Taiwan: A Day In Taichung

Several tourists who visit Taiwan would only put Taipei in their itinerary as it is Taiwan’s most famous city being its capital.  Our family tried to look for other places to visit in Taiwan since we stayed there for four days and restricting our itinerary just in Taipei seems a no-no for us.  We found Taichung.

Taichung is located at the middle part of Taiwan and can be accessible from Taipei through different modes of transportation.  From Taipei, you can

• Hire a private van to bring you to Taichung. This can be expensive but very convenient.
• Ride the Taiwan High Speed Rail (THSR). The cost of this train ride is TWD 700 (~PHP 1246) one-way and the ride will take one hour.
• Ride the Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA). The cost of this train ride is TWD 216 (~PHP 385) for one-way and the ride will take up to three to four hours.

There are quite a lot of tourist spots in Taichung but they are relatively far from each other.  You can hire a private van to tour you around six to eight tourist spots and would cost around TWD3000 – TWD4000.  We are not prepared to spend that much money for Taichung so we opted to just list the places we want to visit.  We narrowed it down to Houli Flower Farm, Miyahara, and Feng Chia Night Market.

And since we love doing the public commute, we chose to use the TRA.  We rode the TRA at Taipei Main Station going to Tai’an Station in Taichung.  This is the station closest to the Houli Flower Farm.  The train ride cost TWD 185 and took us two and a half hours.

From Tai’an Station in Taichung, we walked for 15-20 minutes to Houli Flower Farm.  The entrance fee is TWD 120 for adults and TWD 60 for kids.

Houli Flower Farm is the most instagrammable place in Taiwan.

After taking loads and loads of photo at Houli Flower Farm, we then went to Taichung Station.  From Tai’an Station it took us 30 minutes to arrive at Taichung Station for TWD 31.

We then went to Miyahara.  Miyahara is a popular place in Taichung.  It is just a few minutes walk from Taichung Station.  Miyahara sells ice cream, pastries, chocolates, and tea cakes.  The place looks like it is Harry Potter-inspired with high ceiling and wood finishing.

Our last stop should be Feng Chia Night Market, the largest night market in Taiwan.  However, it was already past 3PM and the TRA’s schedule going back to Taipei is at 4PM.  We need to catch this train else we wait 3 more hours for the next train.

Our TRA ride back to Taipei took almost 4 hours.  The longest and most tiring train ride I had in Taiwan.  Our travel time from Taipei to Taichung and vice versa took us more than 6 hours.  So, if you are visiting Taichung as a side trip from Taipei, I suggest you either use the THSR or hire a private van or stay overnight so as not to spend most of your time on the road.