Fun weekend anyway!

Even though we didn't make it to Taipei we still had a fun weekend! I met Stephen in Causeway Bay after work on Friday for dim sum. We'd been to this place before but I didn't realise until we turned up that it's based in Taipei - the restaurant, Din Tai Fung, appears 6 times in the top 15 restaurants in Taipei on tripadvisor!

Spring rolls, peanut noodles and pork/vegetable wontons

The Taipei sign and saying how it made it to the New York Times top 10 restaurants one year!

Steamed pork buns

Soy noodles

This is what the menu looks like in a typical dim sum place - you just tick things! (We tend to only go in ones that also have english translations, and preferably pictures too!)

The meal was really nice and just what we fancied, having not had any dim sum for a while. There's also a Michelin starred dim sum place we'll hopefully try at some point but given how it's the cheapest Michelin restaurant in the world (think £3-4 a dish) there's inevitably massive queues outside!

After food we went for a couple of drinks and yes only a couple, thought I best take it easy since the doctor told me not to drink at all....

Pretty chinese new year lanterns en route to the bar

Love this stuff, reminds me of being in the states last summer!

On Saturday we were planning to take the cable car to see Big Buddha but it was a bit of a smoggy/foggy day and visibility wasn't great so thought it best saved for another day. Instead we went to Nan Lian Garden (a chinese classical garden) and the Chi Lin Nunnery (buddhist temple complex). We got the tube to the nearest stop and guess what we found? Another enormous shopping centre! We went to one of the many bakeries inside and bought ourselves tasty snacks for lunch. 

Stephen was particularly pleased to discover the egg tarts were deeper than usual and came with a spoon!

I loved these lily pads in the nunnery

Pretty

Trying to capture the nunnery and failing, think this but repeated lots!

There were lots of really impressive gold plated statues of buddha and his key people (not sure what the proper term is?!) but you were't allowed to take photos, given it's a place of worship. We then crossed over the road to the garden, another really impressive space given they're in the middle of loads of high rise buildings! They're both free entry but you had to pay to go into the 'contemporary chinese embroidery' exhibition which was on and with hindsight I should have gone for a look round (I think it was only £1.20 entry!) but I can always go back.

Gold plated building with a bright orange bridge!

We were probably only there about an hour or so total but it was a bit different and slightly cultured at least! We then thought we'd go back to the Globe (I don't think a week goes by when we don't end up here - but the beer and cider selection is just too good to resist) and treat ourselves to pie.

Ahhh proper 'pint' (500ml) of cider!

They'd run out of the only pie I liked so I ended up ordering prawn, ham, spinach and chilli pasta - yum! (I also got to steal some of Stephens pie so not all bad!!)

After the Globe it was time for Mr Bings - Stephen had been earlier in the week and was singing its praises so I had to go try it! 

Beijing Street Crepes

Cool entrance

This bag had two crepes in, it was seriously heavy!!

I was really full so didn't eat much of mine (not entirely sure what was in it but it was coconut based, Stephen had a peanut butter one) but it was so good and I'll definitely be back when I'm properly hungry!!

Sunday was a lazy day, Stephen watched NFL / Football and I knitted - all good!

So yeh, not the weekend in Taipei we had hoped but still good anyway and now we're on the countdown to Chinese New Year... only 18 days of work.... and tomorrow it's my birthday - the big 2-7, agh getting old!!