Travelogue: Taiwan Day 5, Cingjing → Hualien (Taroko National Park) ☼

Back to continue about my Taiwan trip in May, I know I'm way backdated but I would definitely finish all 15 days ASAP, so I'm able to look back on my blog entries and recall all the stuff I've done in Taiwan!

This post is gonna be mostly photos because WE TOOK SO MANY!

So, we woke up bright and early the next morning, packed up our luggage and went to the common area to wait for the driver we've hired to arrive at Misty Villa at 10am. Tzu had previously booked a driver by reading forums and reviews online and he found a really reliable source to book a private cab from! (:

 It cost us 5000NT in total for the trip from Cingjing to Hualien in addition of the driver taking us through Taroko Gorge and HuHuanShan and giving us a sort of like tour. And he helped us to take lots of pictures as well! :D But the booking was rather expensive as it came up to about 100SGD per person since there was only the 2 of us and they charge by a standard rate for one cab. So it'll be quite worth it, if it was a group of friends or a family travelling together for this aspect for sure!

Here's a detailed list of the places within the Taroko National Park that we were brought around and other sightseeing destinations along the mountain route we took via the cab:

Chingjing - Wuling - Hehuanshan - Dayuling - Bilyu Sacred Tree - Tiansiang - Tunnel of Nine Turns - Swallow Grotto trail - Eternal Spring Shrine trail - Entrance of Taroko National Park - (Cingshuei Cliff) – Hualien Sunrise Hostel

Taroko National Park 

Wu Ling - Highest point on Taiwan accessible by public vehicles

It was kinda misty and foggy when we were up there, so we missed quite a view, sadly ): 

A word of caution to people considering this route: the driving can be quite nauseating as it is a rather winding path down from the mountainous regions, so it'll be good to have a packet of sour plums nearby or some motion sickness pills along with you in case you feel like vomiting. I experienced motion sickness, especially when going down the mountainous roads in the cab. So I just closed my eyes and just shut my mouth entirely for the whole journey till we reached the next stop and had some sour plums to ease the puking feeling. 

With the Bilyu Sacred Tree

We stopped by a family-run eatery along the way, where we had our lunch and a break from the road trip (:

Tzu looking extremely happy with his food heh

With some warm tea! (:

I was so glad to get some warm tea, because it was like rather cold up there and I was totally not prepped because I was only in my jeans and a cardigan for warmth hahaha. The tea leaves are picked by the owners and they  have this recipe of using peach-infused honey to sweeten the tea instead of sugar, which was sooooo good. 

Our driver! (:

The wooden cabin interior of the eatery 

Gorgeous mountains

Time for some jumpshots heh! :D 

Super-ugly-legs-jump-shot LOLLL

Yay success! (:

Rocks arranged 

Teehee, this bridge was rather shaky and the boyfriend who's afraid of heights was just a little bit scared :P 

♡

Construction workers lollll

Aftermath of a landslide

While we were there, there was apparently a landslide which occurred a few days earlier, so the Taiwan govt posted a restriction whereby vehicles were only allowed to pass out and in of Taroko Gorge at 3 timings per day as they were trying to reconstruct the road and remove the rocks from the landslide. So while we were queuing and waiting for the time where vehicles were allowed to pass, we actually caught a glimpse of some rocks which were still kinda tumbling downwards(!)

That's the end of our day trip through Taroko National Park (: The driver then drove us to our Minsu(Hualien Sunrise B&B), and we settled in with our luggage and freshened up to head out for dinner at Ziqiang Night Market! 

I'll continue about Ziqiang Night Market on my next post because we went there for both nights that we stayed in Hualien! (: Till the next ♡ 

Le Chocolat Cafe.

Decided that my blog is way too dead, and I should update it much more often, so here's a short post about my visit to Le Chocolat Cafe (:

[ On a side note, I got approved to apply for my Industrial Internship Program(IIP) despite being late to complete my safety quiz SO YAYYY, mega thankful because I really don't want to do a Final Year Project (FYP) for the next semester ]

Tzu and I visited Le Chocolat Cafe on a Saturday afternoon about 3 weeks ago to try out the super pretty Rainbow Cake and to have a nice and quiet afternoon date out (:

What I wore: White Spag Top from Zara Basics, and Santiago Maxi Skirt from Love Bonito (:

The skirt's prints are super lovely in real life, and it's definitely one of my best buys from the LB sales! (: So lucky to have seen this on the racks and to have grabbed it successfully hehe. 

Our coffees (:

Tzu had the Caramel Macchiato and I had a Latte, which came along with the highly raved Rainbow Cake! The Caramel Macchiato tasted better than my Latte tho! 

The pretty slice of cake

The Rainbow Cake tasted pretty good to me actually, although I've read some posts about how it's not very yummy. I thought the chocolate coating around it was sweet and overall, the taste of the cake was great with our coffees (:

 So we spent that Saturday afternoon there, catching up and talking about anything and everything while enjoying a cuppa each and had a yummy slice of cake to share (: And I really love quiet cafe dates as such, cause it feels really nice to just chill around with him and spend some quality time together away from the usual dates out in town! 

Le Chocolat Cafe

28 Ann Siang Road

And I shall end off here, so thankful that I have Fridays off from school! ♡

Cause all I know is we said hello.

Favourite song at the moment ♡ which is making me feel a little better from missing the test submission for my Industrial attachment next semester. I really hope the lady would make an exception and let me apply still sigh *fingers crossed.

Love, me.

I'm trying to rush out a paper I'm supposed to finish by tonight because I've been procrastinating for forever ): and it's terrible because I really like writing things that I feel strongly about or things that I'm interested or things that make me reflect about experiences and life. And writing a chemistry paper about transition metal catalysis is nothing close to any of those cases stated above, so I'm just really super sian about it zz. The woes of a Science undergraduate.

This is so me right now hahahaha.

The boy is up awake to keep me company via Skype and I'm really appreciative about it that he's staying up together with me although he has absolutely nothing to do right now hahaha. So I'm actually watching him through the video secretly now while he thinks I'm typing away for my paper, when I'm actually blogging hehe.

And he shows me this story about this old man and the love for his wife, where they're been together for 70 over years, and his dearly beloved wife has just passed on recently.



I'm absolutely amazed and touched by the depth of his love for his dear wife and it brought tears to my eyes as I watched the video and read about his story here: http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/letter-from-fred-song-green-shoe-studio/.

It is truly bittersweet to hear him mention about how much he misses his wife, and that he just felt that it was all a dream and that the time they had together has just passed way too fast.

I guess it reminded me to always treasure the people you love and to probably appreciate and remember the good things in life. Because time just slips by and past so easily through our fingertips each passing day, and before you know it, it's gone and done. So instead of nitpicking and quarreling over little issues, perhaps we should live each day cherishing the people around us and to stop and smell the roses once in a while in life, instead of hurrying around and being lost in the rat race of success.

And, I just had this wave of inspiration to write this down right now, to remind myself of what I've watched from Fred's story today. Thoughts are always best being penned down, to remind ourselves of what we've learnt and felt at that particular moment, before we forget (:

And so, I've decided to post this in remembrance of this video, to remind myself to always treasure the times I've had and will have with Tzu and also with my lovely friends and family. Thank you for always being so understanding to my craziness and madness, and most of all thank you for loving me the way I am ♡ (:

[Sponsorship] Liese's Juicy Shower Moisturizing Hair Mist for Wavy Hair

I've recently been sponsored by EK Media with a new hair product by Liese, which is quite known for their Bubble Hair Colour for hair dyeing purposes.

Their new launched product is named Liese's Juicy Shower Moisturizing Hair Mist for Wavy hair and here's a review about it! (: (:

I'm a girl who likes to look presentable and pretty in the mornings when I leave my house, but I'm just often too lazy to wake up earlier to wash and dry my curls nicely as well as put on makeup etc. So I end up either being late, or just looking kinda crappy as I rush out of my house to be on time (which is also why my friends/boyfriend would often only make dates with me from after 12pm onwards only and why I'm always on the lookout for all day brunch places because I just can't wake up on time for brunch ): )

So here comes Liese's Juicy Shower Moisturizing Hair Mist for Wavy Hair for lazy girls like me heh!

The basket in which the hair mist came in 

A close-up shot

The hair spray bottle and packaging

The instructions on the back of the plastic case holding the hair mist bottle

Me posing with the bottle heh

So this is what my hair looks like, on a typical day after I've showered and dried it with a hair dryer. It's extremely messy and my curls are all over the place, and super dry ):

Here are more close-ups: 

Extremely dry, uurrrghhh ):

So, I tried the hair mist on my hair, placing the bottle about 15cm away from my hair:

And then proceeded to style it by twisting my curls with my dryer for just a little bit: 

And proceeded to spray just a little more of the hair mist on the dryer ends of my hair and voila, I'm done! (:

Here are some close-ups of my hair after using the hair mist on it: 

Happy girl is me, with happier and healthier looking bouncy waves! (: 

The whole process took me about 7-8mins only, to spray on and style it (: which is pretty manageable for everyday use I think! And plus, the hair mist comes in a raspberry scent which smells great too :D

 Liese's Juicy Shower Moisturizing Hair Mist can be purchased currently at all leading pharmacies, personal care stores and supermarkets at the price of $14.90 for the trigger bottle(200ml) and $16.90 for the refill bottle(400ml). 

I will be conducting a giveaway for one bottle of Liese's Juicy Shower Moisturizing Hair Mist for Wavy Hair to one lucky reader/Instagram follower! (: Follow my Instagram account for more details! (: User name is @jocinaaa !

Giveaway contest ends on 10th August, 9pm and I'll announce the winner then! (:

Thanks for reading! :D and have a good loooooong weekend ahead!