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Published: October 11th 2012
28th Sept: Made it to Yangjae station in plenty of time. Traffic going to Seoul was fine. Stopped off for a Maccy Ds. On the bus by 11 and ready to go, however some people were stuck in traffic, so we sat on the bus and waited for them for 45 minutes. Personally I would of just left them. Once they arrived we started our journey south. The traffic was horrific, as expected at Chuseok as the whole country travels to their home towns or villages. Leaving Seoul there was a sea of red lights on the motorway as far as the eye could see.
29th Sept: The traffic seemed to ease up once we had left Seoul and then Gyeonggi province, and we started to move at a better pace. The bus was no longer a snail. We arrived at Boriam Temple around 6:30 and it was already starting to get light. So much for watching sunrise. We took the shuttle bus up the mountain to save having to hike and then walked about 15 minutes to the temple. Boriam Temple was beautiful. It is set at the edge of the cliffs overlooking the sea. The views were stunning.
We walked back down the hill to the shuttle bus and then went and sat on the regular bus for about an hour. Very boring! We then drove to the spot around the corner where we were picking up the hikers. Next our breakfast muffins were dished out.
We drove to Sangju Beach, which is the area we would stay in that night. The beach was gorgeous. The sun was shining on the water and it was all glittering. We found a nice shaded spot and had a snooze. We went back to the hotel area, around 2 to check in, that was a nightmare. Trying to organise four buses of people is a nightmare. We eventually got checked into the hotel, was a bit crappy and had a long awaited shower and nap. That evening we all met up at seven to go for dinner together. But as the group was so big there wasn't a restaurant big enough for us, so we all went our seperate ways. We ended up in a nice samgyeopsal place, although we did wait forever to be served. However the meat and beer were flowing. After dinner we decided to have an
early night as we were still wiped out.
30th Sept: Well what a non-event today turned out to be! Up around 8 ish and went for brekky, bagels, cream cheese and scrambled eggs, yummy! We had already checked out of the hotel, so we just sat around in the sun, and I went down to the beach for a bit. We left just after 11 to go to the rices terraces that Namhae is apparantly famous for. The drive along the coast was gorgeous, the views of the coastline and the sea were stunning. However, the rice terraces were not. Maybe I have been spoiled by seeing the rice terraces elsewhere, i.e. Sapa, where the views are stunning. Sadly the rice terraces in Namhae did not live up to this. Firstly, we had to walk down and look up at the rice terraces. There was a road through the middle of them and there were quite a few houses dotted about them, too, ruining the view. Also they were pretty small. Bit of a let down. However sitting in the sun eating ice cream kind of made up for it.
We were meant to drive to Namhae town
via a scenic route, but because one of the buses was late, (Some bint had lost her purse drunk on the beach the previous night and had tried to find it that morning) we had to nix that idea and head straight to Namhae town for lunch. This is where we hit our next problem, since it was Chuseok all the restaurants were shut. One of the group leaders suggested that we all just get Lotteria (dodgy Korean fast food outlet, that makes Maccy Ds look good) and that they would ring ahead with the order ahead so that it would all ready to collect as there were four buses of us. Seemed like a good idea. However, after another beautiful drive we arrived in Namhae town and Lotteria would only accept payment for the order in one go. This led to complete disaster as some people buggered off to get other food, the buses kept disappearing and we were left on the streets. Complete and utter chaos! After about two hours we were all finally seated back on the bus, Lotteria in hand.
We then drove to our hotel, that would be our home for the next three
nights. The hotel was really nice and new, a hell of a lot better than the one the previous night. However we were stuck in the middle of nowhere. That afternoon we were meant to be going to the Art Village for a look around. However by the time we got there just before 6, it was about to close. There had been a lot of misinformation, including that it had already closed at 3 pm because of Chuseok. Also we were spoken to very rudely by a very obnoxious bird, that was pally with the tour organiser, I could of happily caved her skull in a few times on this trip, and that's putting it mildly. Since there was no point in going to the Art Village, we stayed in the German Village and had a nice pint of German beer and some seafood pajeon to go with it. After the war many Koreans went to Germany and spent a large portion of their lives there, they had been so immersed in the culture that they were practically German. When they returned home, the Korean government built them a German village as a thank you for going to Germany
and so they didn't feel homesick for Germany.
That night we all went for a meat buffet for dinner. I love meat buffets. There were so many meat buffet virgins there. I have never seen so many plates with so little food on. We got a tonne of meat between the four of us and were still eating away after everyone else had finished theirs. We also drank lots of random Korean liquers, which was a nice change, along with the regular beer. Back at the hotel we nipped up to the corner shop (the woman must of been making a mint off us all) to stock up on booze and then sat outside the hotel drinking.
1st Oct: A very lazy day, today! Didn't wake up until about half twelve. Had a lovely shower, went ot the shop and bought a load of crap for lunch, ice cream, cup ramyeon, shrimp crisps, and quails' eggs. Delish! After lunch we took a stroll down to the beach, which wasn't really a beach as it was just pebbles. Sat down there for a bit and then headed back up the hill to our hotel. Sat outside in the sun.
That night we went to a fish restaurant for dinner. The fish was really nice. BUt it is filled with tiny little bones which makes it a bit hard to eat. Still felt tired so had an early night.
2nd Oct: Up and had another lovely brekky of bagels with cream cheese and scrambled eggs. At 11 we headed over to the Oktoberfest at the German village. It was a beautiful sunny day. We headed to the horticultural art village first. It was really beautiful. There were loads of beautiful flowers. They also had houses, which people could rent out and stay in, that were meant to represent different nationalities. However the majority of the houses didn't seem to match the nation that they were paired with.
After spending a couple of hours there, we headed to the main Oktoberfest festival. We spent the afternoon and evening sitting drinking German beer, eating Bratwuerst, chatting and playing drinking games. They must of played 'Gangnam Style' about 10 times, not that it is in keping with the German theme. Back at the hotel we kept drinking and Sunny, one of the group leaders, brought back a shed load of sausage
and beer. So we continued to drink until pretty late.
3rd Oct: Woke up feeling still drunk around 7:30, so took a shower as I knew once the hangover kicked in I would be good for nothing. Got up again around 10:15. Packed up and headed to the buses. Journey back to Seoul wasn't tooo bad. Pretty long, around 6 hours but the traffic was good and fast moving. Nowhere near as horrific as the way to Namhae. Finally got to have those lovely potatoes at one of the rest stops. Got back to the express bus terminal and then subway and bus back home, before heading out for another well deserved meat buffet.
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