4 days here and I look forward to our next visit.

National Palace Museum,Taipei

Add: No.221, Sec. 2, Zhishan Rd., Shilin District, Taipei City
Directions: Take MRT to Shilin station, at Exit 1, take bus R30
Opening hours: 8:30 -18:30
Tickets: NTD 160 for adults
              NTD 80 for youth travel cards