Christmas in Taiwan: Taipei: Photos 21 to 33

For our Christmas vacation this year we decided to check out Taiwan. We had 5 days so we needed to cram in as much as we possibly could.

We started off in Taipei where we spent the first day parusing through temples as well as paying a visit to Taipei 101. There is a bit of controversy surrounding it's rank among the highest buildings in the world, but accoring to our Lonely Planet guide, it is the tallest. It also claims to have the worlds fastest elevator that rises 1010m per minute as well as a massive damper that counteracts movements from strong winds and earthquakes. All in all it was a pretty amazing building.

Next we visited the Confucius Temple and the Bao-an Temple (Taoist). Both were beautiful and had incredible architecture. Once it got dark we headed for the Hua Xi St. Night Market, aka Snake Alley. Back in the day it wasn't uncommon to see snakes tormented then killed, but now there are only a few stores that still keep and serve snakes (and turtles). On these shops there were big signs that read "NO PHOTOGRAPHS". Probably because of all the animal activists that were peeved

Full Text Entry: Christmas in Taiwan: Taipei