Our Sightseeing Adventure

It's 5:00 AM in our time zone in America, and I am guessing that Reed's Enna, Poppy, and Aunt Ava (and probably evena a few blog friends we've never "met" in real life) are going to wake up and read this post before they go to church. So, before we go and eat supper, I thought I better take the time to post something!

Here is a quick recap of our day's adventure, minus food, which I plan on doing a separate post for.

The day started with a brief wait on Fion in the lobby of our very friendly and clean hotel.




While we waited, and by wait I mean maybe 10 minutes, the hotel staff came by to check and see if we needed any coffee or tea while we waited. We declined both, but soon he was back over with four glasses of water.

Fion arrived and help remedy our room situation which she did with remarkable ease. Nobody is moving, we're in the same rooms we were in last night and we're paying a fair rate.



Next, we headed to the Jade Market. Fion dropped us off while she went and parked, which apparently must be a day-trip in itself and we wandered in the market. Abbey and I immediately saw things that we wanted to purchase but wanted to wait on Fion to make sure we were getting a fair price but mostly to make sure we were getting correct change. Have I mentioned that I have never felt so rich in my life. I walked out of the airport with $19,000 NT last night!

While in the market I remarked to Abbey that many of the people seemed to have physical handicaps. We'll get back to this in a minute.



Next, we crossed into a flower market. Wow! You could do a spectacular wedding with these flowers for very little money. One place was selling beautiful orchids for $50 NT (about $1.50 US). The flowers were very pretty.







We turned back and started looking for Fion who had still not gotten to us. She asked if we had been in the Jade Market. Wait a minute, we thought that's where we were. Nope, we had never actually entered the Jade Market. So, we went there.



Above is Abbey looking through some random bracelets that we liked. Buy 10 get one free!

The Jade Market was HUGE!!!! I asked Fion if this was everyday and she explained that these markets are only on weekends. She further said that all of the things would be moved by Monday morning because the markets were housed on parking lots! Oh my goodness, they have a huge job. In the flower market, there were literally "trees" for sale!

We liked all the markets, but the one with the items we liked the most were in the first market. We headed back there. On the way, we were stopped at the busy intersection (by the way, they are all incredibly busy!) and I looked at the sign above the first market. "Taiwan Market for the Handicapped". "Well," I told Abbey, "That explains it!"



Those of you who know Abbey and me, know that we love original art. The problem is, we don't have the financial assets to go to big expensive galleries. We have to take the art we like when we find it. Above is a beautiful water color, along with a picture of the artist.



We also purchased this for Reed's room. A daddy, mommy, and baby. We thought this piece would be a great little piece of Reed's culture for him to hold onto as we became a family and our culture connected in Taiwan.



One of the biggest prizes of the day were these puzzles. A modern day puzzle map of Taiwan, an Engligh and Chinese number puzzle, and a giraffe puzzle.

We also purchased some pottery in the market, but no pictures of that.

Next onto the Martyrs Shrine.



How cool that when we teach Reed about our nation's independence we can also teach him about his home country's battle for indepence. There is such a price for the freedom we enjoy. Here are a few pictures from the shrine.








(in keeeping with the "doors" theme.)




(look at the detail! Whoa!)




(changing of the guard.)

Well, more details later, but now my stomach is growling loudly and I have finally gotten Abbey up from a deep slumber. Superwoman (Abbey) has been blowing and going since we got here. Now, she is fading fast to sleepy mode!