The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps
Dajia River flows through the districts of Taichung City and at the southern river mouth lies Gao Mei Shi Di (高美湿地, Gao Mei Wetland, “Gao Mei”). There used to be many wetlands at Taiwan’s west coast but many have been replaced by new developments. We …
Following our stop at Lavender Cottage, it’s more flowers appreciation at Zhong She Tourist Flower Garden 中社观光花市 (“Flower Market” or “Flower Garden”). With the colourful array of flowers, your eyes will be in for a treat. Get your camera ready too! Our itinerary was: Rainbow Village, …
Two ladies left their jobs in Taipei and Kaohsiung to pursue their dream of owning a lavender field, a quiet place for people to relax and enjoy nature. Lavender Cottage 薰衣草森林 is where their dreams came into fruition after years of hard work.
We came to Lavender Cottage after driving through a winding road up the mountain. Our itinerary was: Rainbow Village, Carton King, Lavender Cottage, Flower Market, Gao Mei Shi Di, and Fengjia Night Market.
Lavender Cottage is situated on a remote mountain in Taichung City. Imagine the big tour buses having to swerve and turn on the narrow road where only one car can pass through each time. Sounds dangerous already. Hence it’s not surprising that the place is not accessible by public bus.
It’s best you hire a taxi or private car driver or rent a car to reach Lavender Cottage.
If you are getting there on your own, do note that the cottage closes at 6:30PM daily. It opens at 10:30AM on weekdays and 10:00AM on weekend.
And yes, you have to pay for the entrance fee again. This time it’s NT100 (S$4.70) per person and like Carton King, you get to offset this amount with purchases inside Lavender Cottage. Oh, latest update on their website: ticket price has increased to NT150, while only giving you NT100 credit to spend. NT100 is definitely not enough to spend at Lavender Cottage.
As we entered Lavender Cottage, we first passed by a souvenir shop before a climb up the steep slope. On the way up, we spotted a button on the side, pressed it and “showered” ourselves in Lavender mist.
Refreshed, we continued up to this beautiful open concept restaurant with indoor and outdoor seating. The outdoor spots were scattered among the greenery. It seemed like a nice environment for lunch and hence we requested for one of the spots. However, the waiter dissuaded us, citing mosquitoes and insects. Perhaps it’s harder to serve us out in “far-flung” seating area.
Our driver brought us here for lunch, so that he could get a meal ticket from Lavender Cottage. We assumed this because we saw the drivers, including ours, getting a meal with a ticket. I suppose this “free meal” was priced into the food, because the menu is quite expensive.
We ordered the cheapest main dish to share, chicken with a tinge of lavender flavoring, and a cup of coffee for hubby. The dish was simple and quite nice, and the coffee was alright, but the meal was not worth the NT295 (S$13.70). We ordered just to fill our hungry stomach.
After our lunch, we continued to trudge uphill. On the way up, you can make a detour towards Vanilla House 香草 house, accommodation you can book to stay. Start your shopping at the pushcarts found along the way or at the souvenir shop at the accommodation place.
You can find a good selection of Lavender products such as fragrance bags, handmade soap, lotion, and essential oils. However, you will soon realise the shops located in different parts of Lavender Cottage sell similar stuff. If you are not a shopaholic, you can still make that small detour to view flowers other than Lavender.
We didn’t make that detour initially but went straight up to the ‘official’ highest point of Lavender Cottage. Technically, you can still follow a trail and trek up into the forest.
Because of my pregnant bump, we decided to just hang around at the lower end of the forest. We did not have time anyway. Here, we spotted many “floating” poetic Chinese words mounted in various spots. The words actually looked good in photos. So snap away!
After basking in the nature, pop by at the nearby cafe with serene surroundings. Instagrammable place. If not for the time limit given by our driver (as mentioned in my previous post), we would have chilled there while hubby enjoy his cup of coffee.
After roaming around in the nature, it’s time to head back down to the main character of this place – the Lavender field. We were there during off peak, and even so, it’s hard to take a photo of the field without anyone to photo-bomb you. So it was with great timing I got a perfect shot.
To be honest, we were disappointed when we first passed by the Lavender field. We had imagined it to be like those in Provence. But what greeted us was a small hill planted with rows of lavenders flowers. The Lavender seemed sparsely sprouted, probably not in full bloom too. It was a pretty sight, but underwhelming.
After taking photos of the Lavender field from different angles, it’s time to head back to the car. You will pass by a house like structure with lots of postboxes lining outside.
If you want to send a sweet gesture back home, you can purchase postcards here and have Lavender Cottage post it for you. If that’s not your thing, go have fun – pay to ride on the carousel or merry-go-round strangely planted in the midst of Lavender Cottage.
I didn’t really like Lavender Cottage, perhaps because we were rushing. Otherwise, it’s a nice place to chill and relax. Or perhaps because my initial expectations were high. Someone raved about this place to me and she loves all things lavender. Personally, I prefer the Lavender and flowers in our next stop, Flower Market.
After Rainbow Village, we arrived at Carton King, the second stop of our Taichung outskirts tour. We first came across Carton King’s smaller branch at Cingjing Farm, near to the Swiss Garden. I didn’t know what it was about until hubby enlightened me. Most exhibits …
For a one day tour around the outskirts of Taichung, I’ll recommend booking a driver. Our driver is Mr Ye, 葉師榮 and if you are interested in engaging him, you can find out more in “Taichung Driver for the Outskirts“. But if you cannot find a …
For a one day tour around the outskirts of Taichung, I’ll recommend booking a driver. We googled and found Mr Liu 劉錦鐘’s website. Based on online reviews, he seems to be a recommended Taichung Driver for the Outskirts. And since it was last minute planning for us, we just went with him whom we could liaise through WhatsApp.
He was quick in his reply and quoted us NT3,500 (S$162.70 )for a whole day (approx. 10 hours) in April 2017. The quote would be lower if we had excluded Gao Mei Wetland (高美湿地) from our itinerary.
Our guess is that Gao Mei is a bit out of the way and hence the extra charge. We contemplated if we should head there since its online reviews were mixed and excluding it would give us more time in other spots. But we thought might as well go since we were already there!
Do note that the price does not include entrance fees for 3 out of the 5 places we went to: Carton King, Lavender Cottage, and Flower Garden.
So our final itinerary started from Rainbow Village, then to Carton King, Lavender Cottage, Flower Garden and Gao Mei Shi Di. Lastly, the driver dropped us off at FengJia Market in Taichung City.
Mr Liu manages a fleet of drivers, so he will either drive you personally or assign a driver to you. The driver assigned to us was Mr Ye, 葉師榮 (+886 933 685 275).
Mr Ye came in his taxi to pick us up around the agreed timing, 9:00am. Knowing we didn’t have breakfast, he brought us to a breakfast place to buy some takeaway to eat in the car. That was a nice gesture.
However, at Rainbow Village, our first stop, he dropped us at the carpark and told us that he would wait there. He didn’t even give us an introduction of the place and left us on our own. At this stop, we took our couple shots with the help of passerby instead of Mr Ye.
Then, at the second stop – Carton King, Mr Ye eagerly asked for the receipt while we were paying for the entrance fee. Perhaps too eagerly and that puts me off. He went further to ask for the receipts we are going to get throughout the day. We actually didn’t mind, and wanted to pass him the receipts we had kept for the past few days. But still, he seemed more enthusiastic in getting our receipts than showing us around. In case you are wondering, he asked for the receipts because of Taiwan’s Receipt Lottery (統一發票中獎號碼) run by the government.
Unlike at the first stop, Mr Ye led us to Carton King’s ticket counter and followed us in to help us take a few couple photos. Such a contrast from before where there was no receipt issued. Anyhow, we weren’t used to people following us around. So after a few photos, we told him we wanted to explore the place on our own.
While inside Carton King, we saw another driver directing his group of tourists to stand in various positions for the best photo angles, and giving them insights like a tour guide. At that moment, I felt that our driver was not doing his job or was not that professional. On hindsight, we probably should have asked him along, since we paid for the service.
Overall, I don’t recommend Mr Ye because of his lackluster service attitude. You could still contact Mr Liu and try your luck with other drivers.
Website: liusir-travel.blogspot.tw
WhatsApp: +886 927 888 032
Email: [email protected]
Cannot find a driver at the last minute? You might want to consider this Klook tour (affiliate link) that goes to Gao Mei Shi Di, Rainbow Village and a few other places. It’s S$44.50 per pax.
In my next post, I will share more of the places we went to in the outskirts of Taichung. Then you can decide if they are interesting enough for you. :) Or read my other articles if you are looking for ways to travel from Taichung to Cingjing or from Taipei to Taichung.
Do you have other drivers to recommend? Or what’s your experience with Mr Liu’s drivers? Leave a comment below. I love to hear from you!
Disclosure: Affiliate link means I’ll get a small commission if you make a purchase. There’s NO extra cost to you. I appreciate your support to maintain this website, so that I can share more of such travel guides. Thank you!
If you are visiting Cingjing Farm (清境农场), I do recommend a night stay around the farm instead of making a day trip from Taichung. It’s more relaxing this way and you get to enjoy the good weather (at certain months of the year). We stayed …
If you are planning to go to Cingjing/Qingjing Farm in Taiwan (清境農場), you can either stay in Taichung and make a day trip or stay one night around Cinjing farm. We picked the latter option and it’s highly recommended! Either way, you will need to …