Classic Taiwan in 10 days: Taipei, the east coast and Tainan

So this route spends three days in Taipei, crosses to Hualien, works down the Pacific coast to Taitung, then rounds the southern tip on the south-link line to Tainan, which is the oldest city and the best eating in the country. It is almost entirely by train, with a private car and driver on the two days rail does not reach.

Ten days, four hotel changes, no internal flights, six rail legs and three afternoons with nothing scheduled.

Who it suits: first-time visitors to Taiwan, couples and independent travellers, and anyone who has done Japan and wants somewhere with the same competence and none of the formality.

Your specialist: Asaf Zamshtein, our Southeast Asia and China specialist, with our Taiwanese partner team on the ground.

Day by day

Day 1: Arrive Taipei. Airport express or private transfer from Taoyuan, about 40 minutes. Nothing scheduled. We put you near a metro interchange rather than at a landmark, because in Taipei the station matters more than the view. Dinner at Ningxia night market, which is small, old and the best introduction to how this country eats.

Day 2: Taipei, the old city. A guided morning through Dadaocheng: Dihua Street, the herb and dried goods shops that have been trading for a century and a half, and the tea merchants. Then Longshan Temple, which we visit in the late afternoon when it is full of people praying rather than photographing.

Between the two, the middle of the day is yours. Evening at Raohe night market, and the pepper buns that come off the wall of a clay oven.

Day 3: Taipei, the museum and the hills. The National Palace Museum in the morning, which holds the imperial collection moved from Beijing in 1949 and needs two and a half hours with a guide to be more than a warehouse of jade. The famous small pieces rotate and are sometimes away on loan, and we check before we send you.

Afternoon in Beitou, where there are hot springs inside the metro system: the thermal valley, the hot spring museum and a bath. Or Elephant Mountain at dusk for the skyline, which is twenty minutes of steps and the photograph everyone takes.

Day 4: Taipei to Hualien. Two hours on the east coast line, through the Yilan plain and then along the Pacific. Book the seaward side. Reserved seats on this route sell out and we book them the morning the window opens.

Afternoon on the coast south of town with a car and driver: the cliffs at Qingshui if the road is open, the beach at Qixingtan, and a first look at the mountains coming straight down into the sea.

Day 5: Taroko, and what it is now. The gorge day. Taroko is a marble canyon and it was, for decades, the single most spectacular half day in Taiwan. The April 2024 earthquake caused severe rockfall damage and the park has been reopening in phases, with parts of the road and several of the best trails affected.

We check the current position with the park and our partner at the time of quoting, and we build this day around what is genuinely accessible. If the answer is limited, we say so and we run the alternative instead, which is not a consolation prize: Mugua River Gorge and the Sanzhan river south of Hualien, and the Rift Valley inland with its rice terraces and hot springs.

Day 6: Hualien and the East Rift Valley. Inland with the car for the day. Rice terraces at Chishang and the tree-lined lane through them, a hot spring at Ruisui, and the Amis villages of the valley floor. Or the coast road south, Highway 11, with the Pacific on one side the whole way. Back to Hualien for a second night in the same hotel.

Day 7: Hualien to Taitung. Down the coast by train, about two and a half hours, or by car along Highway 11 with stops at Shitiping and Sanxiantai, which is the better version and takes the day. Afternoon in Taitung, which is a small, low, unhurried city that most itineraries skip.

Day 8: Taitung to Tainan. The south-link line around the bottom of the island, which threads between the mountains and the sea and is one of the good train journeys in Asia, then a change and on to Tainan. Three to four hours in total.

Afternoon in Tainan: Anping, Fort Zeelandia, the tree house where banyan roots have taken the walls, and shrimp rolls at the harbour. Evening on Guohua Street, which is where you eat.

Day 9: Tainan. The oldest city in Taiwan and the one that repays a guide. The Confucius temple from 1665, the Grand Matsu Temple, Shennong Street, and a food walk that is really a history lesson: danzai noodles, milkfish congee for breakfast, beef soup at six in the morning if you can face it, coffin bread, and about ten things you will not have heard of.

Afternoon free. Late high speed train to Taipei, one hour forty from the Tainan HSR station, and a last night in the city.

Day 10: Departure. Airport express to Taoyuan, about 40 minutes.

What is included

Accommodation with breakfast throughout, all rail legs in reserved seats including the east coast and south-link services, a private air-conditioned car with English-speaking driver on three days, licensed local guides on four days, the National Palace Museum with a specialist guide, the Tainan food walk, all entrance fees on guided days, a stored-value transport card each, a day-by-day document with train numbers and seat classes, and a WhatsApp group with your consultant and our partner team in Taiwan for the whole trip.

What we would change, and when

• Travelling between July and October? This is typhoon season. We hold an alternative for every exposed day, we keep the east coast legs flexible, and we will tell you plainly at the quoting stage that the mountain roads are the last thing to reopen after a storm.
• Want the mountains rather than the coast? Swap days 6 and 7 for two nights at Alishan, reached from Chiayi. It costs you the Rift Valley and it buys you cypress forest and a sea of clouds.
• Want Sun Moon Lake? It fits between Tainan and Taipei with an extra day. It is beautiful and it is very busy, and we would put you there overnight midweek or not at all.
• Only eight days? Cut Taitung and run Hualien straight to Tainan by air from Hualien or back through Taipei. We would not cut a Taipei night, because three days there is already the minimum.

Honest notes

East coast train seats are the constraint on this itinerary, not hotels. The window opens a set number of days ahead, the good services fill within hours at weekends and around public holidays, and there is no way to buy your way past it. We book the morning the window opens.

Taipei in December and January is often grey and drizzly. It is not cold, at around 63F (17C), and it is persistent. Tainan in the same month is sunny. If your dates are in winter we weight the trip southward and we tell you what the north will probably be like.

The Taroko question is genuinely unresolved and we would rather flag it than sell around it. Anyone promising you the full gorge in a brochure written last year is not checking.

Taiwan is easy in a way that surprises people who have travelled elsewhere in Asia. The trains run to the minute, the convenience stores solve most problems, and nobody will try to sell you anything on the street. The difficulty here is weather and geography, not chaos.

Built by Asaf Zamshtein, our Southeast Asia and China specialist, and checked with our partner team in Taiwan before it goes out.

Related

• Taiwan: the complete guide
• Taiwan by rail in 14 days
• Taiwan food and culture in 12 days