One of our bigger adventures was going to a famous mining town on the north coast of Taiwan called Jiufen. It was made famous by a local romantic movie in the late 1980s as well as by the cartoon movie Spirited Away. The city is the inspiration for the village in the movie. It's a quaint little town high up in the mountains overlooking the coastline. The main attraction is an old street with lots of interesting and unique vendors selling all sorts of treats and interesting items.
Because of the way it was built, another interesting attraction is the several "tunnel" like alleyways crisscrossing the mountain village. These alleys run in between the houses and link one level of the village with another. They are very narrow and really feel like a tunnel with stairs.
Since October, we've taken two trips to Jiufen. Heather and the girls went in mid October with a bunch of women from our church. Then Heather and I went by ourselves with a group organized by AIT in early December. Both were fun trips, although the weather was beautiful during the first trip and rainy and cloudy during the latter. Here are some pics.
Elli attracts a crowd most places she goes. She's like a celebrity. Here she is hamming it up and posing in front of a bunch of locals/tourists.
On the first trip, Heather got to go to a nearby temple. It's a huge temple and decked out in gold trimming, since the town used to be a gold mining town. The details of this temple are really beautiful, and the views were pretty amazing too.
Definitely a place worth a visit!
5 comments:
haha, I LOVE the crowd around Elli! Sounds like a lot to see there!
Such a fun post!! I also LOVE the paparazzi picture of Elli. That's hilarious! You guys have amazing pictures. So fun to be on so many adventures! Hope you had a very Merry Christmas!
Well, I, for one, think it is perfectly reasonable that people would flock to see and take pictures of my beautiful Granddaughters! They are ADORABLE after all, aren't they??? Yes, they are!!! Haha. I really want to see this village! What a wondrous place! Love, Mom (Christine)
This village totally fulfills my image of what a Taiwanese village should look like - awesome views, interesting shops, neat snacks, and a gorgeous temple nearby. Love it, I want to go there. I really want to try the taro and pineapple ice cream that Elli just couldn't share. That pic is so cute of her. The celebrity picture is cute as well. What does she do when they gather round her like that? Just smile for pictures? Sing songs? The pic of Elli and Heather leaning into each other is so sweet too!
70% of the time Elli just smiles, or just keeps doing what she was doing which is what attracted them in the first place. She will often get silly if there is a bunch of people. Like pretend to fall or blurt out random syllables, do a fake laugh, etc. In the pic in this post, she was originally talking and petting a stone dog on the steps which attracted attention. Then she started smiling and being more animated in her play when she saw others watching. The other 30% of the time when she is not happy with their intrusive behavior she might tell them no, pout, cover her face, pull down the sunshade on her stroller, or growl at them. Yep she growls. I usually don't stop her because sometimes I want to growl at them. :)
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