As you may or may not know, I am awarded two weeks off in my one year stint here - one over Christmas and one at the end of July. It worked out perfectly that Aaron was going to be here during that time. Initially we hoped to go to Thailand, but tickets proved to be a little out of our range. Instead, we opted for Jeju Island, South of SoKor. Some people have compared it to Hawaii. It even had an island off of the main island - we agreed that the only thing worse than living on an island is being an island of an island, especially one named after a cow ;)
Day one started easily with a mid-afternoon flight out at a nearby airport (two hours on the bus and tube is nearby). We ended up getting to our hotel around 5, leaving us with little daylight to work with. We set our things down, determined to get a quick start on this trip. Our first stop was the most popular Cheonjiyeon Falls (sp?), which were a mere five minute walk away from us. They were beautiful, but seemed a bit weak due to the low water levels. With adventure in our blood, we wondered down a random pier, up a random road, into a random valley, and around a random walking path in hopes of seeing the falls from above. It was hardly a success. Nice try though Aaron :) We called it a night soon after.
The following day started early. We were determined to complete one of the 13 walking routes that lined the coast. At first, we followed the path religiously until we realized it merely weaved in and out of every street we had already been down the night prior. Being the smarties that we are, we skipped a bunch of the sites and headed straight for the shore. Along the way we got to see the market, a great view of the rooftops, and two more waterfalls, both which we could have practically swam in. The water was so clear and tempting, but a little too cold and a lottle to rocky! That was our greatest obstacle - no matter how tempting the water in the blistering heat, the lava rocks were ginormous and pretty intimidating with massive waves crashing on them. The bummer of the day came about six hours in... well, more like two hours, but it peaked at six. For once in my life I earned some major blisters on my "ring toes" [Mom says, "You should have taken the rings off of them." Laughter ensues.]. They were quite debilitating. We were within a five minute drive of our final destination, but I couldn't do it. Thank goodness Aaron gave in to the cab idea. The black sand beach was well worth the walkcab. It was practically deserted, our own private beach. While I took a nap and admired a random fresh spring in the middle of the beach, Aaron built a turtle, a handsome one at that :)
That evening, with my new disability, we decided to rent a scooter. It was the best decision we made! A) Aaron is a brilliant driver and a fan of the two wheel and B) We got to see so much more than we would have otherwise been able too. After signing our lives away, we scooted off - destination Cinnabon! About 15 minutes in, right before a stop light, the little trucker died. Long story short: waited for it to cool at a bus stop, pulled it into a gas station, owners were incredibly helpful and hospitable, English speaking son saved our butts and after a half hour of waiting and debating, drinking their water and eating their oranges, we were back on the trail with a new scooter (that was still a long story). The evening ended with us finding the sign for the Cinnabon, but it was just a hoax, we saw the amazing coast at night, a little village, then headed home for some comfort food.
In those two days we had knocked out most of what we had planned for the first three, so were gifted a free day. We chose to spend it at random museums, hiking Sunset Peak (not at sunset), stumbling upon a temple and lookout tower, watching the waves crash on the coast and just goofing around on the scooter. That evening, the movie Predator came on, which is strangely a highlight for me. It's a funny joke here in Guri, and I haven't seen it since I was probably six. Anywho, not important.
On Tuesday we rode out to Udo Island - two hours on the scooter and a twenty minute ferry. This is the island of the island, named after a cow that I had mentioned previously. Besides the weather (light showers all day), it was surprisingly pleasant. We rented yet, another scooter - only for two hours this time. That was all we needed to cruise around the entire thing. This was to be my first and last time driving a motorized two-wheel vehicle (that's not a promise). The stint lasted five minutes, and we were both terrified. There was only a one lane road that guided you along the coast. We saw a gorgeous lighthouse atop a towering hillside, the coast was a beautiful combination of white sand and lava rocks, and the water was as clear as day! The actual island was sweet and quaint, the spitting rain, not so much. After the "exciting" ride home, we returned the scooter, got dressed up, and went to the resort area for one nice meal. I was able to get my favorites: cheese infested french onion soup, a perfect caesar salad, and a Korean take on pecan pie.
Good thing we ate well the night prior because the calories we burned on Wednesday were record high. Mount Halla is the active volcano visible from every angle of Jeju. At the time, there were only two routes open: one was described as flat and easy, but not memorable, the other, torturous, steep, but remarkably beautiful - those probably weren't the Korean Information guys' words. We obviously had to take the impossible, impressive one. To give you an idea of its difficulty level, it was an hour hike to even get to the starting point. The scenery along the 8.7km (5.5mi) hike was indescribable and ever-changing. We started off in what looked like the depths of Quarry Hill, then moved into a misty eery version of that, but my favorite scene was the fairy like one in the picture below.
We couldn't help but dream of centaurs and unicorns :) It was that surreal! By the way, the misty appearance was caused by the clouds we were walking through. I think we probably went through about four different levels of them - amazing! After five hours of miserable hiking, in the best weather imaginable, we made it to the top. No Korean in their hiking gear, thought this white girl was going to make it - even my boyfriend doubted me. To give you an idea of how ridiculous it was, I'll post the video of my sarcastic attitude amidst my misery (does that make sense? You'll see). The top was well worth it... even every layer was worth it. There was a giant lake in the middle where you would expect to see boiling lava. Below is a photo of me looking out into the clouds before our rapid descent.
The walk down was mediocre at best, and ravaging on our ankles. Here's some math for you:
Our 8.7k climb up took five hours. The 9.6k walk down took two and a half hours...
Yeah, we were ready to be done and off that mountain!
Our return to the hotel was not a welcoming one - we didn't have the hotel for that night and had missed our flight that morning. After checking our records, I made some foolish calculations that I thought may cost us big time. Everything ended up just fine, no thanks to my anxiety. We were able to pay for one more night at the hotel and the next morning, upon arriving at the airport without flights home, they let us go on the next flight out without charge :D
Overall the trip could not have turned out any better.
Now back to school...
Here is the link for my pictures from the trip:
Enjoy!
Apologies for typos and grammatical errors - you know I hate revising :)
