Korea: agriculture area, swim at the beach, Gochang fortress, Hannok village Jeonju (Day 19)

agricultural area on the islands north of Mokpo 

Sunday, 31 May 2015

We started with a visit to Mount Yudalsan in Mokpo, where was a big bell. It's gonna be another very warm day here.

Afterwards we travelled along the islands north of Mokpo where is a lot of agriculture. There are far more rice fields here and we saw many onions that were harvested. Less mountains than in the East and even saw cows. All cows here are kept in the stables. Poor cows. But, we did saw one herd of Frieze pedigree grazing on a tiny meadow.  

graves (a dome of grass covered soil) with a sangsok (an offering table made of stone) are seen everywhere in the fields

Because it was warm we visited a beach and took a swim in the sea. Here at the west coast in a bay the water was nice and not so cold as at the East coast (Sokcho)

Korean way of enjoying the beach. We seldom see Koreans go into the sea, when they do they keep all their clothes on and wet their feet/legs.

low tide 

Before driving to our next accommodation address we visited the stone walled Fortress in Gochang.

An old superstition, dapseong is the act of putting a stone on one's head and walking around the castle wall three times. It was believed that this would prevent one from getting disease and ensure one goes to a better place after death.

We arrived very late at our next accommodation: a traditional Korean Hannok, in the Hannok village of Jeonju. The owner wasn't there and a non-English speaking kind girl helped us to settle into our 'room' (which resembled more a shed). We got some extra futons, but still this didn't look really comfy ......

We decided to go for a bite first and explored the Hannok village. 

traditional Korean BBQ, sitting on the ground

a lot of new Hannok houses/shops 

Korea: Rain, Coffee, Gardens, Green Tea, Water fountain show at Mokpo (Day 18)

Saturday 30 May 2015:

It's raining today for a change.
After leaving the (love) Motel M in Suncheon we had a nice breakfast (coffee with cookies) and ditto conversation with the owner of Amor Dio, an enchanting coffee shop in Suncheon. We bought a bottle of a non-alcoholic coffee brewage, which needs to be diluted with water. Yummie.

Amor Dio

the 'Dutch garden' 

We visited the Suncheon Bay Gardens, a sort of Floriade. Among many other countries also The Netherlands were represented with a 'typical Dutch garden' ...  mmm windmill and wooden shoes... arghhh!
It's weekend so lots of Koreans around. The Suncheon gardens are vast and you can make nice walks visiting the different 'country' gardens and more, which we did.

Afterwards we visited the Green Tea Plantages at Boseong and the Tea Museum.  

On we went to our hotel; the Fontana Beach in Mokpo. We had a room with seaview. 
Notice the box in the collage (bottom right picture): this is the rescue rope in case of fire. All hotel rooms have such a box with a rope in it and a hook in the wall where you can fix the rope. Our room in the Fontana beach hotel was on the 11th floor ....

It is weekend so lots of Korean families strolling along the esplanades and later watching the water fountain show. So did we of course, after our Japanese dinner. Lots of colors and music. Fun!

  

Korea: shipyards, museum, beach, love hotel, super dinner

Friday, 29 May 2015

What a great morning: starting with a lovely breakfast outside on the terrace of our hotel (the Radiance Hotel in Geoje) with seaview. 
Detour to see more of the impressive shipyard of DSME. After all this is what Korea is famous of: building bigggg ships.

Peter arranged a lovely breakfast on the terrace of our hotel. Super!

Then a beach stop to take a swim: the water is less cold here than up north on the East coast (Sokcho)

not one, but many ships are build simultaneously on this shipyard; impressive!

inspired we visited the Shipbuilding Museum in Geoje

views of bays along the way; it's enchanting here

thousands of buoys; guess for farmed fish...

goodies from the goody bag in our Love Motel (Hotel M) ^-^

Our pink room in the Love Motel; a bit sleezy/jaded (not super clean), but spacious. The cars are parked in the garage of the motel with license plates hidden and taxi's bringing guys accompanied by young girls to the motel.
We received an email this morning from booking.com indicating we couldn't check in before 6 pm.  

What a surprise: super original Korean dinner at the neighbours of our motel. The son of the owners, a student who spoke English, helped us with the 'duck BBQ'. We had a lovely evening and enjoyed the food as well as the conversation.

soooo many side dishes .. and this is not all.

Korea: dressing up, Busan, bridges and tunnels, shipyards, Geoje

Korean girls dressed in traditional clothes

Thursday, 28 May 2015:

We left the cool arty Mini hotel in Gyeongju where we had spent 2 nites. When Peter asked the manager for help with a phonecall to the Avis office in Soeul, he mentioned he spoke better German than English. He liked to practice his German with us it seemed. 

We passed a new Hannok hotel at the outskirts of Gyengju and couldn't resist to have a look. I put some traditional Korean outfits on for fun and I wasn't the only one ^-^ 

always fun dressing up

After a while we arrived in Busan, the second largest city of Korea.

We started in the east where the beach is and the posh hotels, restaurants and bars are. All these impressive skyscrapers, wow.

On a terrace in the harbour we had a fish & chips (yeah 'patatjes') accompanied by two great beers; one of them was a Paulaner a German white, which was in contrast to the Hoegaerde white beer, rather expensive, but tasted great

the beach of Busan not yet so busy in May

 

online with wifi of the hotel nearby

fish and chips lunch at Fingers & Chat in Busan

the remains 

The get to our next stop; the Radiance hotel in Geoje (an island near Busan), we passed a lot of bridges and tunnels. Interesting trip as we saw enormous shipyards. Korea is the worlds leading ship builder.

photos made from a driving car

view from our balcony at the Radiance hotel in Deokpo

taste of a 'real' beer at the cafe of the Radiance hotel

the best Bibimbap we had until now in Okpo

view on the shipyard of DSME

We had bought some drinks in Okpo which we wanted to consume on our balcony. Yeah, this evening we have a cool room WITH a balcony at the 6th floor with seaview. 

However, I (Carina) was so silly to close the balcony door at a certain moment. Arghhh we were stuck. Luckily Peter had his mobile phone and we could call the hotel. The receptionist understood English (phew) and came up to our room and saved us.