M^2 Honeymoon (Extended Edition) - Update 9
20 Nov 2024 - 26 Nov 2024
Summary & Individual Highlights
We finished up our time in Thailand, spent a few days in Taipei, Taiwan, and returned to San Francisco!
This is our final honeymoon update, but we aren’t ruling out a post credits scene!
Michaela’s Highlights
Night markets (Raohe was a particular favorite)
Hot springs
Hike to Thumb Mountain - the view was amazing!
Sleeping for 14 hours once we were home
Morgan’s Highlights
The cooking class in Thailand was fun, as was eating something finally (just a little) too hot afterwards
At the hot springs in Taiwan there was a higher pressure “waterfall” thing that you could stand under and I could stay there all day
Daily Overviews
Wednesday 11/20
We decided to start our last full day in Thailand with a cooking class. We met at the kitchen in the morning and headed over to a nearby market for supplies (really to see what the ingredients look like in raw form, but the class had everything prepped back at the kitchen, so really the market was for show). We made panang curry, pad thai, papaya salad, and bananas in syrup for dessert.
Despite being in Thailand for over a week and attempting to order spicy things, we had still yet to have any dish that was too spicy. On our list of to-dos before leaving was get something spicier than we could handle. We figure one possible reason for our mild food was that restaurants can see our pale complexion and are adjusting the spice down accordingly. We met Tiffany for a second lunch way too soon after cooking, with Tiffany ordering the spiciest dish for us to share before we got there. At last, something that was (only slightly) too hot to handle. We got some ice cream and coffees to neutralize some of the spice before setting out to wander one last neighborhood. Notable stops were a Japanese supermarket and another cool, themed mall (this one had a waterfall in it).
Thursday 11/21
In the morning we checked out of our hotel and headed to the airport for our flight to Taiwan. Once in our new hotel in Taipei, we set out for minor adventure before calling it a night. Our adventure of choice: the Ximending night market a 10 minute walk away. We accidentally found ourselves a parade and got handed some sweet round bread from the back of a a truck, which turned out to be a celebration of a temple nearby. We got street food for dinner (fried stinky tofu, scallion pancake with egg, turnip cakes) and had some beer at a bar with a fun vibe.
Friday 11/22
We decided to go back to our routine from before we had friends showing us around in each new location, so we spent our first morning doing a free walking tour. The tour started at the Longshan Temple, which was so different from the Thai temples we visited last week, but just as beautiful. We got to see architecture from multiple periods of the city’s history, government buildings and monuments, and even made a pit stop for some ice cream. (The tour guide encouraged us to get ice cream before all the shops closed for winter. It was about 24C/75F out. What a contrast to the start of our trip in Iceland, where we ate ice cream in the snow, and the ranger at the park told us “if we only ate ice cream when it was warm, we would never eat ice cream”). We ended the walking tour at the massive Chiang Kai-shek memorial hall. Full of new information, but empty of food, we sought out a soy milk restaurant for lunch. Very eager for night markets round 2, we headed over to the neighborhood with the next night market we wanted to go to, even though it was far from night. We checked out a few temples in the area, walked along the river, and grabbed a beer, before the market was bustling enough to start eating. After a few laps up and down and multiple snacks consumed, we stopped at another night market on our way back to the hotel. More food = more fun.
Saturday 11/23
We wanted to check out some of the hot springs in Beitou, so we hopped on the train to head up north. We meandered our way through the town, stopping in old historical sites and free museums, including an aboriginal culture museum, before we reached the place we had picked to actually soak in hot springs. Many of the hot spring resorts are Japanese style, which means sex segregated and nude, but there are a few where you wear bathing suits and poor little newlyweds (do we still count?) don’t have to separate, so we stopped in one of those, not sure what to expect. It was so much fun! There were a series of pools at different temperatures, with and without bubbles, and even one where you could hit a button to turn on 3 “waterfalls” (read: overhead jets) of different pressures to massage your neck, shoulders, and back (that was Morgan’s favorite). We grabbed some noodles from a vegetarian restaurant for lunch, then continued even further north on the train to check out the neighborhood at the end of the line (Tamsui), and take a ferry ride across the river to check out the other side (Bali). Snacks on the eastern bank of the river, snacks on the western side. Then, because there is always room for more snacks, we stopped at the Shilin night market on our way back south to the hotel.
Sunday 11/24
For our last full day of the trip, Michaela was feeling the pressure to make it awesome, since yesterday had been so great, and you don’t want your second to last day to be great but your last day to be blah! We started on the Elephant Mountain hike, for views of Taipei 101, along with plenty of other tourists. It was a nice view, but luckily, we had gotten a recommendation to continue another few kilometers to a place called Thumb Mountain. It was nice to get away from the crowds, and we were enjoying seeing the jungle flora, but part way through, we weren’t sure if the view of the city would be THAT much better than it had been at the popular turnaround point. Plus, we took a wrong turn, so ended up taking a longer route than we meant to, it was hot so we were super sweaty, and after two months of being decidedly over the over/under of our step count bet, our knees and feet were skeptical of this decision. But the last little scramble, which was much more precarious than we expected, was so worth it. We had a 360 degree view of the city on one side and the hills off in the other direction. There were very few other people, and there was the sort of wind that only blows when you are standing near a scary ledge. It was fantastic.
We shifted plans a little bit and decided to head back to the hotel for a mid-day shower, since we had gotten so sweaty and stinky on the hike. Two showers and instant noodle late lunches later, we ventured back out for a late afternoon to sunset walk through the botanical gardens, and one final night market. After snacks round one, we took a mid-market break at a nearby bar/cafe which was also a cat hotel. We got to see one of the residents when a 3 legged orange cat hopped around the bar for a while, accepting scritches. Two fun cocktails (including a smoked plum one), a Taiwanese beer, and a coffee later, we ventured back for one more round of street food dinner. Full, but not ready to turn in for the night, we headed back to Ximending to check out a brewery we had pinned. We got a few beers and watched a room full of people celebrate the Taiwanese team winning the WBSC Premier12. The last full day was a resounding success.
Monday 11/25
Since our flight was not until the late afternoon, we spent the morning doing a little bit more walking around and sightseeing. We did a loop to all the old city gates before catching the train to the airport.
The longest day of our trip, because we crossed the international date line!
Michaela watched both the Barbie movie and the Godfather. Talk about an exercise in contrasts.
Arrived in the US, got picked up by Zack & Andy, got burritos in the Mission, arrived at Missy’s where Morgan was productive for a few hours but Michaela immediately passed out for 14 hours.
Tuesday 11/26
Our first full day back in the US and our first non-honeymoon day. We checked our mail, checked on our cars, and generally did chores to help get ready for Thanksgiving with Morgan’s family. We took a break in the middle of the day to get lunch with Bryan, one of Morgan’s groomsmen, and we finished the day playing with Morgan’s nieces and having dinner with the family. Overall a low-key day back, with no photos taken (for better or worse).
Notable Bites
Taipei, Taiwan - Raohe Night Market
Braised Tofu Noodles
At this stall you could build your own bowl of braised things, and we assembled a bowl of multiple kinds of tofu and imitation pork belly with noodles. They cook it all for you and then toss it with sauce before handing it back over for you to eat. It was very good.
Taipei, Taiwan - Raohe Night Market
Grilled King Oyster Mushrooms
The king oyster mushrooms get grilled, brushed with a sauce, and grilled some more to get them a nice mix of charred mushroom, caramelized sauce, and tender mushrooms. They were cut to bite size pieces and tossed a bit more with sauce and white pepper before we could dig in.
Taipei, Taiwan - Raohe Night Market
Hot Pineapple Bun with Butter
The pineapple bun (named for appearance, not flavor) was toasted to get it hot and crispy before it got sliced in half and a fat pad of butter was wedged between. It was as good as it sounds.
Taipei, Taiwan - Ximending Night Market
Scallion Pancake with Egg
At this stall the scallion pancakes were made fresh and you could choose your fillings. We opted for the standard of a fresh pancake with just an egg. The steamy, crispy combo got brushed with a sauce and some chili as well before being handed over for us to enjoy.
Taipei, Taiwan - Ximending Night Market
Fried Mushrooms
Its hard to go wrong with a hot, salty, fried thing on the way home from a bar. These hot, salty mushrooms were so good! Very well seasoned and well fried, with the crisp batter staying right in place on the otherwise tender mushrooms.
Taipei, Taiwan - Ximending Night Market
Turnip Cake
Though a bit different than the turnip cakes we had in Thailand (which were less dense and less rectangular), these turnip cakes from the night market were still very much hitting the spot. Turns out we might just really like turnip cake.
Taipei, Taiwan - Nanjichang Night Market
Sweet Potato Balls
These perfectly spherical fried dough balls were chewy and crisp. We got them topped with plum powder, which added a bright, acidic note to them and which was a much appreciated pop of flavor after several of our previous stall bites were on the sweeter side.
Taipei, Taiwan - Chili Noodle Vegetarian
Chili Noodles (and sauces)
As one might expect, the vegetarian chili noodles at Chili Noodle Vegetarian were pretty, pretty good. They were spicy, and chewy, and ticked the box for us for “I had good noodles in Taiwan”. There were also a few sauces on the table that we really liked. Due to the language barrier, we don’t know the names of the sauces, but one was like a citrusy soy sauce and the other one we liked was a salty chili sauce.
Honorable Mentions
Bangkok, Thailand - Sompong Thai Cooking School
All our food
In the class, we made panang curry, pad thai, papaya salad, and bananas in syrup for dessert. We did a pretty good job! We even nailed making tomato roses to garnish our salads. Go us. Did we have better food in Thailand? Yes. Was this the best Thai food we made for each other in Thailand? Objectively, this was the best Thai food we had ever made in Thailand (and that was just fun to do)
San Francisco, United States - Taqueria El Farolito
Mission Burritos
With our 11 hour flight across the Pacific behind us, it felt like 4 am and we were exhausted. We had just enough energy to house our first burritos in two months on the way back to the east bay though. At least for Morgan, the burrito was a bit of a homecoming. If one looked up from their burrito between bites, they would also see Morgan’s brother and 5 year old niece who had picked us up from the airport, which was also nice.
(Not Quite) Dishonorable Mentions
Taipei, Taiwan - Our Hotel
Breakfast
It wasn’t really bad, but it also definitely wasn’t good. Our hotel had some food included between 7-11am. We appreciated having some coffee available, but it was otherwise an area for improvement. The hotel also provided free packaged snacks and instant noodles, which were somehow preferable to the hot breakfast items provided.
Step Count Bet Update
Before the trip, we made a bet with each other about what we thought our average daily step count would be. The stakes are that the loser pays for our first date in Texas, winner decides what the date is. Also bragging rights. We both like being right. Michaela took the over and Morgan took the under on 12,500 steps/day as a final average.
The trip is now over and the counts are in:
Day 57 - 19,880
Day 58 - 11,568
Day 59 - 26,170
Day 60 - 30,178
Day 61 - 30,989
Day 62 - 13,258
Day 63** - 11,197
Average for this week: 20,463 (counting day 63)
Final trip average: 18,580 (not counting day 63)
*all averages rounded to the nearest whole step
**day 63 was our first full day back in the US and was not part of the official honeymoon