台湾春天之旅 2013- Around Yilan City (宜兰市)

宜兰 is a stop away from 礁溪 by express train, and 2 stops away by local train. The frequency of the trains are around 20mins, travelling time is around 10mins. Depending on the type of trains you take, there is a slight difference in the prices.

While buying the train tickets, you can choose a later timing to take if you do not want to pay more, but then the difference is not very significant, thus we chose to take the next available train which happens to be 1 of the most atas train type-Taroko Express.

The train tickets

Taroko train- 太鲁阁

Interior of the train, more atas den normal 自强号。。

Automatic doors

We arrived in Yilan at around 15.45 and was feeling lost on where to go. Based on my research, there is nothing here that will interest us, but still we have 2hrs to kill before its time to hit the Night Market夜市。 And then, I spotted our 救星- Yilan Vistor Information Center ( 宜兰旅游服务中心） its located on the left side of the station exit.

Arrived in Yilan

Map of 宜兰市

宜兰车站

 Inside the vistors' information centre, there are tons of information guides that you can find there, not only about 宜兰 but the whole of Taiwan, the north, the east, central and south. I took some of them, hehe to prepare for future trips to other places.

While we are there, we also checked with the staff there on where we can go ard Yilan city and kill the 2hrs of free time we have. She suggested us taking a walk along Yilan city area, which can be completed in 45mins if you dun stop at any attractions. But since we have more time, she suggested us to go to Yilan Winery (宜兰酒厂) and Memorial Hall of the Founding of the Yian Administration (宜兰设治纪念馆）。

宜兰旅游服务中心

 Armed with the map they provided, we decided to take their suggestions and set out to explore Yilan City, not knowing what is in store for us.

Yilan Police station

 Since it's a Tuesday, the streets are pretty quiet and traffic is consider light. The streets in Yilan are much wider as compared to 礁溪 and the buildings are more spread out too. The town area is also pretty big.

Pretty quiet street as it's a working day