Our second day in Kaohsiung was more packed with activities. We started the day with visiting a pond surrounded by temples and pagodas, and explored the famous Dragon and Tiger Pagodas. There were large “statues” of a dragon and tiger on the entrances of both buildings, and we entered through their mouths to get in. The pagodas had 7 floors and had really gorgeous interiors and exteriors. There was also a great view of the pond, mountains, and cities outside, and I took dozens of pictures to try to capture everything I saw. We headed to two other temples after seeing the pagodas, one of which was at the base of a giant statue of a deity. They were both smaller than a lot of the other temples we’ve visited, but nonetheless were quite beautiful, especially the second one. There were a lot of gold elements and nearly every aspect of the temple was constructed with great detail. As beautiful as the site was the heat and humidity made the visit less than comfortable, though we soon headed back to the hotel, where I was able to relax and cool down before going to Sunset Beach with a bunch of other people from the trip. This was probably my favorite part of the day – though getting to the beach was a bit of a trek, it was really nice to be able to spend some time in the sand and take a dip in the pleasantly warm water. The sun was also setting at this point, and the view of the sky and the mountains was beautiful. Before going back to the hotel we spent some time in a night market in the city, which had a similar feel to a lot of the other night markets we had visited in Taipei, though it mostly spanned one street, rather than multiple. While the weather made things a little uncomfortable today, all the places we visited more than made up for it, and I had a great time seeing different parts of Kaohsiung!
