Thinking of coming to Taiwan? In this blog, we will share insider tips for planning a great vacation here.
Taiwan is the most friendly country in the world for foreigners and one of the best tourist destinations in the world. Many have called it the best-kept secret in Asia. Taiwan is not usually known as a travel destination, mainly because of PRC China which tries to downplay its existence and the fact that the Taiwan Tourism Bureau does not do a very good job. We will try to make up for that with this blog.
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Table of Contents

• When to go:
• How to get there:
• Tours:
• Where to stay:
• How to get around in Taiwan:
• Map:
• Taiwan's Outer Islands 台灣的外島
• Taiwan's East Coast 台灣東海岸
• Taroko National Park 太魯閣國家公園
• Kenting 墾丁
• Alishan 阿里山
• Sun Moon Lake 日月潭
• Beitou Hot Springs 北投溫泉
• Tamsui 淡水
• Wulai 烏來
• Yangmingshan National Park 陽明山國家公園
• Pingxi Railway 平溪支線鐵路
• Taiwan's Northern Coast 台灣北海岸
• Taipingshan 太平山
• Maolin 茂林
• Keelung 基隆
• Taipei City  台北市
• New Taipei 新北市
• Yilan County 宜蘭
• Hualien 花蓮
• Taitung 台東
• Pingtung 屏東
• Kaohsiung 高雄
• Tainan 臺南
• Chiayi 嘉義
• Yunlin 雲林
• Changhua 彰化
• Nantou 南投
• Taichung 台中
• Miaoli 苗栗
• Hsinchu 新竹
• Taoyuan 桃園

When to go:
The best time to go they say is anytime!
There is always a part of Taiwan that is great to visit at any given time of year.
However, most areas are most comfortable around May when it is not too hot and there are no northeasterly winds or typhoons.
​The typhoon season lasts from around June to October. The tourist busy season is during summer break from June to August, during which time it can be hard to book a hostel or airplane ticket. Winter is the less crowded season, but the water will be colder, there will be constant wind (which could cancel transportation), and it will rain more often.

How to get there:
By Plane:
You can book cheap flights to Taiwan on Trip.com or CheapO Air. You can also search for cheap flights in Taiwan here and here. 
You can also book discount tickets for domestic flights within Taiwan on KKday here. 
By Boat: 
There is a ferry boat between Kinmen and Xiamen, China. That is the only commercial way I know of to travel to Taiwan by boat.

Tours:
There are many tours and activities available such as snorkeling, diving, SUPing, Surfing, Speed Boating, Glamping, River tracing, Paragliding, Kayaking, Canoeing, River Tracing, River Rafting, River Tubing, Pack Rafting, Whale Watching, ATV / 4-wheeling, Paintballing, Water Biking, Glamping, Cycling, Ziplining, Horse Riding, and many others, which you can book through Klook here or KKday here.

Where to stay:
Looking for a hotel? We recommend booking through Agoda here, which provides the best quality selection of accommodation on the islands.
Booking.com, Expedia, and Hotels.com are also good choices. 

How to get around in Taiwan:
By Train:
You can take a train ride around the entire island in about 8 hours. Book tickets via the normal train (TRA)  on Klook here.
By HSR:
Taiwan’s HSR runs from north to south along the west coast of Taiwan, and is perhaps the fastest mode of transport available. You can book discount tickets via high speed rail (HSR)  on Klook here or KKDay here. 
By Bus: 
Busses leave hourly from most major cities. You can book inter-city bus on Klook here.
By Scooter:
You can rent a scooter on Klook or KKday. Scooter rental is about 300 NT per day. You can check out our scooter rental guide here.
By Car:
You can also rent a car for about 1500 NT per day. If you are looking for car rentals, you can also search Qeeq here, Klook here, or KKday here. You can also check out our car rental guide here. 

Map:
​Please see a map below of all the places we have blogged about in Taiwan:

When learning Chinese for the first time, chances are that you will mispronounce Pinyin, which is the Romanized spelling of Chinese sounds. If you don't properly learn these sounds early on, chances are that it will mess up your Chinese down the road because you will be memorizing and practicing the right sounds. In this blog, we will point out commonly mispronounced Pinyin Sounds and teach you how to master the sounds of Chinese. 

About the author: I am an American English native speaker who has been studying Chinese for almost two decades. I also hold a Bachelor's degree in Chinese and I know what it takes to become fluent in Mandarin as a native English speaker.

The first step to learning a language is making a plan. Revisiting your study plan often and making adjustments as necessary will also help boost your effectiveness in learning Chinese. In this blog, we will present a ten step process for creating the perfect Chinese language study plan.  

​​About the author: I am an American English native speaker  has been studying Chinese for almost two decades. I also hold a Bachelor's degree in Chinese and I know what it takes to become fluent in Mandarin as a native English speaker.

Let's get this list started!

Chinese is considered the most spoken language in the world, and knowing it can help you build personal and business ties in Asia and throughout the world. However, before you start learning Chinese, it's important to get an understanding of the best resources available so that you can best use your time learning Chinese effectively. In this blog, we will introduce some of the best resources, such as books, apps, and other methods we have personally used to become proficient in Mandarin Chinese.

​About the author: I am an American English native speaker who has been studying Chinese for almost two decades. I also hold a Bachelor's degree in Chinese and I know what it takes to become fluent in Mandarin as a native English speaker.

Learning Mandarin Chinese can be a difficult task, especially for Westerners. It has often been ranked as one of the hardest languages in the world for English native speakers to learn. However, with these tips you should be on your way to learning fluent Chinese.

Below is a list of ten steps to master Mandarin Chinese. 

About the author: I am an American English native speaker that has been studying Chinese for almost two decades. I also hold a Bachelor's degree in Chinese and I know what it takes to become fluent in Mandarin as a native English speaker.

Let's get this list started!

I am a native born American learning Mandarin Chinese as a second language. I have a bachelor's degree in Chinese, and at this stage in my Chinese learning, I have hit a peak with spoken Chinese and I have been putting all my energy into learning more written Chinese. Chinese idioms are special because normally they are only four characters and you need to memorize what they mean in order to understand; this is the education that is taught in Taiwan elementary schools that I was never able to be a part of. If you can memorize these, you can drastically improve your formal Chinese reading and formal Chinese writing skills.

It can be hard to pick up idioms just out of context. However there are not a lot of English resources that focus on just idioms, and the ones that do don't filter out the commonly used idioms. Chinese idiom dictionaries also have too many idioms that are not widely known or used, or are too formal for normal writing or speech. Some idioms are more formal variations of other more common idioms with the same meaning. In this blog, I am focusing on the more commonly used idioms that most native speakers will recognize, and which are commonly used in formal speech and writing such as news reports and newspapers.

Therefore I have created this list using commonly used idioms selected from the dictionary with the help native speaker, filtering the idioms by asking whether or not the native speaker has ever heard of or knows of the idiom.

This is a major project, and it will probably take me a few years to catalog all of the useful idioms in the dictionary. The list below is organized according to character stroke order and will be added upon regularly. Some words have two definitions, which are separated by a semicolon. Similar meanings are separated by a comma.
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FYI: the reason I do not use a table is for SEO purposes, so this list can be found in Google. Also, all these English translations are from yours truly, using a Chinese to Chinese idiom dictionary, translated with my knowledge of Chinese and referencing various other dictionaries when needed. 

Just so you know, you can also get a big discount on Chinese (and English) classes and tutoring on Tutor ABC by using our promo code: FOREIGNERS10

在這個階段我的中文學習主要專注於閲讀及寫作。成語特別難因爲每一個都需要背起來，但是有太多沒有用的成語，所以我請了一位台灣朋友幫我整理比較常見的成語。以下是常用成語的中翻英對照表，我會陸陸續續把字典裏面所有有用的成語寫上去，可能要花個幾年的時間。以下所有翻譯都是我親自從中文字典里面的解釋直接翻成英文，如果有問題可以在下面留言。