Taiwan (8) - Practical Tips regarding Kaoshiung

Buffet Breakfast at Kindness Xiong Zhong Hotel 

      I was helped tremendously by many online resources when I was planning the Taiwan trip (Dad practically gave me one day to plan all the details!) and I thought it would be nice if I shared some of the tips here for anyone who wants to go to Kaoshiung. I really liked Kaoshiung - it's not what I would call exciting, but homely. Kind of like the good earnest cousin of Taipei that you want to give a good big hug, because he is just that nice and sincere. 

    1) Travelling from Taoyuan Airport (Taipei) to Kaoshiung (THSR Zuoying) 

     There are many ways to travel from Taoyuan Airport to Kaoshiung - you could take train or bus, even if you choose to travel by train, there appears to be a wide array of options! My preferred pick was to travel by the High Speed Railway Train - it only takes one and a half hours and the trains are extremely comfortable and well-organised. 

     Basically, you take a shuttle bus from Taoyuan Airport to THSR Taoyuan (it's about 15 minutes) and then you can redeem the tickets you booked online. The excellent thing is that you can change your tickets if you change it 30 minutes before the booked journey. So, I usually booked trains with a buffer of two to three hours and then change the tickets when I arrive at the station. This is because I'm always wary of budget airlines delaying their flights. This worked out relatively well as we never had a problem changing to the earliest trains at our convenience - though this might not work as well if you travel at absolutely peak periods. But, the frequency of the trains one/two trains per hour I think prevents any long wait. 

   After you arrive at THSR Zuoying, you can just take the metro to reach the city centre at Kaoshiung Main Station. Note that the metro is very efficient so you can choose to stay at a hotel around THSR Zuoying as well. 

     2) Hotel at Kaoshiung 

    We stayed at Kindness Xiong Zhong Hotel, which is everything a budget friendly hotel needs to be. It was extremely clean and spacious (except for the bathroom), had a truly awesome breakfast buffet, extremely dedicated staff and lots of extra amenities and services for guest (such as free tea, free icecream, free bicycles, etc). It's a ten minutes walk from Liuhe Night Market and five minutes from Kaoshiung Main Station. It costs about $90 per night for a family room (fits 4 pax) and I booked this one week before we arrived. 

3) Accomodations at Fo Guang Shan Monastery 

   This is the direct link to the accomodations page for Fo Guang Shan Monastery as the main homepage is rather hard to navigate.  From there, you will get the number to contact them if you want to make reservations for a tour or accommodations, there are two places you can stay: 朝山会馆 or 麻竹园. 

   I actually emailed them to make the accommodation request (fgs5000@ecp.fgs.org.tw), but the email address does not seem to appear on the site anymore. But you can still try! Do note that they take days to reply your emails. Feel free to email me if you require help to email them in Mandarin - although my own Mandarin is painfully awkward. 

4) Travelling to Fo Guang Shan

  You could travel by taxi to Fo Guang Shan - it's probably faster and not expensive if you travel in a group of four. There are taxi drivers hanging around the bus stations touting taxi services/rates not by the meter. 

  We travelled by bus though since we planned to take a bus back from Fo Guang Shan and the taxi drivers were rather aggressive in getting clients, which really put us off. 

  There are two buses. One is from THSR Zuoying Station - it's just right outside and is called the E-DA bus. It departs every 30 minutes and the bus ride is about 45 minutes. This bus also goes to the E-DA factory outlet. 

   The other bus is from Kaoshiung Main Station - you walk to Kaoshiung Bus Station which is just down the road (on the left) from the train station. It's a ten minutes walk. Take bus #8010 heading to Jishan (旗山). There are more buses on the weekends. There is roughly one bus every 1 and 1/2 hours. The journey is longer for this bus - 1 and 1/2 hour. 

   We took the #8010 bus there (we stayed around Kaoshiung Main Station) and took the E-DA bus back to TSHR Zuoying Station to catch our train to Taipei. 

5) Liuhe Night Market (Opens Daily) vs Ruifeng Night Market (closed Monday & Wednesday) 

   Liuhe Night Market is more famous but Ruifeng Night Market has by far better food and shopping. One of P's friend was doing exchange in Kaoshiung and recommended the following food at Ruifeng: 

   

   For travelling in Kaoshiung, there are a whole lots of options! You could get an all day travel card for bus, train and ferry at any of the metro stations. That's what we did. But, it's not expensive to take the taxi too - and that's also what we did when we got tired. 

   Just grab a map from your hotel and go off and explore! At every corner, there will be a friendly person ready to help you. True story.