Skipping
the Philippines
and going to Jeju for the summer holiday turned out to be the best thing in the
end. One, we missed out on all the flooding in the Philippines. Two, we got to see the
best place in Korea.
Everyone
seemed surprised that we were going to spend five whole days on the island.
Turns out, that almost wasn’t enough! Perhaps, if you have your own vehicle it
would be enough, but we took taxis and buses the whole way.
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| Seogwipo Harbor. |
We
arrived in Jeju City on August third, and took an
Airport Limousine down to Seogwipo in the south. We found our hostel above a
7-Eleven across the road from the ocean. We immediately started exploring the
area, walking the famous Olleh
Road that goes from West to East along the coast. We
stopped at Sojeongbang Falls, a
small waterfall. We only stayed a few minutes because the tide was coming in
and the waves were splashing up the cliffs. We thought we had better take the
cues from the cockroaches and run up the mountain
After filling ourselves up on black pig
BBQ and beer, we passed out in our bunks, only to rise early and most literally,
climb into town to find an open coffee shop.
It made the hill on Home
Street seem like an ant hill, especially without coffee!
Once armed with coffee, we walked to Cheonjiyeon Falls, around
the harbor, crossed over the bridge shaped like a sail, and onto Saeseom Island (nothing special, just more
walkways).
We then hiked back up to Jeongbang
Falls,
only to climb down several steps. But it was worth it in the end, as we got to
play in the falls and walk to where it flows out into the ocean. It was a great
break from the heat of the island.
But we could not escape the heat, so we
headed to Swesokak black beach, a pool blocked off from the ocean. While
swimming, we marveled and how naked we felt in our bathing suits next to the
fully dressed Koreans swimming about (every beach was like this, Koreans fully
dressed in shorts, long-sleeved shirts, and sunhats swimming in the ocean).
Our next adventure was exploring the south
west area of the island. We walked around the World Cup Stadium, a surprisingly
beautiful building for Korea.
We then got back on the Airport Limousine bus to go to Jungmun Beach.
We stopped along the way to see Cheonjeyeon Falls. We stumbled back to the main part of town to scarf
down a burger before trying to find our way to the beach, which turned out to
be quite difficult. But once we found it, we had a blast riding the waves on
the innertube, despite my taking out an entire family and getting caught in the
buoy rope.
A man helped us get to Jeju City
and found us a guest house in Samyang
Black Beach.
Samyang is famous for its sunsets, and it does have some beautiful sunsets! We
enjoyed taking morning swims at Samyang and night-time strolls along the beach,
avoiding the buried old people soaking their arthritic joints.
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| Sunset at Samyang |
Our third full day in Jeju was
spent exploring LoveLand,
the sex-themed park. Which was surprisingly tame and, not surprisingly, very
Korean. We then met up with one of my friends for dinner at Bagdad Indian Restaurant
where we had a traditional Chinese tea for desert, compliments of the owner.
The next day we awoke early
and headed east to Manjanggul
Cave.
The bus ride is surprisingly long, for such a small island. The bus dropped us
off about two kilometers from the entrance of the cave and we stubbornly
refused the “expensive” taxis. We spent one kilometer questioning the sanity of
the American who was trying to hitchhike in Korea, until she actually caught a
ride and was kind enough to offer to share the car with us. Unfortunately,
there wasn’t any room. But shortly after, a nice couple stopped and gave us a
ride to the caves.
Manjanggul is a lava cave going 1 km into
the island. It is very open, very well lit, and very touristy. We braved the
cold and the damp and managed to make it to the end of the cave. After catching
a small lunch of kimbap, we headed to the neighboring maze park.
We then relaxed our aching limbs at Hamdeok Beach. This beach was the best in terms
of waves, but was very crowded and full of seaweed. We suffered some minor cuts
and bruises from the sand and smashing into other ring-riders.
Our last full day in Jeju, we decided to
try out the famous Hallim
Beach to the west. We got
distracted for four hours in the Hallim
Tropical Park—a
large botanical garden, including two lava caves. One cave is the only cave in
the world where limestone and lave meet. Suddenly we remembered our main
purpose for the trip and headed to the beach. It was a beautiful beach with
sea-green waters and black lava rocks jutting out of the water. But those black
lava rocks were under the water too, and very, very sharp. In a short time, I
was cut from head to toe from the rocks, so we escaped back to Jeju City.
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| Beautiful beach, painful rocks! |
In those five days we didn’t get to climb
Hallasan nor did we go further east to Udo. We were sad to see Jeju in the plane
window and even more depressed to say goodbye to the bright blue skies and
green waters when we arrived in grey, depressing Seoul.
