Naksan Beach

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28th Jun: We left Suwon around eight. The bus journey was long and tedious, it took about four hours. The only highlights were the conversation and passing by the beautiful Seoraksan. We were deposited at Sokcho bus station around midday. Bathrooms are rank. We got a caffeine fix and took a taxi to Naksan beach. The journey took around 15 to 20 minutes and cost around 15,000 won. We were deposited at our motel. We checked in and got the keys for the two rooms. We went and checked them and the room with the extra bedding was for the four of us. We were confused as the rooms were meant to have a kitchen, but we couldn't see it in the room. We scoffed at the size of the wardrobe, it was huge for beach side love motel. Well the wardrobe had the last laugh, it opened up to reveal the kitchen. We got ourselves sorted and hid in the others' room, ready to surprise the birthday girl. She was surprised!

After a bit of a natter, we were all starving, so we went in search of some food. All the places along the front were seafood restaurants, so we headed to the backstreets to find something more suitable. We found a small restaurant that ha some outdoor seating, so we decided to eat there. We ordered up a tonne of food as we were all starving. We had jaeyuk deopbap (spicy pork), kimchi jjigae, seafood pancake, and potato pancake. It was all delicious an we all enjoyed it. Just as we were finishing up on the food, the heavens opened. Well, we weren't moving, as it was peeing down an we would of been drenched walking round to the hotel. So, we decided to order some beers. We enjoyed some beers waiting for the rain to ease off.

The rain stopped and we headed across to the hotel. It was time for dessert, birthday cake! A homemade carrot cake with cream cheese icing. It was delightful! After stuffing our faces with cake, we headed down to the beach. Me and Yeri went for coffee, there was a gorgeous cafe near the beach. We spent an hour, about an hour and a half on the beach, I ha a little nap, but it was too cold and windy, so we headed back to the hotel and took a nap there. We woke up and went on the search for food to cook later, as the motel had a barbecue space on the roof that we could use. Well. we thought that going to the supermarket would be our best bet, but it was closed. Really, a Saturday night in a beach town at summer, someone obviously has enough money and doesn't want to make any more. So we ended up in the mart under our hotel. Shopping hungry again, we ended up with tonne of food; 2kg of meat, rice, lettuce, sesame leaves, radish, onions, and mushrooms. Oh, and of course some booze!

Back at the hotel, we got the BBQ ready the staff provided us with hot coals and we cooked up a feast. We were all starving and ate too much of course. Also buying two kilos of meat was a bit too much. Ah well! The roof ares was nice, because as we had decided to barbecue later than everyone else, most of them were leaving or had left, by the time we got there. There was only really one group of men left. They were getting really drunk and we had a good laugh at them when some of them started to fight with each other. After finishing our mains, we all still had some room for dessert. So we devoured the left over carrot cake and some peaches we had bought. We sat around for a few hours playing cards against humanity, I love that game! Around midnight we headed to the noraebang for a singing session. We ha a good couple of hours there, singing our hearts out.

29th Jun: I think it was around 10 when we woke up. Ashley made us some lovely pancakes for breakfast. We sat on the balcony eating our pancakes, drinking orange juice and coffee. We ha a lovely view of the beach. By the time we had all fannied on getting ready it was well after midday, oops. Luckily no one mentioned that we had one over checkout time. We were able to leave our things in reception and we headed out.

We split into two, some people heading down to the beach and the others heading up to Naksan temple. I opted for the temple. We walked uphill, not too steep, for about ten to fifteen minutes to reach the temple. The temple was pretty busy. We walked into the entrance and looked at the gorgeous views of the coastline. The weather was pretty hot, and there was a pagoda filled with people. We went in to the pagoda, it was noticeably cooler in there. I think I've found the perfect place to spend summer. I didn't want to leave. Naksan temple was built by Ui-Sang, the ambassador of the 30th King of the Silla Dynasty. The temple has been burnt down and rebuilt a few times. The last time was not that long ago, around 1953, the end of the Korean War.

We wandered around the temple complex, it was beautiful, being so close to the ocean. I would love to do a temple stay here. Yeri had told us that the temple had a secret, so we headed off to find it. We headed to Hongryeonam, a small Buddhist temple built above a cave, by Ui-Sang, by the sea to find what we were looking for. There were people praying and mediating in the temple, it's pretty small, but we were directed to a section of the floor that had the wood cut out and it had been replaced with glass. It was only a tiny section in the middle of the floor. Beneath you could see the ocean and the waves, coming crashing in. It felt like we were perched on the edge of the cliff and that the temple could fall into the sea. Then we headed up to the main temple building and to the giant Buddha statue. it was impressive, shame about the weather. It was so hot and humid and overcast.

As we were walking down the hill to meet the others at the beach, it started to rain quite badly. So we arranged to meet at the hotel. We headed to a restaurant for lunch. I had bulgogi, it was delicious and we sat around there chatting for a while. The others were trying to decide how to get back to Seoul, take the bus from Naksan or head to Sokcho and take the bus back from there. We picked up our stuff from the hotel and headed to Sokcho. We were really early for our bus, but there is a lovely new little cafe next to the bus station, so we sat in there, playing sets, eating cake and drinking coffee. Also the toilets were a million miles better than the ones in the bus station. Our bus left around 5:20 pm. The journey took ages about four hours, but we went the back roads to avoid the evil motorway traffic.

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Comments

[Austen]

Bus to Sokcho
I know it has been a little over a year ago that you took this trip, but can you perhaps remember where you took the bus from Suwon to Sokcho?

[Zephyr]

Bus to Sokcho
I took the bus from Suwon bus terminal, it is a short taxi or bus ride from the Suwon station area. Let me know if you need any additional info :)