Hi,
Did lots of searching. Didn’t find anything specific.
Does anyone have suggestions for good bus companies to use for transportation from Taipei to Kenting (or reverse)? Not a tour, just transportation.
Thanks,
Seeker4
P.S. - Airbus doesn’t go to Kenting.
Hi,
I’ve taken buses from Taipei to Central Taiwan and to Southern Taiwan.
All I can say is: “Don’t do it.”
Believe me, you don’t want to spend 8 or 9 hours on a bus when you’re going on holiday – or any other time, for that matter.
Take a plane from Taipei’s municipal airport to Kaohsiung’s airport. Planes are leaving all the time.
If you don’t have time to book a flight with an agent or airline, you can practically walk into the aiport and have your choice of flights.
From the Kaohsiung airport it is quite easy to get a bus to Kenting (about 90 minutes in good traffic.)
Believe me, it is worth the price.
If you really don’t want to take a plane, take the train to Kaohsiung.
6 to 8 hours on a train is better than on a bus.
The bus station in Kaohsiung is next to the train station. From there you can get a bus to Kenting (about 90 minutes in good traffic).
Thanks for the info. Actually, I ended up taking a bus from Kaohsiung to Taipei recently. In short, it was my first, and my last, bus trip in Taiwan. A miserable 7 hours of traffic jams mixed with hot, stuffy, nausea-inducing, incompetent driving. By distance, it should have taken only half of that time, tops. The only good thing was the price (about NT $350). Next time – train or plane for certain.
You can fly directly to Hengchun now which is only 30 minutes from Kenting. Catch a bus the rest of the way or rent your scooter in Hengchun and drive down.
The buses are bad if you get stuck in traffic. But to popular destinations there are services all night - just turn up and go - so you can time your journey for a quiet period on the motorway. To places like taichng and kaohsng there’s a lot of competition - some services have atseat planelike entertainment, and in all cases bizarrely capacious seats.
The plane is pretty expensive (and no reductions for kids, so comes out expensive if you’re a family). Trains are generally as slow as the buses, cost quite a bit more for the faster ones, and seats generally have to be booked in advance. Even if you get a seat, if you’re travelling at holiday times ow weekends, you’ll be totally crowded out by others who are standing in the gangway.
The train is, however, often overlooked as a means of getting about locally in and around Taipei.
I believe that Mucha Man was talking about this:
One thing to note is that different companies fly on different days, so there’s a high likelihood that you won’t be flying the same company both ways. Might be a good idea to book your return flight at the same time. It would be TERRIBLE to get stuck down there for an extra day or two, wouldn’t it? 
Take the overnight bus! I used to take buses quite regularly before living in Taipei, and in my experience the overnight bus to Kaohsiung is the way to go. Five months ago I paid NT350 for a huge great comfortable seat, the bus left Taipei at 10:30pm, and we arrived in Kaohsiung at 2:30am - including a 20-minute smoke-break in Taichung. :bravo:
Oh before I forget, it was Tieng Long (sp?) bus company in Cheng De Rd, two blocks north of Taipei Main Station. 
I don’t think the bus is a good idea especially the overnight bus.
Not only most of those bus companies in Taiwan are running business illegally, even bus drivers are not all qualified.
Anyways, I think train or flight is a better idea.
[quote=“Steve Zodiac”]Hi,
Take a plane from Taipei’s municipal airport to Kaohsiung’s airport. Planes are leaving all the time.
If you don’t have time to book a flight with an agent or airline, you can practically walk into the aiport and have your choice of flights.
From the Kaohsiung airport it is quite easy to get a bus to Kenting (Kending) (about 90 minutes in good traffic.)
Believe me, it is worth the price.
quote]
Can you tell me what the price of that flight is? and you’re totally certain that i can just walk into the airport andget a flight?
thanks
My sister and her friend just flew back from Kaohsiung yesterday. The price for a one-way ticket was 1793nt/person. We had booked them on a flight at 8.30pm but they got to the airport early (took them about 2.5 hours by bus from Kenting, buses supposedly were leaving every ten minutes), so they asked if they could hop on an earlier flight, and there were a few seats left for the next flight. There seem to be several flights per hour. If you want details, check the Taipei - Kaohsiung departure and arrival tables for Songshan airport.
They had a great time, found a nice little hotel, enjoyed themselves thoroughly, actually went swimming in the sea and came back sunburned
HTH
Iris
There is a LEGAL bus service 信泰 that goes from the airport in KHH to Kenting. You used to have to cross the street - now it drives right up to the airport. Unusally run every 10-15, sometimes you wait 30min. It takes about 2.5 in day time, and about 1hr less at night (they tend to drive faster and stop less).
I haven’t taken a bus TPE to KHH in a very long time. When I did, it was always overnight and I slept on the bus. Take a 12am or 1am bus that will get you to KHH in the morning. Aloha is now my preferred bus provider, it used to be 統聯. If you have the time, I recommend that you take the slow service train from KHH to the most southern stop (I forget what it is as I always get off at Kanting.
Best way to go is to fly to KHH and then take the 信泰 bus.
[quote=“banshette”]Take the overnight bus! I used to take buses quite regularly before living in Taipei, and in my experience the overnight bus to Kaohsiung is the way to go. Five months ago I paid NT350 for a huge great comfortable seat, the bus left Taipei at 10:30pm, and we arrived in Kaohsiung at 2:30am - including a 20-minute smoke-break in Taichung. :bravo:
Oh before I forget, it was Tieng Long (sp?) bus company in Cheng De Rd, two blocks north of Taipei Main Station. 
[/quote]
Are you sure that it arrived at 2:30am? With the break that means you are driving to Kaohsiung in 3.5 hours or so. That’s way too fast.
Isn’t it Tong Lien? Very comforatable buses, cheap, and they make fewer stops than the other companies.
Don’t make the mistake of taking a train to PingTung and hoping for a bus from there. I did. There are no busses from Pingtung to Kenting. Night train to KS and bus from there is how I do it now.