With it being out last full day in Taipei and in Taiwan as a whole, I thought it was about time to get out and see what else was going on in this city…. And it turned out to be one of the busiest days I have had here. The day was spent at the Taiwan Beer Brewery, Taipei 101 and finishing up in the Snake Alley Night Market…

First I need to give a shout out to my shoebuddy, Ms. Angela, for the tip on the Taiwan Beer Brewery… But I’m not sure this was how the tour was suppose to be… We arrived around 3pm by cab and kind of just let ourselves in. No real signs posted about any brewery tours, or even that we were in the right location. With Taiwan Beer being owned by the government, the only logos we saw were that of the TTL (Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor) and a bunch empty bottles… We soon found a person in an office that agreed to try and help us. He took us back to where we walked in, and went up to the Director of the brewery’s office. He came back 5 minutes later and said he got someone to give us a tour (BTW this guy helping us didn’t work for the brewery, he worked in sales for the TTL) but the only problem with the new guy that was going to give a private tour, he didn’t speak English. So the gentleman that was helping us before agreed to join us on the tour as well… During which we walk through what looks like were they give normal tours, but there really isn’t much to see besides the actual plant. In past brewery tours I’ve been on, there is so much marketing going on, you are so overwhelmed and put off. This trip had just a few posters and a lot of dark wet hallways instead. At the “end” of the tour in the brewery control room, we actually got some free beer that was as fresh as can be and by some I mean a lot for the four of us drinking it… At this point we had another worker stop in that could actually speak English and was one of the nicest ladies in the world. Of course I asked if I could have the glass I was drinking from as a souvenir, I even offered to pay (I usually steal them from bars/pubs around the world) so this was something new for me. But she actually gave me 6 brand new taster glasses for free because she couldn’t believe I actually wanted to keep one. “This ugly thing….we have a better glass you can see later”……and then she put in call to the main office, all in Taiwanese. As we finished our beers in the “heart of the brewery” we were lead out by “Vicki” back to the front gates where we were met with a gift bag filled with 6 more pint glasses, again for free…Speechless.

The people here have been unbelievable…  So beyond helpful and nice… And I can do is say thank you… It’s been a real refreshing trip in Taiwan, sure things don’t always go your way (maybe about 15% of the time actually) but that’s part of traveling… Two countries down and there isn’t really anything I bad I can say about the people and the experience thus far… [knocks on wood]…

Enjoy the pics of Taipei 101… and Part 2 of the day… Snakes.