How many days of travel is sufficient to appreciate the beauty of Taiwan without rushing?

I love to explore the culture, street food, places of interest but at a relaxing pace and hate to rush by going out too early everyday and getting back really late. Also, I hate to keep rushing in order to travel to many different places within a day because I like to appreciate the beauty of every country. From my description, how many days do you think would be sufficient for me to travel in Taiwan. I'm looking at 9 days? What are the places that you recommend? How many days of travel is sufficient to appreciate the beauty of Taiwan without rushing?
Hi, This is Pagan Dan's wife answering. He and I lived in Taiwan on and off for five of the past seven years and we feel we've just scratched the surface. What can you do in nine days? hmmm.... Well, you will probably start with Taipei. I lived and taught there for three years. It was great fun riding the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) and just hopping off at an interesting place, of which there is no shortage. On the Brown Line, go to the end to the Taipei Zoo. While there take the Gondola up the Mountain and stop for tea in the mountainside at one of the many tea restaurants. Explore the town of Muzha one stop back on the MRT. Great food there, too. Hop back on the Brown Line and get off at Zhongxiao Fuxing stop. Explore the back lanes for more great food. Walk north on Fuxing to the shopping mall if you enjoy shopping or seeing a movie (on the 9th or 10th floor). Walk over to Dunhua Road and hit the back lanes again for more great food. Certainly no shortage of fabulous restaurants. You can do similar things on each of the red, blue and orange lines. Two weeks might suffice but in a pinch you might catch the highlites in a week. Go to Danshui, 1/2 hr north of Taipei. It's my most favourite place with it's boardwalk. You can snack as you walk along. Takes about 1/2 hour from one end to the other. There's also Yangminshan Mountain, Chiang Kai Shek Memorial, Dr. Sun Yat Sen Hall, Taipei 101 and more. Go online and check out things to do in Taipei and around Taiwan.





During your 2nd week, you could go down the stunning east coast. Don't miss Taroko Gorge which was 1/2 hr from where we lived in Hualien. Loved it there, too. Then, travel south through the most stunning scenery to Kenting, a local tourist getaway. Over west to Kaoshiang, the 2nd largest city in Taiwan. Continue up the west coast or go inland to Miaoli and/or Nantou Counties. Incredible scenery + Sun Moon Lake. Travelling in Taiwan could be an endless adventure for you. I'd allow a month but two weeks would give you a terrific overview. Enjoy!!! The tourists haven't discovered it yet. And another thing. You'll love the low prices of everything. Food is so inexpensive that we ate out all the time. If you live in N. America, you haven't experienced great Chinese food yet. Taiwan is the best. They also have great Thai food. Don't miss eating those shrimp cakes. Yummy! BTW, make sure to interact lots with the local people. You'll love them. They're so kind, friendly and helpful. Mind you, they also enjoy a free English lesson just by talking to you but it's worth it because you'll be able to learn about their culture if they can converse fairly well with you.How many days of travel is sufficient to appreciate the beauty of Taiwan without rushing?
Pagan Dan's wife has a nice list, but a few errors too.





Skip the Makong Gondola because it's broken (and it was just built too, hmm I wonder why) and they need to spend lots of NT$ + time to clean up that mess.





Taipei is a nice place- but too many overrated tourist traps. Yang-ming shan is definitely overrated- I mean come on, there are thousands of better looking mountains out in the east/central/south part of the island! Then there's Taipei 101 which can be summed up as a tower with a built in mall. That said if your coming over new-years (regular) then check out the fireworks show at the 101.





Oh, and I think the MRT doesn't run to the zoo on weekends anymore, so plan accordingly.
If you're looking for beauty, you can skip the West coast entirely... that will save you some time.