Taipei and Taipei 101

After going to the coast, we drove to Taipei. I forgot to mention that, on the way to the coast, we drove through a newly opened tunnel - the longest in Taiwan. It is called Hsuehshan and it's an eight-mile road tunnel that took 15 years to build and opened to traffic just over a year ago. It slices through the jagged peaks that separate Ilan from the capital, Taipei, and links to a new southbound highway that rises above the rice paddies. The tunnel is the longest in Asia.

We arrived at Taipei around 7 p.m. Many of us chose to immediately go up the tallest building in the world: Taipei 101 (it opened last New Year's Eve). We went up to 89th floor. This floor is inside and there is no access to the outside. In order to go outside, you have to pay extra to walk up to the 91st floor. The other teachers and I went for it and paid extra to go up. It was worth it. The view was much better (a lot of the glass was foggy down below).

Taipei 101 is not just a tall building, it is full of offices and the first five floors are a mall. We felt like we were back in the USA - all of the signs were in English and they were mostly stores found in the States. We ate in the food court in the basement. After, we went to a local night market (basically a street fair at night).