weekend in the south // Kenting, Taiwan

Taiwan is a fairly small country; yet there is so much to do and see here, which I kind of wasn't expecting. Since it is an island, finding a beach to relax at is not that difficult (whether the beach is nice or the water is calm enough to swim in is another question though). For our first getaway in Taiwan, we decided to go to Kenting, the far south of the island, known for its soft, sandy beaches and tropical vibes.🌴

From Taichung, it is quite easy to get to Kenting but it can take you about half a day of traveling if you choose to take trains/busses (by car it takes about 3-4 hours). We took a 2 hour train ride from Taichung to Kaohsiung (which I really didn't mind since it gave me some time to catch up on my sleep). From the train station we arrived at in Kaohsiung (not sure what the exact name of it is) we took a metro to the Zuoying Station where we would catch an express bus to Kenting. The bus was very cheap and had wifi (!!). After about 2 and a half hours of snoozing off in the bus, we finally arrived in Kenting!

First thing we did in Kenting was check into our hotel. We were with 7 people, so you would think finding a room where everyone is able to sleep would be close to impossible. Wrong. Our hotel room had 5 queen size beds lined up next to each other in a big row. We basically had one huge, 25 foot (almost 8 meters) sized bed. It was perfect for our big group, seeing that we all basically had our own bed.

We dropped off our stuff, put our bathing suits on and headed straight to the beach. It was close to 6pm at this time so we were just in time for the sunset. We grabbed some drinks at 7-eleven (the holy grail to anyone living in Asia) and hung out on the beach. It felt like summer, like I am living in this never ending vacation (with the occasional school hours but whatever). 

For dinner, we went to the night market which was much larger than the night market we have near our apartment. The vibes were good, the drinks were good, the food was good, everything was good. Ending our night at the beach, we got some more drinks and decided to go for a night swim. We got kicked off of the beach a little after 12, because I guess they were closing down the restaurants surrounding it (don't worry, mom) so we went back to our 100 foot bed and called it a night.

The hotel was right next to the Kenting National Forest Recreational Area, so the next morning we went to check it out. I am not a huge "in the forest" nature person, but it was a very nice park. There were caves, 360 look-out point over the park/ocean, monkeys (we saw an exciting amount of ZERO monkeys 🙃), etc. It was a nice, relaxing start to our day.

After being all ~~adventurous in the woods~~, it was beach time! Kenting has a lot of nice beaches to go to, one of them being Nanwan beach. Our main reason for coming to this beach was to go surfing. I know nothing about surfing or what 'good' waves are, but by seeing how many surfers there were in the water, I am assuming it was a pretty ok spot for those who wanted to try it out. I relaxed on the beach for the rest of the afternoon and slept for a little bit (I honestly sleep my life away), cooling off once in a while in the water.

Towards the evening, we headed back to the night market to have dinner and some drinks. The drinks were very cheap, so “alright I’ll have one more” was said a few times that night. We ended the night back at the beach, just relaxed hanging out.

We spent our last day fairly relaxed. We had breakfast at 7-eleven (of course), went to look at this really big rock in the middle of the ocean, and then headed back to Nanwan Beach for a couple more hours of surfing. At around 4pm, we took the bus back to Kaohsiung in order to get the train back in time so we wouldn't get home so late.

Getting back, we took a high speed train from Zuoying station straight to Taichung. This cost a little bit more but it only took us 40 minutes…. 40 minutes instead of 2 hours (can you imagine how fast it went?!?!) to get home.

  

  

The south part of Taiwan is definitely worth visiting, especially when it is still very good weather in Taiwan. Even though the water is not ideal to swim in (crazy waves), the beaches were very nice. Regardless of me being mostly a city girl, there is something about the beach, friends and sand EVERYWHERE that makes me very happy. (cheeessyyyy, I know)🧀

I look forward to exploring more parts of Taiwan during the next 4 months.

With love,
Sara