April 9th In The Country

This picture is right outside the restaurant that we had bruch at on Sunday.
(Our internet is acting funny again, so I am unable to send more photos at this time...ahhhhh!)



April 9th
Woke up in the morning and hung out while everyone was getting ready, put back on the same old clothes, and headed out. Julia drove us, and her sister. Will went with his grandparents, and we met them in a beautiful park in Nantou County. On the way we passed through this very, very long man-made tunnel. It is very new, and speeds up getting to this area so much. You kept thinking any second you’d see daylight peeking through the tunnel, but it took a while. It’s the longest tunnel in Taiwan. It lasted for over 6 entire minutes Michelle said!

Will was running around the park playing with a ball. His grandparents, and there many friends were all hanging out and enjoying the beautiful weather. It was actually almost too hot!!! It was over plus 30, and very humid!!! But this area was so clean. There were many families out with there kids, people out for a walk. It was a very relaxing atmosphere. There were many statues in the park (see pictures), and with all the beautifully trimmed trees you easily felt like you were at a resort minus the “tickets to fly or pina coladas.” The alcohol wasn’t far behind though.

Although Michelle & Julia’s Mom (Lily) doesn’t speak English, nevertheless she took us to a bamboo forest to take pictures, and to a few other sights along the way. You can express a lot with body language. The area was well taken care of as you can tell from the pictures. This place was very tourist friendly, with many road and information signs in English.

Soon we all headed to a restaurant for lunch…brunch for us. It was a buffet, I must say the restaurant sure lost money on me….I sure ate a lot!!! It was beyond delicious. Michelle keeps taking us to these amazing restaurants, her and her family have great taste.
There were 14 of us altogether, mostly Julia’s parents friends. We had are own section of the restaurant that over looked a little man-made water fall, and flower gardens. One of the men brought in a 26’er of Scotch….and went to work….Michelle and I helped them out….of course. I must admit, I thought it was whiskey so I was all excited until my first sip…yikes…hello heartburn!!!

I ordered a bacon-peppercorn-steak….and I know I keep saying this about all the food we have been trying---but it was amazing!!! Absolutely delicious. Plus all the before and after buffet/salad bar was great too. Fresh salmon, duck, rice, 3 different soups, pasta, garlic bread, salads, even potato salad which I was surprised to see. Tons of cakes, fresh fruit, fruit juice, ahh so much more…it was all very satisfying. Michelle had the sweet pepper chutney steak and felt the same way I did! To make this experience even more enjoyable, Lily and her husband surprised us and picked up out tab for bruch, wow what a treat. They are such a generous family.

After brunch we walked around the flower gardens, took some pictures, and watched Will enjoying anything and everything like cute little kids do. Will was very hesitant with us when he first met us, but by the afternoon he was warming up to us a lot! He’s so cute!

Then we headed back to Yuanlin and hung out for a while and cooled down!

Jeff