This weekend I took a trip up north to a few islands in Jeolla province: Keum-ho-do, and Won-do. It was only a two day trip, but we got a ton done! Unfortunately the first day of our trip it was raining on and off, so we couldn't do much outside of the car. The second day, however, we had beautiful weather!
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| Our "seats" on the ferry |
The drive from Busan to Jeolla province took about 4 hours, with a few stops here and there. When we finally reached our destination, Yeosu, we were just in time to catch the last ferry to Keum-ho-do. We loaded up our car, and we were on our way! I was kind of expecting a normal ferry, complete with seats and all... but, I guess I forgot where I was... What we got was a heated floor, and that's it. So, we took in a few seat cushions from the car, parked ourselves against the wall and took a nap. Two hours later we were on the island! It was only a little misty, not much rain, but still not nice enough to get out and walk around. So instead we took a scenic drive around the islands just to see what was offered. There's not a whole lot on the islands, just the homes of locals and some "Min-bak" (homes that rent rooms to tourists). It was really interesting to see how the locals lived, most of them looked at us like we were from another planet. We were clearly the 'outsiders,' but they were nice enough.
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| Our dinner of Kimchi Jiggae |
We had some amazing meals while we were on Keum-ho island. Jeolla province is known for having very fresh, very delicious food, and if you know anything about me you'd know I didn't need much more convincing than that! Our first dinner was a typical meal of Kimchi-jiggae (a rich, spicy, kimchi soup) but it was the best I've ever had! Even the side dishes were 10 times above par; At each meal we had a plethora of fresh vegetables, fresh seafood, and amazing kimchi... I was definitely a happy camper! Breakfast the next morning was
full of clams (one of my favorite foods) - we had clam soup, clam pajeon (a potato pancake) steamed clams, 2 types of kimchi, some seafood/crab pajeon... and more that I can't remember, but all of it was amazing!
After loading up on our clam-a-licious breakfast, we took off on our expedition around the island. We knew that it'd be a bit of a hike, but we were not expecting it to be as difficult as it was! The point we wanted to reach was about a 4 mile hike, and the entire time we were scaling rocks, climbing over boulders, and trying not to fall down rock slide areas. It was really hard, but looking back I'm glad we reached our goal! Luckily the weather was amazing (although, my sunburned skin begs to differ...), so we got some great views. The ocean up there really made it seem as if we were in South East Asia, not Korea. The water was a beautiful teal, and crystal clear. After about 3 hours of solid walking, we got to our destination, bought an ice cream, and made it just in time to take a bus back to the ferry terminal.
Once we got there we met a funny little old man, who insisted in talking to me in Korean (even after I told him I only speak very little Korean, in Korean of course). He had to be at least 80 years old, his skin wrinkly and tanned, and his mouth full of gold and silver teeth. We had a nice little conversation about the temple at the top of the hill, and when it was time to go he told me that he was going to tie me to the chair so I couldn't go - that way I could meet his son and become his daughter in law. He was
sooo funny! My friend (who ended up translating most of the conversation because I got really lost) and I were cracking up the entire time.
We assumed the weather wouldn't be great the next day, not to mention it'd be the day after Thanksgiving (Chuseok) so the traffic would have been ghastly, SO we decided to just pack up and go home that night. We got back to Busan around midnight, tired and dirty, but we were glad to be back home after such a hard day. It was a really great trip, and I'm glad I went. It was really nice to be away from the big city for a few days and experience the rural life of Korea. The weather worked out wonderfully, and I got to spend a nice weekend with a new friend.
Here's a few extra photos of our trip! 'Till next time...
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| The view from the ferry |
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| A beautiful view on our drive around the island |
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| One of the tiny towns on the island. This is where we had dinner and stayed the night in a small motel. |
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| A really nice pebble beach. Unfortunately it started raining so we couldn't stay here long. |
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| Clams, clams, and more clams!! Oh, and my friend Jennifer, of course... ^_^ |
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| The start of our hike... The uneven, extremely slippery rock steps should have sent up a red flag as to the difficulty of the walk... live and learn! |
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| These signs crack me up... The little stick man looks like he's having such a good time! :P |
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| We made it to the first point! |
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| Really these photos don't do the views justice, it was absolutely breathtaking! |
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| All along the trail you could find these domes in the grass, which are actually tombs. I learned on this trip that they'll take the body of a loved one and place it in a temporary tomb covered in dried grass until all the moisture leaves the body. A few months/years later they'll remove the bones from the temporary grave, and place them in a tomb like these as their final resting place. |
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| Point 2! |
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| Another silly sign, but well warranted! |
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| We walked that entire length: from the leftmost part of the photo, past the little white building on the right, to the point where I'm standing to take the photo. And at this point we weren't even halfway done! |
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| Just another pretty view. This really doesn't look like Korea! |
