4-Day Taipei Itinerary — Night Markets, Jiufen & Maokong Tea Houses

Longshan Temple

📍 Wanhua District

Taipei's busiest working temple, from 1738. Come early and watch the weekday regulars work the incense and moon blocks — this is a place of worship first and a sight second.

Bopiliao Historic Block

📍 Wanhua District

A restored Qing-era street of arcaded shophouses two minutes from Longshan. Free, rarely crowded, and the best surviving picture of what Taipei looked like before the tower blocks.

Ay-Chung Flour-Rice Noodle

📍 Ximending

Standing-room only, one item on the menu: thick pork-intestine noodle soup eaten off the kerb. Add the black vinegar and chilli oil from the counter — locals do, tourists forget to.

Ximending

📍 Wanhua District

Taipei's pedestrianised youth quarter — street performers, sneaker shops and the octagonal Red House Theater from 1908 at its western edge. Good place to sit out the hottest hour.

Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall

📍 Zhongzheng District

Enormous white hall at the top of 89 steps, flanked by the National Theater and Concert Hall. The hourly changing of the guard is the reason to time your arrival on the hour.

Ningxia Night Market

📍 Datong District

Compact, food-only and where Taipei residents send you instead of Shilin. Work the single lane: sesame-oil chicken soup, taro balls, and the queue for oyster omelette at the north end.

Beitou Hot Spring Museum

📍 Beitou District

The 1913 Japanese-era bathhouse, now free to enter. Socks off at the door. It sets up the whole valley: Beitou was built as a spa town under Japanese rule and still runs on the same water.

Thermal Valley

📍 Beitou District

The sulphur spring the whole valley drains from — 80-plus degrees, steaming hard enough to swallow the far side of the pool. Ten minutes uphill from the museum.

Millennium Hot Spring Beitou

📍 Beitou District

Public open-air terraced pools, swimwear required, a few hundred NT to enter. The tiered pools run hot to cold — start in the middle and work up rather than down.

National Palace Museum

📍 Shilin District

The imperial Chinese collection that left Beijing in 1948 — nearly 700,000 pieces, rotated. Go straight to the third floor for the jadeite cabbage and the Meat-Shaped Stone, then double back.

Shilin Night Market

📍 Shilin District

The big, loud, touristy one — and still worth a night. The basement food court is where the cooking is; upstairs is games and phone cases. Hot-Star large fried chicken is the size of a face and the queue moves fast.

Houtong Cat Village

📍 Ruifang District

An abandoned coal-mining settlement rebuilt around its cat population, right on the platform of Houtong Station. Twenty minutes here is plenty and it costs nothing.

Shifen Old Street

📍 Pingxi District

The branch-line train runs down the middle of the street and everyone steps aside as it passes. This is where the sky lanterns are launched — write on all four sides before you let it go.

Shifen Waterfall

📍 Pingxi District

Taiwan's widest waterfall, a 20-minute walk from the old street along the river. Free entry, viewing platforms on both banks — the lower one gets the rainbow in early afternoon.

Jiufen Old Street

📍 Ruifang District

A gold-rush hill town of covered lanes stacked above the sea. Eat as you climb: taro balls, peanut ice-cream rolls with coriander, fish-ball soup. Arrive before the tour buses at four.

A-Mei Tea House

📍 Jiufen

The red-lantern teahouse on the Shuqi Road steps, the one on every Jiufen postcard. Order a pot properly and sit on the balcony as the lanterns come on over the bay.

Keelung Miaokou Night Market

📍 Keelung

A port-city market built around a temple gate, numbered stall by stall. Seafood is the point here — thick crab soup, one-bite sausage, and the nutritious sandwich at stall 58.

Din Tai Fung Xinyi Road

📍 Da'an District

The original branch, opened 1972 — a shop-front that became a global chain. Take a number, watch the glassed-in kitchen fold xiaolongbao while you wait, order the crab-roe basket as well as the pork.

Yongkang Street

📍 Da'an District

The food lane that grew up around Din Tai Fung: beef-noodle shops, tea sellers and coffee bars in a few walkable blocks. Wander into the side alleys, which is where the rents and prices drop.

Smoothie House Yongkang

📍 Da'an District

Mango shaved ice under a mound of fresh fruit and condensed milk. Order one between two — the portion is designed for sharing and defeats most solo eaters.

Taipei 101 Observatory

📍 Xinyi District

Up in 37 seconds, once the fastest lift in the world. The engineering payoff is on 88: the 660-tonne golden tuned mass damper that keeps the tower still in a typhoon.

Maokong Gondola

📍 Wenshan District

Cable car from Taipei Zoo up into the tea hills, 30 minutes each way. Queue for a Crystal Cabin with the glass floor if the wait is under half an hour — otherwise take the next car up.

Yao Yue Teahouse

📍 Maokong

Hillside teahouse where you brew your own pot at the table and the city glitters below through the trees. They serve tea-leaf dishes too. Last gondola down is around nine — check the board before you settle in.