2 Days in Taipei and Beyond
Two days is barely enough for one thing beyond the city, so make it the right one: a half-day taste of Taipei itself, then a full day on the coast. If you want the deep in-city version instead, no day trips at all, see our 2-day Taipei itinerary .
Book these before you go:
- Your Taipei hotel : base yourself centrally since both days start from here
- A guided Jiufen, Shifen and Yehliu day tour : removes the bus-timetable juggling on your one full day out
| Day | Focus | Transit from Taipei |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Land, EasyCard, Elephant Mountain sunset, Raohe Night Market | in-city |
| 2 | Jiufen, Shifen, Yehliu Geopark (the north coast loop) | ~1-1.5 hrs to Jiufen, ~75 min bus to Yehliu |
Day 1: Land, get sorted, see the city in an afternoon
Land at Taoyuan (TPE) and take the Airport MRT straight into town, Express in 35 to 38 minutes or Commuter around 50, both NT$160. Get an EasyCard the moment you’re through the gate; it runs the MRT, buses, YouBike and most convenience stores.
Drop your bags, then knock out the city’s one unmissable view: hike Elephant Mountain in the late afternoon for the skyline shot with Taipei 101 glowing behind it, free, 20 to 40 minutes, and a better photo than the paid observatory gives you. Skip the observatory entirely if you’re tight on time; it hasn’t been the world’s tallest building since 2010 anyway.
Dinner at Raohe Street Night Market, not Shilin. Smaller, better food-to-crowd ratio, and cash is king here even with an EasyCard in your pocket. That’s the entire “Taipei the city” portion of this trip.
Day 2: The north coast loop
This is the day that makes the whole trip worth it. Jiufen, Shifen and Yehliu Geopark sit close enough together on the north coast that you can string all three into one long day.
Jiufen is a hillside mountain town, not a Taipei neighborhood, roughly an hour to an hour and a half out by MRT plus the 1062 bus, or by train to Ruifang and a connecting bus. Go early; it’s a lantern-lit maze of tea houses and narrow alleys that turns into a shuffling crowd by mid-morning on any weekend. Shifen comes next: an old railway street built so close to the tracks that vendors clear their stalls when a train passes, plus a waterfall and the sky lantern releases everyone’s seen in photos.
Is it worth doing all three, Jiufen, Shifen and Yehliu, in a single day? Yes, if you go early and accept a guided tour or a tightly timed self-drive schedule. Yehliu Geopark’s coastal rock formations, including the famous Queen’s Head, sit about 75 minutes from the city via bus 1815, and trying to add a fourth stop on top of these three is what turns a good day into a rushed one.
Managing three separate bus routes in one day is genuinely annoying to plan solo. A guided combo tour covers all three legs in around nine hours and removes the logistics headache entirely, at the cost of moving at someone else’s pace.
Getting around and gotchas
The EasyCard covers city transit but keep cash on hand for Jiufen and Shifen, where small vendors don’t always take it. MRT paid zones ban eating and drinking, water included, fines from NT$1,500.
One concrete tip
Do the north coast loop on a weekday, not a weekend. Jiufen’s alleys are barely walkable on a Saturday and completely fine on a Tuesday morning, same lanterns, same views, none of the crush.