- What it is The county seat and the county's only city, in the middle of the Lanyang Plain.
- Getting there TRA train to Yilan Station; buses from Taipei also stop in the city. → Trains to Yilan · Buses from Taipei
- Getting around On foot: the station, the old town and the night market are all walking distance. Take a taxi or scooter for the brick kiln. Chang Cheng Rental, across the road from the station, rents scooters if your licence covers them. → Scooter rentals and licences
Come to Yilan City (宜蘭市) for a slow half day on foot: the Jimmy Liao square at the station, the Japanese-era houses in the old town, and dinner at Dongmen Night Market. It's been the seat of the county since the Qing set up a government here around 1812, and it's still the county's main centre of culture and education. It feels it, too: less of a holiday town than Jiaoxi or Luodong, more of a place to walk. The four roads named Jiucheng (舊城, "old city") East, West, South and North still trace the old town walls, and inside them are temples, old shops and a cluster of Japanese-era wooden houses the county has restored as museums.
Jimmy Square and Diu Diu Dang Forest (幾米廣場, 丟丟噹森林)
Straight across from Yilan Station, a green train flies through a grove of steel trees: the Diu Diu Dang Forest, with scenes from Jimmy Liao's picture books around it in Jimmy Park. Jimmy Liao grew up in Yilan. It's free, open all day and lit at night. → Jimmy Park and Diu Diu Dang Forest
Dongmen Night Market (東門夜市)
About five minutes' walk from the station along Yixing Road, Dongmen Night Market fills an L of streets, Shenghou Street (聖後街) and Hemu Road (和睦路), beside the Donggang overpass. It dates to 1979. It's smaller than Luodong's, and more local. Go straight to Shenghou Street for the food, and leave Hemu Road, with its stalls of clothes and odds and ends, for after. There are no official hours, but stalls open from about 17:00 until around midnight.
Good to know: Dongmen has to move to make way for the railway elevation project. As of April 28, 2026 no new site or date was agreed, so it is still trading where it is. → Yilan's night markets
NightMarket.tw keeps the market's opening days and the stalls worth queueing for.
The old town's Japanese-era houses
If you see one thing in the old town, make it these. South of the station, along Jiucheng South Road, a small group of Japanese-era official residences still stand in their gardens. They're next to each other, so see them together.
- Memorial Hall of Founding of Yilan Administration (宜蘭設治紀念館). Built in 1900 as the official residence of the district's chief administrators, and the home of county magistrates after the war, it mixes a Japanese wooden house with Western classical touches, in a Japanese garden with a camphor tree more than a hundred years old. Inside is the story of how Yilan has been governed since the Qing. Tuesday to Sunday, 09:00 to 17:00; closed Mondays, the last day of each month and Lunar New Year's Eve. NT$30, NT$20 for students and civil servants with ID; free for Yilan residents, over-65s and children under 115 cm.
- Yilan Literature Museum (宜蘭文學館). Next door, in the former residence of the agricultural school's principal: tatami rooms and sliding doors, now used for exhibitions of Yilan writers, reading corners and talks. Tuesday to Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00; closed Mondays.
Getting there: walk from Yilan Station along Guangfu Road (光復路) onto Jiucheng South Road, cross Zhongshan Road, and turn left after about three minutes where you see the stone wall and trees, into Lane 3, Lixing (力行3巷). About 10 to 15 minutes.
More of the old town
- Yilan Museum of Art (宜蘭美術館). In the former Yilan branch of the Bank of Taiwan, one of the bank's first seven branches, at the five-way Nanmen junction. The old vault door is still there. Changing exhibitions of Yilan and visiting artists, and a roof terrace over the town. Tuesday to Sunday, 09:00 to 17:00.
- Zhaoying Temple (昭應宮). The old town's Mazu temple, founded in the Jiaqing era of the Qing. In 1834 it was rebuilt to face the mountains instead of the sea, which makes it the only Mazu temple in Taiwan that faces inland. The carved stone and wood of the front hall date from that rebuilding. Open daily 05:30 to 20:00, at No. 106, Zhongshan Road Section 3.
- Yilan Story House and Juan I-Jong Taiwan Story House (宜蘭人故事館, 阮義忠台灣故事館). Beside the city hall: the old county council building of 1959, now a local culture house, and behind it a red-brick group housing exhibitions by the Yilan-born photographer Juan I-Jong, open since 2018.
Yilan Distillery (宜蘭酒廠)
The Yilan Distillery, on Jiucheng West Road, opened in 1909, and it's the oldest state-run distillery in Taiwan. It's still working. Visitors come for the Jiazilan Wine Museum (甲子蘭酒文物館) in an old materials warehouse, with early equipment and the stories of rice wine and Hong Lu red wine, and the wall of old wine jars outside. Open 08:30 to 17:00 on weekdays and 08:30 to 17:30 at weekends. About 15 minutes' walk from the station, at No. 3, Jiucheng West Road.
Yilan Brick Kiln (宜蘭磚窯)
Near Yilan Bridge (宜蘭橋), the Yilan Brick Kiln, also called the Jinmei Brick Kiln (津梅磚窯), is a county historic site and the best-preserved kiln of its type in Yilan: thirteen red-brick chambers in a row under a 37 m chimney. Brick-making here goes back to the Qing, and the kiln stopped in 1981, when concrete took over. The grounds are open all day.
Getting there: take a taxi or scooter from Yilan Station. A car or scooter is the easiest way here.
Along the Yilan River
The Yilan Riverside Park (宜蘭河濱公園) runs for 33 hectares along the river from Ximen Bridge to Yixing Bridge: lawns, ball fields and a bike path of about 15 km that follows the river upstream to Yuanshan. Open all day. → Bikes and scooters
From Yilan Station, the Taiwan Tourist Shuttle Zhuangwei Dune line (綠18) runs out to the coast and up to Wushi Harbor and Toucheng. → Local buses · Yilan's other areas
→ The Kavalan distillery, a short taxi away · Where to eat in Yilan City · Two days in Yilan
Sources: Taiwan Tourism Administration, Yilan City; Yilan County tourism (宜蘭勁好玩): Jimmy Square, Dongmen Night Market, Yilan Literature Museum, Yilan Museum of Art, Zhaoying Temple, Yilan Distillery, Yilan Brick Kiln, Yilan Riverside Park; Yilan County Government on the Starry Train; Memorial Hall of Founding of Yilan Administration: hours, tickets, getting there, history; Taiwan Tourist Shuttle, Zhuangwei Dune line; Chang Cheng Rental as listed on Google Maps in November 2026. PTS on the Dongmen move (April 28, 2026). Checked November 2026.