Tea-time for Tuesday

We woke up uber early on Tuesday, and again had an arduous search for coffee. We had found a few places the night before, but again, most weren't open before 10, and we were on the bus for the next city by 8am. We got to Boseong (pronounced Bosawng) just before 9am, and managed to miss the 9:10 bus to the tea plantation. Since they only run once an hour, we took a cab. Apparently the only cabs in Boseong are the executive cabs. I haven't seen a meter run up that fast, even at 4am in Seoul. It was almost W10,000 to get to the plantation, about 7 minutes away. But the plantation itself was beautiful.

There were huge trees leading up to the entrance, and there was a walkway through the plants. They're more like hedges, really.

There were a few other people around the areas we were in, but for the most part, we wandered around alone.

In fact, they are hedges. They look exactly like the hedges you see in suburbia around a soccer mom's yard: low and well trimmed.

We took a side path into the woods, and found a temple-style pavillion tucked away from the main foot traffic.

We also found an area that had already been harvested, which wasn't as scenic, but still interesting.

We then had a cup of fresh tea in one of the pavillions, and had a quick lunch before heading out. There didn't seem to be much else to do in Boseong, so we took the next bus to Yeosu, which is on the southern coast, around the middle of the country.

It was early evening, so after finding a place to stay and dropping off our bags, we headed out to Odongdo island.

Along with a scenic walk across the South Sea to the island,

we found a dragon cave,

A lighthouse,

and "Musical Water Pipes" with LED lights that the kids just loved to play in.

It was a very nice evening overall, and we headed back to our hotel (passing by a mass amount of ajumas, or older Korean women, doing group yoga or something in the park).

Manic Monday

On Monday we woke up early and went in search of coffee after deciding to stay in Mokpo for another night and head for Boseong the next day. We had past a few coffee places that were open the night before, but weren't able to find one open at 9am. Most of the places we saw were open at 10am, some were noon. It still amazes me that you can own a coffee place anywhere in the world that isn't open by 7am - at the latest. Regardless, we decided to head over to Yudalsan Park, which was listed in our guidebook and we both had wanted to see. It was between us and the shore, where we wanted to take a boat out to some of the further reaching islands, so it seemed like a good idea to walk through it.

Now, when I think of a park, I think trees, grass, maybe some landscaping and places to sit and have a picnic. This is probably because that describes most of the parks I saw growing up in the flatlands of Florida. When Korea says 'park', you can almost bet that it's actually a mountain. This one happened to be about 600 meters high. This is the walkway up to the park through the city:

We missed the glass botanical gardens, mostly because when we got there it was blazing hot, and we were really just concentrating on getting up the mountain, and not what the guidebook said to look for.

We saw Madangbawi (great views and two rock carvings) and Ildeung, another peak on our way up.

We must have taken the long way around, because it took us about 3-4 hours to get to the other side to the beach. We wanted to take a boat ride out to some of the further flung islands, but the ferries only run twice a day, and we were a good 20 minute walk from the ferry terminal and only had about 3 minutes before it left. So we took a small boat tour in the bay around Yuldusan.

Then we took a bus to the Mokpo Natural History Museum. Aside from a horribly stuffed taxidermy tiger that looked like a third grade sewing project, it was actually a nice museum.

It took us forever to find a place to eat. Most places won't serve just one person -there has to be at least two people - and the first several that we tried were either too expensive, or wouldn't allow us to share a single serving of any dish (even though some of the dishes started at W30,000 each). We decided to head to bed early since we wanted to be in Boseong first thing the next day. We debated about trying to head out anyway and cancel our reservation, but having a place to keep our bags and a shower, as well as not knowing if we'd be able to find a place in Boseong, was worth staying in Mokpo another night.

Saturday and Sunday

We started out on Saturday by catching a bus, then the metro at 5:30 in the morning. We headed out to Muan which is on the southwest coast of the country about 5 hours south, for the White Lotus Festival.

We made rice rolls with lotus leaves, called sambop, which was actually pretty gross.

Then we took a boat ride out on this large pond that was completely covered with lotus plants. 

We had dinner at the festival, which consisted of a normal Korean fare, but almost everything was wrapped or made with lotus leaves. I don't think they taste that good - pretty much like picking a leaf from any flower and eating it.  Then we left for the beach house, which was nice except for the lack of beds, but that's more than normal here.

There was a pool out back, and it was a steep climb down to the Doripo Beach

It was pretty misty, so it was hard to see far, but there was a little island, and more coastline around us. We had a campfire out on the beach, and pretty much just sat around the pool and beach and hung out and talked with the other 50 people on the trip until late. I had to teach James how to make a s'more. He'd never even heard of them before!!

The next morning we were supposed to be supplied breakfast - it was make it yourself pb&j. I watched a bunch of people play cricket and watched the tide go out - I've never seen a tide like that before. Some people tried to walk out to the island, but couldn't because the mud was so sticky and deep it was almost impossible to walk - with or without shoes.

We left around noon to go clam digging, which I turned out to be pretty good at. It was overcast, but still ridiculously hot outside. The poles that you see in the water are part of a seaweed farm. 

You pretty much take an odd shaped trowel and dig in the mud for clam shells that are still closed. 

I got about 30 or 40 before we stopped. We were supposed to catch octopus too, but apparently it was too hard to do. Someone else was able to catch quite a few by digging holes about a foot deep in the mud:

And about half an hour later - I ate a whole baby octopus, live.

I also had quite a few tentacles, which I thought tasted better. The video shows them cutting the tentacles and people taking them to eat - don't watch it if you're squeemish.

And this one I just held in my teeth - it was too big to eat. Too big to eat whole anyways. 

Afterwards we were supposed to go net fishing. It really ended up the fisherman pulled the nets out and pulled them in over the mud, and we picked the fish up out of the mud and put them in a box.

Rather disapointing after eating octopus, but it was a very interesting looking islet. They cut up the fish we caught in the boat and we ate it raw on the way back to the bus.

The rest of the people then got on the bus to go back to Seoul. James had been talking to one of the people that was running the tour, and managed to get us a ride into Mokpo with the photographers who had come with Adventure Korea. (They haven't posted pictures yet, otherwise I'd have better ones of me eating the octopus. They took quite a few of that.) We got there at the tail end of a festival. We didn't see it, but this may have been the vestiges from it, though it looked a bit permanent and expensive to be for a festival.

We found a place to stay in Mokpo, and then took a cab to the beach. We watched people setting off fireworks (they sell them on the streets here like any other vendor), and watched an impromptu wrestling match between a couple guys.

It's apparently an ancient form of wresting, but I don't remember the name of it. So James and I sat out by the beach for a few hours and talked and then went to sleep. 

And that was just the first two days. I'll try and post Monday's events tomorrow.

Bouncin' around the south and back

I just got back from an AMAZING week long vacation. I spent the last9 days with James and went from the south east to the south west of Korea. We packed quite a lot into each day, and I took over 600 pictures, so it's going to take a while to put it all up here. It'll probably take me a week or so to put everything up, so please be patient. :)

Some of the highlights include eating live octupus - head and all - in Muan, climbing a mountain on an island above a buddhist hermitage and getting a 360 view of the coastline at Dilsando, walking through a tea plantation in Boseng, and catching a breakdancing competition at the base of Busan tower.