I finally leave Seoul, and events are set in place which define the whole trip for me.

When I eventually managed to get out of Seoul on my last visit, I first headed to Geoje island, staying with my friend’s parents.  Things started a little poorly with my father-in-law suggesting that the express bus was a perfectly good way to get from Seoul to Busan.  I’m guessing he hadn’t caught the bus in a while (or at least hadn’t had a chance to catch the excellent KTX).

The express buses are clean and comfortable, so while I didn’t mind the journey, what did bother me was that the express bus terminal in Busan seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. From the bus terminal, I jumped on a train and made my way to the ferry terminal (which, annoyingly, I discovered to be extremely close to the railway station. Another plus for the KTX).  I had planned to take the ferry from Busan to Geojedo, as I figured there was a fair chance the bridge they were building from the mainland would kill this mode of transport off by the time I made it to Korea again.

Using my copy of Moon’s South Korea (a decent guidebook for older, nerdier travellers, written by someone who obviously loves Korea a lot), I made my way to a cheap motel, which seemed to have suffered a bit since it had been written about.  On the plus side, its somewhat run-down state meant that it wasn’t really suitable for love motel use, so I hoped for a decent night’s sleep.  I made a brief excursion to find something to eat, then with convenience-store sushi, yukpo (beef jerky) and an awesomely cheap Hoegaarden in belly, I settled in for an undisturbed night.

In the morning, I grabbed kimbap and soup, almost walked out without paying, then lugged my attention-grabbing Aarn backpack (front and backpack?) to the ferry terminal.  I bought my ticket, watched the ajumma cleaning army and chatted to a guy heading to Geoje for work.  I would learn that the shipbuilding industry on Geoje brought many foreigners to the island.

I’d bought a giant, detailed atlas and photographed the relevant maps onto my tiny netbook, but picked up a physical map from a newsagent while waiting at the terminal.  At this point, I still harboured hopes of walking my way along the south coast, but really wasn’t sure what Geoje had in store for me.  I would find out soon enough.

Finally, I boarded the ferry.  The windows were disappointingly grubby, taking some of the magic out of what was a beautiful day to be on the ocean.  We passed the foundations of the new bridge, and I could see small groups of fishermen sitting on rocks along the coast.  There didn’t seem to be any way for them to access the places they were sitting so I assumed someone had dropped them off by boat.

The ferry arrived at the Gohyeon terminal, and it was a stark contrast to the relatively shiny Busan terminal I’d left just over an hour before.  Little more than a shed, I lugged my bags off the boat and headed to the main road, parking myself there while I organised my things.  I kept hearing splashing sounds in the water, and realised that it was the constant sound of fish leaping out of the water.  “The first settlers must have been very happy to find this place”, I thought to myself, and sat a little longer to take in the view.

I made my way toward an interesting looking building, needing somewhere to sit while I figured out exactly where I was.  The large, boxy building was unsurprisingly called the D-Cube department store, a pretty standard Korean affair, with a supermarket (Tesco) on the lower levels and department store above.  I wandered around, found the food court and tried something called a Rottibun, a slightly sweet bread roll with a melted buttery filling (which I recently learned is of Malaysian origin).  Scarred by many burned lattes on my last trip to Korea, I stuck to my habit of drinking black coffee, downed my Americano and the Rottibun, then called my friend’s father, Mr Kim.

Between my broken Korean, and Mr. Kim’s similar English, I learned that I needed to go to Tongyeong.  It was about now that I was learning that I was carrying way to much stuff to enjoy travelling. The walk to the bus terminal was uncomfortably long with a 16 kilogram pack and not much practice.  I was having to stop frequently and was looking forward to lightening my load once I had accommodation.  Still shy about my novice language skills, I only felt brave enough to ask kids on the street which way I should be headed.

I had survived though, sans-English.  They understood and felt a slight sense of accomplishment as I arrived at the bus terminal, bought my ticket and was on the bus to Tongyeong.  After arriving at the Tongyeong bus terminal I made another call to Mr. Kim, and he had soon arrived to collect me.

We first made our way to what Mr Kim explained to me was one of his offices, and the site of a new building he was constructing.  He seemed almost apologetic at its incompleteness, and we headed off to see the head office of his company.

When I say ‘his company’, I’m pretty sure that Mr Kim owns it, most of it, or a lot.  I can’t quite figure it out from the public information.  The guard gave a salute as we drove through, and we went into a portable office building where I was introduced to several people and offered coffee from a Korean-style coffee machine, sweet and fake-milky.  Then we went into the shipyard.

SPP is the 10th largest shipbuilder in the world. They make big ships. Not super big by Korean standards, but certainly big enough by mine.  I was impressed, the sheds that contained the ships they were building were massive, and hard to do justice to photographically.  I would see traces of SPP all over the country as I travelled around later, but for now I was simply taking it all in.

We got back in the car, and we drove to Tongyeong Tower, a revolving restaurant that looked over the bridge between the mainland and Geoje island.  Like a lot of things around the place, it seemed half finished, with a new building surrounded by gravel and some dumpy looking older buildings.  Mr Kim asked me to order, so we sat drinking outrageously priced coffees, admiring the spectacular view as the sun began to set over the myriad of islands that dotted the shining water.

We were soon back in the car, and Mr Kim put pedal to the metal in an effort to get me around the island before the sun set.  This was complicated by the difficulty of distinguishing Geoje’s many fake speed humps (ie. painted lines) from the real ones (ie. painted lines with lumps of concrete sticking up from the road).  We survived thanks to mandatory seatbelt laws and good brakes, but it was seriously dark as I got out to look at Geoje’s pebble beach.  Yes, it was a beach made of giant, round rocks, probably not done justice by the lack of light. We were back in the car, and soon arrived in Gohyeon.

Mr Kim lived at the top of an aprtment block that he owned.  I was shown to a room on the penthouse level, and unloaded my gear there.  It was apparently Mr Kim’s man-cave and was full of various gifts he had received as part of his business dealings.  After settling in and greeting Mr Kim’s wife, we headed out for dinner.

I like some seafood, but crab has always been one of those dishes that I’ve avoided. Sure, it’s tasty, but the effort involved in getting the small amount of meat out of the shell never seems quite worth the payoff.   I don’t remember now whether I fully understood exactly where we going for dinner, but the picture of the giant spider crab on the side of the restaurant made it pretty clear what I was up for.  We were seated, Mr Kim ordered, and I waited to see what turned up.

We started with sashimi, sushi and a simple salad, and then the crab arrived.  It was huge, and in what was to become a pattern for the next few days, Mr Kim and his wife ate a little, and spent most of their time loading up my plate with the best pieces.  My incompetence at extracting meat from the more difficult parts of the crab no doubt made their decision as hosts fairly easy.  This was dangerous territory, my western upbringing of ‘finish your plate’ in combination with Korean style serving.  My protestations that I was almost full fell on deaf ears and five crabs later, I was ready to face the final part of the meal.

They had thrown me pretty much all of the legs, that being the easiest part to get meat out of, so I had discovered that ‘crab sticks‘ actually do look a part of a crab, just not a crab that we get in Australia.  Ah, the embarassment of my sheltered, landlocked upbringing.

Sitting on our tables for most of the night were half-shells of what I assume were scrambled crab gizzards.  As the final course, we threw in some rice, mixed it around and somewhat apprehensively, I took the first mouthful.  Crab gizzards, it turns out, are pretty tasty.  After this and some animated tongue-like things I ‘d eaten earlier in Seoul, I was starting to feel like a pretty adventurous eater.  Mr Kim got the bill, and we were on our way home.

Back at Mr Kim’s house, we retreated to the man-cave.  A large proportion of the gifts seemed to be high-end alcohol, so we proceeded to get through the remainder of a bottle of very nice scotch.  Both Mr Kim and I gave up, he in order to go to work the next day, me to do a bit of planning for the next day ‘s travels.  The roads hadn’t looked at all friendly for walking, with lots of cars and narrow shoulders like most of Korea.  With my dream of walking from here to Mokpo looking shaky, I figured I was going to be catching buses.  My maps showed a number of old fortresses around the island, so I took some notes in preparation, and went to sleep, excited about what felt like the real beginning of my journey.

Links:

The crab restaurant in Gohyeon – Daegae ilbeonji – 대게일번지

Tongyeong tower

A couple of Korean bloggers here and here have taken much nicer pictures than I managed with my point and shoot’s terrible flash, and they have some pricing information.

Getting to Geoje:

Express buses run regularly from Seoul to Tongyeong and non-express buses run to Gohyeon.  Alternatively, catch the KTX to Busan and make your way from there.  Sadly, as I expected, the ferries no longer appear to be running, though Naver tells me the bus from Busan still takes two hours and forty minutes, which I find hard to believe.  If that appears to be the case, the express would be the best option.

There’s been a bit of online reaction to Lonely Planet’s publishing of a blog-reader list of “Most hated cities”, and the fact that Seoul featured at number three.

Lonely Planet have updated the post in an attempt to clarify that it’s reader comments, not editorial opinion.  That probably won’t stop people from being outraged anyway, but those people should bear in mind that linking to the post that offended them is not helping Korean tourism’s cause.  It’s just going to boost the Google ranking of Lonely Planet’s article.

So if you genuinely want to do something to improve Seoul’s standing, don’t mention the LP post.  Just fight it with Google, by posting something of your own that state your view on why Seoul is a good place to visit, laden with keywords that are relevant.  This post is an example, and I’ll follow up with “Why Seoul shouldn’t be on a list of Cities You Really Hate’”.  This is the world of the web .  A hundred positive reviews trump one good one.  But even one good one trumps a bad one if it’s higher in search engine results.

I’d recommend you have a go.

Today, we hitched a ride from near Damyang back to Gwangju.  I was slightly freaked out, but my wife’s Korean friend had no qualms and jumped at the offer.  I figured he’d be safer wth me in the car and jumped in after him.

Along the way, the driver suggested some sights to see and a venue for dinner.  He dropped as at the restaurant and went on his way.

We ordered Nakkji muchim, a spicy octopus dish with the octopus boiled briefly (only one minute).  When the dish arrived, the cooked octopus was promptly chopped up with scissors, and the (apparently delicious) inside of its head was set aside after the outer flesh was removed and cut. The octopus was tasty, and we mixed it with rice as well to make a kind of nakkji bibimbap.  The octopus innards sat there for a while as we both discussed what it was going to be like.

We finally decided it was time, and grabbed the odd-looking egg-like objects and put them in or mouths.  I chewed.  The taste was OK, with an oddly appropriate raw egg-yolk taste and texture mixed with the octopus.  I had to fight a gag reflex though as my brain thought through just exactly what I was eating.

 As we neared the end of the meal, my friend suggested we get some sambalnakkji (three legged octopus), which we had discussed earlier in the day.  I suspected nothing, was a bit full, but it was the last I was going to see of him until I was back in Seoul, so I said ‘OK’.

Rather than describe what happened then, I’ll just embed the youtube videos:

And the earlier video of the octopus innards being set aside:

Which unfortunately means no time to blog.  Will try and put some pictures up tomorrow when things ease up a little.

Highlights so far include -

- Staying at a traditional Korean house.

- Eating fish and drinking beer and soju with some random Korean fishermen.

- Black goats in the hills on Geoje-do.

- A mountain road walk near Gohyeon.

- Meeting people on KTO’s blogger camp through Gangwondo and Gyeongbuk.

- Lots and lots of food…Haven’t made much progress on the alcohol trail, although last night’s Naju berry wine was pretty good.  I will try to go back there to sample their pear wine.

Until then…

As some of you will have noticed, there’s a little Korean Tourism Organisation widget on my blog.  I think this has been used by the KTO to measure visitors to my blog for their ‘Blog Korea’ competition, in which I’ve been participating.

Anyway, it appears I’ve made the top 100, so for now that means a small prize, and a possible tour for a few days when I am over in Korea next month.  Things have been a touch hectic at home, so I’m looking forward to getting away to the Korean countryside and south coast.

While I’m happy about the win, my left arm is feeling a little sorry for itself.  Today I dragged myself in for various vaccinations that are useful safety precautions.

I didn’t really bother with this last time, as we spent almost the entire time in Seoul, but as I’ll be venturing through the countryside I’ve done a bit more research this time.    While this is definitely not the sexiest topic, neither is the thought of contracting Japanese Encephalitis.  Slim chance of contracting it, but a pretty serious result if you do.

I found the Lonely Planet South Korea Health information page to be a pretty good resource in this regard.  You can also get helpful information from the Australian government at http://www.smartraveller.gov.au/zw-cgi/view/Advice/south_korea, and from the US government at http://wwwn.cdc.gov/travel/destinations/south-korea.aspx.  The KTO website is unfortunately silent on the topic, but given where the average Korean traveller is going, there probably isn’t much risk, so I can understand this.  However, do your research (Google is extremely helpful, ask your doctor, and make sure you do so at least one month before you leave. I’ve left it a few days and late and will have to chase one of my booster shots down when I’m in Seoul.

None of the standard vaccinations was particularly unpleasant.  I just happened to mention that I was probably due for my tetanus booster and the doctor threw that one in for free.

So do take your travel seriously.  On my last trip to Korea, I found it to be clean and safe for the most part, but like any country, there are risks and you need to make sure you manage them.  Be safe.

The first major excursion from Seoul in our trip was to Gyeongju.  As we left Namyangju, following the banks of the Han river south, we passed through Yeoju, a city in Gyeonggi province.  As we drove, a sign caught my eye and I asked my father-in-law if we could stop and take a look.

The sign pointed to the tomb of King Sejong, perhaps Korea’s most loved ruler.  King Sejong presided over a somewhat more enlightened period of Korea’s history, encouraging science, implementing agricultural improvements and most famously, bringing about the creation of the Korean alphabet.  While his role in its creation may never be completely clear, that he had empathy for the plight of the common person is.  An alternative reasoning might suggest he was a savvy enough manager to realise enabling all of his subjects to communicate their desires using the written word could only benefit his ability to rule in an orderly fashion.

Despite efforts to squash literacy in non-aristocrats by subsequent rulers, and the attacks on Korea culture during Japanese occupation, Hangul has survived, and so has Sejong the great’s place in the hearts of Koreans.

When we pulled into the site of his tomb that day, however, it was closed.  This wasn’t entirely a bad thing, as it meant there were few people around to compete with my wife’s mother as she collected the many gingko nuts lying on the ground.  We moved on, but a few weeks later, we were able to return.

Ginko nuts

I was glad we did.  On entering, we were presented with an open-air museum exhibiting the various scientific instruments created and improved under Sejong’s patronage.  Satisfying my nerdy bent, we were able to see various astronomical devices, observatories, sundials and star charts.  The rain gauge, first used under Sejong’s rule to help manage agriculture (central to the Confucian economy) could also be seen.

Astronomical instruments at King Sejong's tomb

Moving closer to the tomb through the main gates, the afternoon sun bathed the grassy field and burial mound in a warm glow, and pigeons moved slowly along the edge of the nearby woods.  Seeing pigeons in their natural environment, and not as filthy imported city rats was a novel first for me as well.

Approaching the tomb

We walked to the top of the mound, past the guardian statues, and looking back toward the entrance, I couldn’t imagine a more fitting place for a great ruler.  It seems some thought must have gone into this too, as his tomb was moved from its orginal site to the current site, deemed better than his original resting place.

The view from the burial mound

We left the tomb and headed to another Yeoju site, the birthplace of Empress Myeongseong.

Empress Myeongseong has an interesting place in Korean history, mostly played out during the difficult times as the Choseon dynasty ended and the Japanese occupation began.  You can read about it on wikipedia, although I’d also recommend a read of Korean history for a full background of life in Confucian society.

A much smaller museum, it was hard for the childhood home of “Queen Min” to make the same impression as the spiritual calm of Sejong’s tomb, but like most of the sites you’ll visit in Korea, it’s an interesting piece of their frequently tragic history.

Outside the museum at the birthplace of Empress Myeongseong

Assuming that the exhibits don’t get you down too much, you can lighten your spirits a little by trying to throw ten-won pieces into the fountain outside.  If your aim is good, you’ll be rewarded with an aquatic display fit for a miniature Esther Williams, as well as the admiration of any Koreans who happen to be around (I’m speaking from experience).

Yeoju is also famous for its rice, and we finished the evening sampling Nureungji (누릉지),  which is essentially rice served in a hot stone bowl.  The rice in contact with the stone becomes crunchy, and you then add water and mix into a kind of soup or porridge.  The restaurant we ate at was alongside the river, and while I don’t remember the name, I’m sure you’ll have no trouble finding somewhere.

Yeoju Nureungji

Links:

Sejong’s tomb

Getting there:

• http://english.gg.go.kr/tour/sightseeingSite.jsp?seq=17&page=2&caller=list
• http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/SI/SI_EN_3_1_1_1.jsp?cid=778679

Article discussing UNESCO events taking place at Joseon tombs this year:

• http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/culturenlife/culturenlife_realfield_detail.htm?No=1679

Birthplace of Empress Myeongseong

Getting there -

• http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/SI/SI_EN_3_1_1_1.jsp?cid=264609
• http://www.yeoju.gyeonggi.kr/eng/tour/remain_04.asp

History -

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empress_Myeongseong

Hanjeongsik in Yeoju

• http://joonsfamily.com/index.php?showtopic=8572&st=180&p=55976&#entry55976

Our second outing in Seoul was one that many do – Hitting the palaces.  While many would start with Kyeongbokgung, the largest of the Korean palaces, Changdeokgung (창덕궁) was our first call.

We had a large group in tow, so our ambitious thoughts of getting through two palaces in a day were put to rest pretty early.  My wife had been researching prior to the trip, and Thursday was the only day that tourists are allowed into the palace on their own.  All other days require that you join a guided tour.  While the guided tour is substantially cheaper, I can’t imagine it’s anywhere near as pleasant as touring the palace at your own pace on a sunny day, as Changdeok palace’s main attraction is its organic surrounds, ponds and leafy strolls.  Biwon, the secret garden, is the centrepiece.

While the larger palace has some epic structures, Changdeok presents a more intimate environment.  At Gyeongbok, you imagine the country being run.  At Changdeok, while some of the palace seems quite functional, mostly you imagine a ruler doing very little other than enjoying his (frequently brief – Being King was a tough business -) time at the top of the tree.  Fortunately, it’s now possible for you to to enjoy it, and in some ways your experience will be less constrained than that of a ruler in Confucian society.

Before I leave the rest of this post to the gallery, one thing you might want to do if you are particularly interested in palaces is to track down a copy of Palaces of Seoul by Edward Adams.  I’ve browsed the local library copy, and it would have made a nice companion to my walks around Seoul’s palaces.  You won’t need this book.  The palace is well signed in multiple languages, and there are English-speakers at the main information centre.  You will get a lot of extra information though.

A sunny Thursday and a secret garden is a perfect mix.  Take a look!

Links:

Seoul’s palaces at Visit Korea

A stroll through Changdeokgung

Changdeokgung on Wikipedia

I recently pointed to some discount coupons in my E-mart post.  You can still download them at visitkorea.or.kr, but I discovered on Friday that there may be a nicer way for you to get them.  When visiting the travel agency to book my tickets for my upcoming trip, I noticed that the travel agent had the coupons in small booklets:

Easier to carry than A4 printouts...

Needless to say, we grabbed a few.  If you’re in Melbourne, we found ours at Korean Travel Service, but I’m assuming these are being sent around by KTO, so hopefully they’re more widely available.  You might try contacting your local KTO (http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/OO/OO_EN_13_4_1.jsp - Choose yours), or use the brochure request forms on the KTO site.

We started by going to the photo studio where we were going to have our pre-wedding photos taken.

Unlike weddings in Australia, couples in Korea typically go to a studio (although more frequently outside) and have professional portraits taken on a day before the actual wedding ceremony.  It’s big business, and the photos are a touch cheesy for western tastes.  We spent a lot of time prior to our trip trawling through over fifty wedding photography studio websites until we finally settled on one we liked, Studio Mecca.

After sorting a few things out, we were off downstairs to have be measures for our traditional Korean clothes, , or Hanbok.  We would wear these for both the studio photos and on the wedding day.  The measuring went well for me. Koreans generally seem a bit sturdier and taller than a lot of Asian races, so I was an easy fit.  My wife though is tall by any standard.  In the words of the seamstress, “This is the first time my tape measure wasn’t long enough!”.  All of the nicest female Hanbok fabrics come already joined.  Budget dictated something more modest than we would have liked, but eventually, we settled on something satisfactory, then moved on to explore Seoul.

From Hongdae (홍대), we headed to Gangnam, literally meaning ‘south (of the) river’.  Gangnam is an area of expensive real estate, business and higher-end shopping.  When I say business, I don’t mean this kind of business:

Not in Gangnam

That’s for another post.  First, came lunch, which meant Kimbab.  ‘Kim’ (김)  means the particular variety of dried, roasted seaweed that the Korean version of sushi is wrapped in.  ‘Bab’ (밥) means rice, so it’s literally rice and seaweed.  Kimbab is generally anything but just those two ingredients, being pretty much a meal all in itself.  Vegetables, meat, fish and egg all find their way in, as does cheese and kimchi depending on your preferences.  It’s also really cheap, and I expect it will be one of the staples of my hike in a couple of months.  Complete, carbohydrate laden and portable.

One word of warning.  I did on one occasion at a truck-stop get given Kimbab that was literally just rice and seaweed.  This was a massive letdown, and I saw no way to prevent the error.

Just so you know – here’s what I look like when eating impostor kimbab:

Kimbab that wasn't really = sad face

Note the complete lack of any filling in them.  You will want to avoid this when you’re in Korea.

After finishing lunch, we set out to explore Gangnam.  I’ll save the details for the gallery at the end of the post.  As the sun went down, we slowly made our way toward a restaurant owned by one of my father in-law’s cousins, “Du-ori”.  If I’d been paying more attention to the name on the way in, I would’ve been less surprised.  As we sat down to a fantastic spread of side dishes, whole, roasted pumpkins came out to the table.  These were split open to reveal what we thought was delicious bacon.  It turned out, this was actually a kind of cured duck, something I’d not eaten before. And despite being kind-of family, we were unable to get the recipe.

Bacon-duck in a pumpkin - delicious!Side-dishes galore!

At any rate, it was really, really good, and hopefully I get to go back there on my next trip.  I highly recommend it for something different. It seems to be linked to on the Visit Korea website, but only in the Korean language part of the site.

Links and maps:

Studio Mecca:
Website: http://www.studiomecca.co.kr
Map (They’re on floor 2):

크게 보기

Du-ori:
Listing on Visit Korea (Korean language)
http://korean.visitkorea.or.kr/kor/ti/lodgig_food_shopping_traffic/area_food/list_920.jsp?category=&areaCode=&gotoPage=1&cid=132898&keyword=&stype=&ListType
On Daum: http://local.daum.net/place/place_view.daum?place_id=P38458 
Map:

크게 보기

A friend sent me a link to a youtube video doing the rounds, unsure if I would enjoy or be offended!  I was amused, but as it was a video response I wanted to find the original video.

Which I did:

Watching that first made the original video I was sent more enjoyable:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYXTj7p8nzI

I showed it to my wife (who found it even funnier than I did) thinking the drummer or singer might be someone famous.  She wasn’t sure, but through a little more searching we were able to figure out the name of the drummer (Gweon Sun-Geun – 권순근), and find some other videos.

The most interesting part of this for me, music history buff that I am, was that he was apparently the drummer in Korea’s first rock band, ‘Add 4′.  I was able to turn up this snippet, which then led to a pleasantly wasted evening exploring the history of Korean pop music.  I recommend you do the same (starting with random related videos in the above snippet)…There’s a whole world to discover.