It's almost three months that I haven't written anything. Excuses:
#1. At the end of the day, I'm too tired to sit in front of a computer after staring at another one at work for a whole day.
#2. The work is busy, when I have some free time, I'd rather sleep.
#3. My parents were here for two months that I'd rather watch TV with them at night. On the weekends, we traveled a lot.
#4. PR and I travel, eat out or have other fun together and he writes about them, which left me little to write about. And he is a better writer any way.
#5. I'm just too lazy.
But now I should start to write again. In fact, most of my travel for the past year were done in the past two months. We literally took my parents somewhere every weekend, Gaoxiong, Tainan, Hualian... I also had a chance to go on a company trip to Kending, where the best beach in Taiwan is (according to some people, not sure if it's true). One of the typical thing that companies in Taiwan do for their employees is annual trip. After the crazy tax seasons ended at the end of May, we headed to Kending for a overnight trip.
We took the high speed rail to Gaoxiong, where the tour bus picked us up. It was the first time for many of my colleagues to take the train (2nd time for me), so they were very excited.
I have to say, even though food is absolutely important in Chinese culture, people in Taiwan take it to a different level. In all the trips I've taken with locals, the itinerary was carefully planned so that we won't miss any famous local food on the way, sometimes even with a little bit detour. This time, we had Tuna meal on the way to Kending and Pork feet meal on the way back. Everyone was raving about it. The Pork feet restaurant even offer gift package to go. I wasn't impressed with either meal. For the first time, I tried a slice of raw Tuna. It probably will be my last piece too. Don't get me wrong. It was not bad but I really don't like to eat any raw meat/fish.

After about 10 courses of Tuna cooked in different way, I made a comment to my boss that I thought the sesame noodles was the best (the simplest food that you can get in the night market). It's definitely not the smartest comment. He probably thought that the company's big expenses on the meal was wasted.

Another vegetable dish called 山蘇, which I have never seen before was good too.

Result from the trip - Most of the pictures in my camera were for food.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chengdu_spicygirl/page2/But the hotel we stayed in was wonderful. The Chateau Beach Resort, best hotel in Kending, with great private beach.

When we got there in the afternoon, it was very cloudy. Lying on the chair by the beach, I could see the thunderstorm moving in from the Ocean. But it was such a relaxing afternoon, with very few people around. I loved it.

The sun only came out for one hour before we checked out the next morning. We grabbed the chance to take some more pictures.

By the time we got on the bus, the rain was pouring down. The hotel is a little pricey. Our room with one big bed and two small beds cost around US$350. I'm sure we got some group discount with over 80 people but I had to share room with three other colleagues. Nevertheless, I had a great time. I hope I can go back there sometime.

View from our balcony