Slept well, about 9 hours then down to breakfast.
Breakfast is always a bit of a lottery for me in non western countries, and this was no exception. Kim chi, bean salad, and a few unidentifiable dishes. Luckily they had cereal and stuff like bacon, eggs, sausages. I tried the bacon and hash browns but both were cold and awful so had toast and a bowl of yoghurt.
The hotel is in the middle of nowhere, although on google maps and trip advisor it didn’t look that far. Luckily there’s a bus stop right outside the hotel that has 2 buses that run regularly into the city and the airport. Caught the bus at 09:00, cost $1.50 each, we were the only ones on it, only took 30 minutes to the city. The bus dropped us off at one of the major attractions – Gwandeokjeong Pavilion. Weather was mostly cloudy and a bit cool, around 14c, but when the sun came out it was quite warm Had a quick look around, then changed some money at a bank and got on the hop on hop off tourist bus. We hopped off at Yongduam Rock, a lava rock that supposedly looks like a dragon head. It sort of does if you have a reasonable imagination. Walked around the corner to a tourist information office and found out how to see the lady divers. There are only two places on the island they do it and only twice a day, and it’s quite a way from the city. Decided to stick to the bus today and go tomorrow. Lunch was a newly opened French style bistro which I thought would be a change from the local food so went in for a salmon and avacado Benedict which was surprisingly good although a bit pricey.
Hopped back on the bus, headed to the intercity bus station to get a public bus to the other side of the island, to a waterfall which is a couple of hours away but the bus goes through the countryside.
The bus was virtually empty, and went through a national park, up some hills and through a forest. Since it’s Autumn some of the trees were spectacular oranges and reds.
Song got talking to a lady from Malaysia who had been on the island for 3 weeks, doing long walks, and she was very helpful and told us of some volcanic formations that were nearby and worth a look, so we took her advice and did so – the rocks were like the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland, not as big but worth the trip.
Got on another bus for the 10 minute trip to the waterfall. Down some steps to a pool with a couple of small falls, but the main one was dry – bit of a disappointment. There was a sign to the 2nd waterfall so we followed that not expecting much, but it was actually OK – not amazing but worth the time.
Getting late now we left the falls and started to walk towards the bus stop to go back across the island, but after 20 minutes realised we were not where we thought we were. We stopped a couple of school kids and asked if they spoke English, they giggled and offered to help even though they didn’t understand – she tried Google translate but I typed out the bus number and they got it, and walked us about 50 metres to a bus stop and showed us the bus we needed to get back to the city. After a 20 minute wait we hopped on, on our way back. We realised that all the bus fares were the same – 1200 Won, which is about $1.50, regardless of whether you were going one stop or across the other side of the island. Pretty amazing.
Going back was a bit quicker, but we hit traffic when we got to the city. Wandered up the road to get something to eat and decided on a Japanese restaurant (despite the fact we’ll be in Japan in a few days and will be eating a lot more of it). Not many people here speak much English (even the woman on the tourist bus struggled), and although the menu was also in English it only said “sushi” and “course a”, “course b” and “course c”. We chose “course a“, guessing that it’s going to be sushi, sashimi, possibily tempura and miso soup.
First they brought out some small plates of vegetables and hard boiled quail’s eggs. This was followed by some buck wheat noodles in ice water (unusual). Then some raw tuna in a chilli sauce. Then a plate of 32 pieces of sashimi. Then more plates of vegetables. Then a few servings of shell fish. Just when we thought it was all over they came out with more sashimi and we had to tell them to stop, but not before they dropped off some tempura and a plate of some kind of cheesy sweet corn dish. We got up and paid before they carried in a whole tuna. Cost about $80 and well worth it, but just too much.
Walked down the road and got the bus back to the hotel, a really full day, we intend to lie in and take it easy tomorrow.
