Jeju-Do Escapades... part 1

If you are a private school English teacher in Korea, you REALLY value every extra iota of time you have off. Unlike our spoiled public school teaching counterparts (sense a small jealously) we have 5 days of summer vacay compared to their 3-4 weeks off and another handful of weeks working "summer" hours. Kenty and I wanted to maximize our precious one week. In May, when I realized I had dragged my feet a little too long for the promo ticket deals to the Philippines ($200 USD roundtrip rocketed to $800 USD in 2 weeks) we had to make new summer plans, RAPIDO. We decided to visit the honeymooners' island of the Korean peninsula, Jeju-do. 

"Everyone, stay close to your travel buddy."

In April, we were pretty pleased with ourselves after our first paychecks. Instead of indulging in a wild spending spree, we implemented a strict budget to maximize our SoKo (South Korea) savings... and then we went on a spending spree... and then we really started our budgetary lifestyles. After months of our travel fund inflating x dollars every month, we decided we had enough money to feel comfortable renting a car during our August vacation! This was all my lobbying, and it wasn't as easy as it should have been, but we rolled out of the Jeju International Airport in a sexy, silver Hyundai Sonata... looking juuuuust like every other car on every street in Korea. You would be correct to assume that Hyundai is a popular car of choice in SoKo. 

Watch out Koreans! Here I come.

Day 1 
We headed directly to Hallasan, the highest point in SoKo, an extinct volcano, the origin of the island. Some of you readers may remember a story we shared from our travels in Nicaragua, where too much perseverance and curiosity resulted in a bizarre camping night of winds, moon and spirits. I have since learned my lesson and this time I only wanted to peek inside the infamous Korean crater. Kent had endured for weeks me talking about how awesome the hike will be and then again how awesome the hike will be. 


All of my narrow-sighted energy forced us to start the hike ASAP. So when we came to the first picture perfect opportunity and I reached for the camera and found nothing, I was really frustrated that I had hustled too fast to camera-check at the car. And then, when I got that pesky thirsty feeling in my throat and I reached for a water bottle and found nothing, I was really, really frustrated that I had hustled too fast to water-check at the car. I had not read my maps carefully enough and we ended up on a path that only went to the base of the volcano's rim, not into the crater. NOOOOOOOO! My bummed out attitude was starting to rear its ugly head. Kent made us take pause after another couple kilometers of my grumblings and said, "I think it's beach time. We can hike another day." So wise, Kentisan.

A southern view of Korea's Honeymooner's Paradise

We switched gears and drove south to hit the white sandy beach of Jungmun.  Four hours later we roll up and were so happy to see free camping right at the boardwalk to the beach. We set up camp, changed into our suits and headed down to the water's edge. 


What's this? Something is off about this scene. What is it? Ahhhh. No one is in the water. We just assume it must be too cold for the other thin-skinned tourists but WE'RE FROM WISCONSIN where the winter's get so cold that it's shorts season when the thermometer hits 40*F. I'm in the mood for a nap but Kent tears into the water. Pretty quickly a lifeguard runs over, whistling, speaking Korean, making an X with his arms and then dangles his fingers down and makes a frowny face. Oh man. What's happening with this day?! We found out that there was a typhoon a-brewin in the south and thousands of man-o-war jellies had been washing up on the beaches. The lifeguard's finger-dangle signal must have been a jellyfish. Beach-ee closed. We hung out a little longer, then washed up and went out for some dinner. 

Baekkop: Korean for bellybutton

After dinner we christened the little fire/grill pit we bought and cooked Korean charcoal down to smoldering embers and made s'mores. Oh yes, delicious. 

Dinner: HeMul Jiggae (Seafood Soup)

Improvised s'more with chocolate coated digestives
instead of graham crackers

Day 2 
We woke up early and hopped in the car, on a mission for coffee, gatorade and beach time. We swung up and around the southern coast to the western coast, hitting every beach we could see on the map. We learned if it's a beach on the map that someone hasn't mentioned to you, it's not really worth visiting. Lucky for us, we had some wheels to take us anywhere, but for a budget traveller I suggest sticking to sites you've heard and read about. Eventually, we made our way to Geumneung and Hyeopjae Beaches. 

We were immediately pleased and knew we had found home for the night. We still had all day, so we swam and snorkeled and napped and beach walked and swam and snorkeled and... you get the picture. We set up camp and napped in the shade. We ate a meal somewhere in the beach haze too. It was a lot of sun and nap and read-a-book life. In my memory, that one full day at those beaches stretches on for weeks. It felt that lazy and awesome. 

We camped at the Geumneung beach-camp area (for free) and hung out mostly on that beach because it was significantly less crowded. At some point, before the sun set, we went grocery shopping and bought veggies galore. That night, by the light of head lamps and glowing embers, we feasted on marinated veggies and mushrooms, followed by some more s'mores. We slept a good sleep and woke up the next morning to a beautiful view. 

Good Morning!