Much to the girl's happiness (and my sanity), Ronnie returned from Arizona last week. He was out there for a few weeks for a training course. We had talked about doing something over Labor Day weekend, possibly going to Jeju Island, but suspended our plans for his marathon training. Because really, who wants to run while they are on a mini-vaca?
Well, that plan went out the window, as I started checking around to see if we could do a quick weekend trip in October, heading south to soak up the last bits of summer. Unfortunately, every flight I wanted was booked and the hotels all had premium pricing. We decided to go for it anyway, he would just have to run while we were there. After some hasty trip planning, we had flights, hotel and a loose plan for our trip.
Jeju is a volcanic island off of the south tip of Korea. It boasts the highest mountain in Korea (Mt. Halla), many waterfalls, and lava rock beaches, as well as being a large producer of tangerines.
We took off on a Friday evening so we could enjoy 2 full days on the island. We woke up Saturday and started off trying to get on a tour bus. Yeah, that didn't work because we needed reservations in advance, so we rented a car. We took off and decided to do the western half of the island, starting by heading up Mt. Halla. Our first stop was the southern overlook from Mt. Halla - it was breathtaking! The sky was bright blue, the water was a blue-green and everything in between was green. Unfortunately, the mountain peak was obscured by clouds. We continued our adventure to the north side of the island, finding Yongdu-am (Dragon Head Rock) and meandering our way down the Korean A1A. Once we got back to our neck of the woods, and a short hike later, we found the Cheonjeyeon Waterfall. We made it back to the hotel in time to clean up for supper and catch the volcano show from our balcony.
Sunday brought us cloudy, drizzly skies (more on that to come in the next post). Since we headed north and west the day before, we headed to the eastern half of the island and tried to find as many covered activities as possible. We started our day at the Teddy Bear museum. The displays and scenes were too cute; they had storybooks, events from history, priceless pieces of art and even a Louis Vuitton bear. Afterwards, we headed to find Oedolgae, a rocky tower in the ocean caused by an eruption. We continued our Korean A1A adventures down the southeastern coast, stopping to enjoy the sea splashing on the lava rock beaches. Since we had made it to the eastern coast, we decided to look for Micheon Cave, one of the many lava caves you can explore. We meandered our way back to the hotel and decided on seeking out the infamous Jeju black pork for dinner. After dinner, we got back to our hotel in time to wind down and head to watch the volcano show up close.
Monday was our last morning on the island, and it was even more rainy and windy than Sunday. For good reason too, a typhoon was blowing through. Ronnie and I have decided we are definitely returning before we leave Korea next year.
No comments:
Post a Comment