Massage in Shilin is sorted by street.
Thai on Zhongzheng Road, foot massage on Wenlin Road, oil spas upstairs in Tianmu. Each line has its own customers and its own price tier. The earlier Shilin late supper covered what to eat after eleven; this one covers who to hand your body to once you have eaten.
Three kinds, sorted first
Foot massage is soles plus calves, forty minutes for NT$600 to NT$800, the right answer for the ache you get after two hours of night market. Thai is full body, stretching plus pressure, ninety to a hundred and twenty minutes for a little over NT$1,000 up to NT$1,500. Oil spa is slow, dim and long, and costs more — posted prices rule.
If it is your first massage, do not book ninety minutes of Thai. People with tight muscles find out halfway through a stretch that they cannot take it, and the money is not coming back. Do foot, or a sixty-minute Thai, and go longer next time.
West from MRT Shilin: Zhongzheng Road is the Thai stretch
MRT Shilin is at No. 215 Zhongzheng Road. Walk west out of the station and the Thai shops run along Zhongzheng Road into the six hundreds.
Closest to the station is 錫安泰式按摩養生館 siam thai massage at No. 200, two hundred-odd reviews and a 4.3, two minutes from the exit. Further west, 清邁星辰泰式養生館-士林 at No. 622 has two hundred and ten-odd reviews and a 4.7, and 新泰屋泰式養生館 at No. 637 has two hundred-odd and a 4.6 — one road apart, about fifteen minutes on foot from the station.
Yanping North Road Section 5 is the tail of the stretch. 蘭泰坊泰式按摩 at No. 178, ground floor, has a hundred and forty reviews and a 4.5; 泰和軒泰式SPA養生會館 at No. 186 holds a 4.9 on ninety-odd reviews, the highest score along here but still a thin sample — phone ahead on weekends.
Prices on this stretch are the most honest in Shilin: ninety minutes of Thai a little over NT$1,000, the kind of thing people who live nearby do on the way home on a weeknight.
Zhongzheng Road is not only Thai. 佳倍莉SPA士林捷運館 on the 2nd floor of No. 301 has more than eleven hundred reviews and a perfect score, a rare oil-spa option this close to the station; 明易足體按摩 士中館 at No. 211, a hundred-odd reviews and a 4.8, is the backup when Wenlin Road has a queue.
Wenlin Road: foot massage for night-market legs
Wenlin Road’s foot massage exists for the night market.
森SPA足體養生館 - 士林館 at No. 102 has nearly four thousand reviews and a 4.8, 夯足足體養生會館 Hang Foot Massage at No. 135 more than three thousand three hundred and a 4.7, 指舞春秋足體養生會館 士林會館 at No. 69 over sixteen hundred and a 4.3.
Forty minutes, NT$600 to NT$800. That is the Wenlin Road rate.
Bluntly: Friday and Saturday from nine to eleven, these three are tourist hours, and a thirty-to-forty-minute wait is normal. Walk to Zhongzheng Road instead — same money, no waiting.
Tianmu: oil spas and the upper Thai tier
Tianmu has no MRT of its own. Zhishan station is at No. 70 Fuguo Road, fifteen to twenty minutes on foot.
The spas here sit in a different price bracket. Eunice SPA 高島屋旗艦館 on the 12th floor of No. 55 Zhongcheng Road Section 2 has nearly six hundred reviews and a 4.9; 逗Doll Spa台北天母店 on the 2nd floor of No. 134 Zhongshan North Road Section 6 holds a perfect score on five hundred-odd. Both are oil spas, mostly by appointment, not the kind of place you drift into after the market closes.
Thai exists in Tianmu too, a tier above Zhongzheng Road. 泰天母 泰式養身會館 at No. 1 Lane 109 Dexing East Road, ground floor, has three hundred and twenty reviews and a 4.8; 水明漾泰式會館 at No. 4 Lane 114 Zhongshan North Road Section 7 has ninety-odd and a 4.7.
Tianmu is for a day you have set aside, with a looser budget. If you are trying to save money, do not come up here.
When you will not wait
Weekday afternoons, three to six, all three lines are empty and the therapists are at their best.
Before eight on a weeknight you can walk straight into Wenlin Road; after eight the queue starts. The Thai shops on Zhongzheng Road usually have a bed on weeknights; weekends, phone first.
For late nights Wenlin Road holds out longest, most places running late; Zhongzheng Road closes a little earlier, posted hours rule. If it is half past eleven and you have only just thought of it, Wenlin Road.
Market first, massage after: the route and the last train
The main stall area shuts around midnight, and the crowd starts thinning from half past ten.
If you want a massage, leave the market at ten. Jihe Road to Wenlin Road is about five minutes, foot massage forty, done a little after eleven, ten minutes back to MRT Shilin or Jiantan. Last trains run about midnight. It fits.
If you want ninety minutes of Thai, you get one hour of market and head for Zhongzheng Road at nine. Done at half past eleven, still in time for the last train — no second lap.
After the last train, taxis are easy to flag anywhere along Zhongshan North Road. If you drove, the Jihe Road multi-storey car park charges about NT$30 to NT$60 an hour; if you drank, leave the car and call a designated driver.
From December to February Shilin nights are colder than downtown, and you come out of a massage warm — coat on before you step out. Every Shilin massage shop with house numbers and review counts is on one page at Shilin massage and spa; how to choose in other Taipei districts is in how to pick a Taipei massage; the whole district’s night is in the Shilin guide.