MLand

陽明山國家公園 Yang Ming Shan
It's another rainy day. We were scared it will be even much colder up at 陽明山 so decided to let Chloe wear the oversized pullover that Eileen bought for her.



We took a public bus up to 陽明山. It's a super long queue while waiting for the bus. As it's quite a long journey, we have to make sure there's seats for us before we get up onto the bus. There's a lot of students, Eileen mentioned there's quite a number of schools along the journey. Wah I won't want to study at such a far and "high" place. So unconvenient.

We went to settle our lunch at a cosy small restaurant serving Italtian food before heading our way to 陽明山. It's really cold with the rain and the wind blowing. We finally made our way up to the 陽明山國家公園, took some photos and decided to walk back to take the mini bus to tour abit. Chloe kept complained, "COLD~~~ COLD~~~". She worn 2 jackets but still complain cold.



We saw some old aunties and uncles climbing up and really admire their stamina. Eileen wanted to show us the 小油坑 which was said to be a dead volcano. As it's a weekday and rainy day, the mini bus only got the 3 of us. The bus driver asked where we plan to go and when we told her about 小油坑, she said it's too hazy for us to see anything and it will be super cold up there, not advisable since we have a kid with us. So we just took the mini bus for like sightseeing on the bus without alighting. Sit one round and back to the place where we board the bus.

信義商圈 / 台北101大樓
As xmas is coming, there's sure to have xmas decorations outside those big shopping centres. But weird thing is Christmas is not declared as a public holiday over at Taiwan.



After dinner we went up to 台北101大樓. Taipei 101 is equipped with three wind-vibration dampers. One of them, the world's largest and heaviest, and the only one made visible to visitors, is located on the 89th Floor Observatory. It has a diameter of 5.5 meters, weighs 660 metric tons, and consists of 41 layers of 12.5 cm steel plates welded together. The Tuned Mass Damper (TMD) is a specially designed passive damper that reduces wind movement in high-rises, and is located between the 87th and 91st Floors. This system, is to ensure the stability of the high building, the first to be exhibited to public.

The entrance fee is NT350(~SG$16.8)It took only 37secs for the lift to bring us up to 89th storey of the building. That's really very fast.. There's 4 directions which we can view the night scenery of Taipei.



We are able to go up to the 91st storey, but we have to pay another NT100 additional. We were thinking since we already paid to go up 89th storey, might as well go up to 91th storey and see. Over at 91st storey, the surrounding is open-air but of cos with bars surrounding us. So we really can feel the coldness up there. It's very windy. The below pix shows that the temperature at 91st storey was 13.2deg... Wah.. but I don't feel that super cold at all :P