SANGARIA - not sangria. Learn from my mistake.

Turns out Tanshui is a lot bigger than I thought. I got a chance to spend the day there with Tiffany, who taught me many good things about Tanshui.

Lesson 1: Tanshui is super godamn busy on Sunday. Avoid it.
Lesson 2: They have corn on the cob that is first covered in butter, fried, covered in a spice of your choosing, then fried again. The end result is like a 3 layer corn thing, except the outside is fried butter and garlic. This is awesome.
Lesson 3: Take the boat to Fisherman's Wharf. While the river appears calm, as you get near the ocean the waves get quite large, and seem totally cool with jumping over the side and getting you all sorts of wet.
Lesson 4: The Fisherman's Wharf has fried mushrooms.
Lesson 5: There is no Lesson 5. Lesson 4 is all you will ever need.

Tiffany was all too eager to point this out.

In maybe more exciting news, I accidentally crashed a party with Taiwan's president. How did that happen? In the most mundane, boring way possible. Tiffany and I were headed off to dinner at a restaurant I thought looked cool but hadn't eaten at. Well it turns out that place is totally awesome because its cheap and has the largest beer selection I have seen in Taipei. So, big win there. It's in this artists village with these little exhibition halls. One of them was being used for some sort of African festival.

On the way out, there were tons of cops. Like, every 10 paces another cop standing around. As we got caught in a crowd, Tiffany asked, and we were told the president is here. Oh. Interesting. Well one of those halls had some pretty bumping music playing as we walked by, so I decided to poke my head in and look. I walked past the cops, but there were cops on every corner so I didn't think anything of it. There was just a stage with a performer on it, bunch of guys in expensive suits. I'm not standing there for but 10 seconds when I overhear the president is about to speak. Also, some regular folk try to come in right behind me. The cops stop them, tell them they are not allowed to pass. Like, right where I just walked in. Moral of the story - if you want to crash the party of a president, be white.

So, mountain update! Man, today's trek was hard because the peaks weren't very clearly marked. Oh right, also because I got stupid drunk the night before and wanted to die by the time I was done. But I gave 小八里分，坑子，小坪頂，and 忠義 my best shot. The only official elevation I can find is for Xiaobalifen, at 232m. The other 2 were not as high, and Zhongyi was a bit taller. So I'll say 200, 200, and 250 respectively. Add another 882 meters for a total of 6038. (68%). Zhongyi was probably one of my favorite hikes yet, as when you get to the top it just opens to a very cool field. I've never seen anything like that, so it was a nice surprise.

Beitou has the cutest trains ever.

On my way back I stopped off at Xinbeitou to make use of the hot springs, because I needed it. There was an awesome kid there who was using the water bowl thingies you wash your feet off with as his personal battleship, moving it about in the water and making "pew pew" noises at a Japanese couple. I will not stand by and watch an American ally's sovereignty be threatened by senseless Taiwanese aggression, so I grabbed the other bowl and engaged the enemy. Sadly, I was defeated - however his mother made him leave, so the land of the rising sun remains secure.






Closer to home I was going to stop by the new Subway to have dinner, because the old one closed like a week after I arrived. I don't know why the old one did close, because the new is literally across the street. And for some reason, at 7:00pm on a Sunday, the new one was also closed. Like, what the hell guys? You are sweet onion chicken teriyaki teases, and you should be ashamed.