This is running very late !!

After the the Guam/Taiwan trip, there were a flurry of things to be done. Loads of planning with MunBear who was finishing his work rotation here meant having to meet up to discuss where to go and what to do. Luckily MunBear is a similar kind of traveler, willing to try everything, willing for hardship and interested in doing and seeing stuff rather than big city shopping. We worked out a rough plan at first and then finetuned the details. We would spend about 2 days in Jeju before taking a ferry up to Mokpo and driving eastwards and northwards before going back to Seoul. We used the Korea Tourism Website a lot in those days and it was easy to plan a route complete with GPS pictures and length of time required between each destination. The hardest part was actually booking the car, as we had to return the car to a different city and that is not easy to do ! In the end though it was solved because I had MsSong help us out and even then it was a very long conversation in Korean.

Halfway through GATrac decided to join us which was great since it decreased the costs of car rental though the room rental worried me a little. She could also have her moods which may bust the whole trip down the valley of unhappiness. But her being easy on the details meant we did not have to change anything we wanted to do.

The first problem came on the flights though. GATrac decided to fly a day earlier through Shanghai to save money but her connecting flight was cancelled. In the end, MunBear and I went to Jeju first and familiarised ourselves with driving (it was easy for me as I had just driven in Guam and Taiwan) on the wrong side of the road. When GATrac finally made it half a day earlier she was so relieved to be there. Haha. One of our first stops was to stop at a beach side rock formation to gawk at the rocks and try seafood being taken out of the sea right in front of us. it was that fresh ! Other things we did on Jeju including feasting on the famous black pork, visiting the villages, lava tubes, and climbing the Sunrise Peak to see the sunrise. Though our mornings started early, we were all tired out as we walked a lot and did a lot more in a day that one would usually do on tour.

One serious problem we faced was that all our ferries to Mokpo were fully booked ! Something we did not count on. We managed to get ferry tickets to Busan but that would mean cutting out most of the Southwest and more importantly we needed to change our car booking ! The friendly ferry person helped us sort through this after a lot of sign language and we took an overnight ferry to Busan. It felt a little like Titanic even though we were second class passengers meaning we were in a four bunk cabin. There were areas we could not go, but it was fun and my first time as far as I can remember sleeping on the sea. We arrived in Busan very early and rested a while before trudging to find the car rental. And we could not find it. It took us more than an hour to find the office which had sneakily changed places before picking up GATrac from the train station. But by then we were set.

More fresh seafood we had before finding lodgings at Haeundae. We walked by the beach in the sunset and had a great barbeque dinner before resting our tired selves in a huge Spa at Spaland. Complete with 27 saunas and many different pools of different temperatures. The next few days we slowly made our way northwards along the coast and visited tombs, temples, museums, villages, old schools and cities, all the while feasting on great healthy Korean fare. Among some of the best things we did were going to visit a Penis Park (literally a park of phallic sculptures) and riding a railbike hidden in the valleys and mountains of East Korea. We made our way through the historical Gyeongju before spending the night in Pohang, home of the steel industry. Then up to sleepy Andong in the heartland and then the fishing village of Samcheok. After the scenic Jongseon in the mountains, we arrived at the Northeast port of Sokcho. This was a place where you could see into North Korea and there were evacuation plans and lighthouses and barbed wire on the beaches ! It was also home to the best and yummiest crabs in the world.

We spent a few hours taking a cable car and then climbing to the peak of Seorak mountain before spending a few romantic hours on the famous Nami island. This was my second time here as I had been to Jeju and the norther parts of Korea 3 years ago. Nami island was just as I remembered it, fantastic scenery, appropriate village decor, and remnants of Winter Sonata everywhere. We spent the night in Chuncheon munching on the famous dakgalbi. We were now very close to Seoul and we did one more detour to the largest botanical garden in Korea where it was like stepping into many pieces of heaven stitched together. Rivers, tiny chapels, model trains ran among many different themed gardens and it made a fantastic place to rest your soul. When we finally entered the city of Seoul, we spent a few hours at the Palace and the National Museum before retiring to have a 20 course dinner at the Cultural Korea House followed by an hour long cultural presentation.

The last two days were spent shopping and looking at Korean goods, visiting another spa, getting a massage, and basically just soaking in Korea. Korea to me is like Australia, a healthy sunny happy place. I loved it. And now I know it so much more. It was a very satisfying trip to make and took 10 days. Perhaps someday I will have time to travel down the West side as well.

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