As we only had one night and half of the next day to explore Taichung, the areas of exploration were minimal. We did
Fengjia Night Market on our first night in Taichung, and the next morning, we packed our bags and loaded into the van, and we were ready to explore some more of Taichung during the day time before spending the night at Sun Moon Lake.
Rainbow Village 彩虹眷村 for its colourful walls and was fortunate enough to meet with Grandpa Huang Yung-Fu (黃永阜), the creator of Rainbow Village. Thanks to him, a desolated area is now visited by many to enjoy the colourful murals. There is a small souvenir shop there for visitors to purchase a piece of the artwork of Huang Yung-Fu. The caps and umbrella are nice.
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| Rainbow Village |
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| let's explore! |
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| souvenir shop |
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| the talented Mr Huang Yung-Fu |
The rainbow village is quite small and easy to explore. Not many visitors before 10am. The temperature in Taichung was about 32 degrees celcius and the sun was starting to beat down on us, so we went in search of ice (cream).
Our guide, Sam said that Miyahara (宮原眼科) is a popular snack shop in Taichung. For me, am just puzzled why a name that sounded like eye specialist is a snack shop. Apparently, it was an opthalmology hospital previously. Oooh, I see.
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| Miyahara Building from across the street |
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| at its entrance floor |
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| felt like a step into history |
Once you step into Miyahara, it has that grand majestic feel. High ceiling, sturdy furniture and knowledgeable staff at each turn. There are chocolate counters, cake counters, snacks/biscuits counters tea counters etc. Must say that their packaging for the biscuits are quite cool. They have a restaurant at the Miyahara Pavillion but it wasn't opened yet when we were there at about 10.40am.
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| to Miyahara Pavillion |
Nevertheless, we were there for the ice-cream and that's a separate kiosk so out we went and towards the ice-cream take-away area.
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| Miyahara Milk Tea |
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| expectations |
The queue for the ice-cream was pretty long. The queue to order and to make payment was about half hour to 40 minutes and another 10 to 15 minutes before your number is called.
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| choose your toppings |
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| Miyahara Ice-Cream |
Many customers would eat their ice-cream just outside of the ice-cream parlour. No seats but one could squeeze butts near the plants. Lucky us, we have a van to squeeze into and to enjoy our ice-cream. 5 scoops of ice-cream with toppings for about NT$620. Two of it came in crispy cone bowl with free one scoop of yoghurt ice-cream. Yums!
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| Miyahara Ice-Cream bowl (recommended) |
Thank you
Ivan for helping us to queue for the ice-cream!
Final stop before heading to Sun Moon Lake was to have proper lunch. Well, the definition of 'proper' after all the ice-cream, was to have some meat. Haha!
Ok, so Sam (our guide) said that there is this area famous for chicken which happened to be on our way to the lake thus suggested that we stop there for food. Local rustic lunch of golden chicken.
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| Fu Bo Crispy Skin Golden Chicken |
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| using wood to burn |
It was a roadside restaurant and looks dingy. There were stacks of firewood outside the restaurant and they are using this method to cook the chicken in huge huge pots. Looks similar to how char siew is roasted.
The place uses disposable utensils, so things were flying away when the strong wind blew to our side or flies attempting to have a taste of our food.
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| interior |
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| menu |
The most expensive item on the menu is the whole chicken at NT$550 (SGD25) per chicken. The rest of the dishes are priced between NT$50 to NT$150.
The food is rustic and no-frills. For every order of the chicken, they will serve a bowl of 'soup' which are the drippings from the roasted chicken. Flavoured salt (with pepper) is served along with the chicken. Careful as these can fly away when the wind blows.
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| our unglam looking lunch |
We ordered a few side dishes to go along with the chicken. Bamboo rice, stir-fried mountain vegetables, and deep fried intestines.
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| bamboo rice |
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| stir-fried greens with anchovies and black bean |
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| deep fried intestines |
The bamboo rice has mild flavours and a tad dry for me. The deep fried intestines were good and sliced thinly. Loved the stir-fried vegetables as it had stronger flavours and a good refreshing crunch. The roasted chicken, remained the star. Chunky, moist and well-seasoned meat.
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| 福伯黃金雞 Fu Bo Golden Chicken |
The skin of the chicken was indeed an attractive golden brown hue and so thin! Was impressed. The meat was flavourful and good on its own. Best eaten while warm. Even its breast meat was so good and tender. This is as rustic as it gets. Recommended.
Rainbow Village 彩虹眷村
Address: No. 56巷, Chunan Road, Nantun District, Taichung City, Taiwan 408
Contact: +886 4 2380 2351
Business Hours:
Daily: 830am to 6pm
宮原眼科
Address: No. 20號, Zhongshan Road, Central District, Taichung City, Taiwan 400
Contact: +886 4 2227 1927
Website: http://www.miyahara.com.tw/
Business Hours:
Daily: 10am to 10pm
福伯黃金雞
Address: No. 1808, Section 1, Jishan Road, Zhushan Township, Nantou County, Taiwan 557
Contact: +886 4 9262 4767
Business Hours:
Daily 9am to 7pm
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