We got back from Jeju-do this morning after 5 nights there for our summer holidays. The Koreans love Jeju, everybody is always asking us, "Have you been to Jeju yet?" and claiming that it is like a different country to Korea. Even the guidebooks state that Jeju is like the Korean Hawaii and all the young just-married couples head there for a few days of post-wedding romance.
Maybe I am horribly cynical, or maybe I have just been far too spoilt having grown up only an hour away from the beautiful Dorset coast and having spent many holidays walking along the dramatic Cornish coastline or relaxing on the untouched and unspoilt Isles of Scilly. Whatever the reason I have to report that Jeju was slightly disappointing. It's not that it wasn't pretty- it was quite nice. It was just so overdone and over spoilt. Every picturesque view or area of natural beauty was bombarded with cafes, tacky gift shops, terrible 'relaxing' music or crowds and crowds of people. I guess I just thought it was fine but pretty uninspiring. Anyway, the weather could be to blame as it rained a lot of the time which was pretty unfortunate as it made visibility for climbing Mt Hallasan impossible. We did find other things to do though and we had a good day looking around Yeomiji botanical gardens and some of the waterfalls. We also managed some go-carting which was great fun and we did a fair amount of walking too. We stumbled across a secluded Buddhist temple that was nested above a gorgeous pond full of lily pads and dragonflies which was so peaceful. We also found our way to a superb Nepalese restaurant, Baghdad Cafe, that served fantastic curry and had a wonderful atmosphere too so that was a huge bonus.
Unfortunately we returned home to find Lee's bike missing a saddle and my bike missing altogether. The lock had been completely ripped apart and somebody had just taken it. I'm pretty irate at the moment considering it had already been vandalised once and I'm constantly being told by Korean people that this country has such a low crime rate...hmmm...
I admit that I am becoming more and more cynical about Korea though I probably need to see a bit more of the place than I have so far. We have a long weekend in August so we will head to Seoul then. I am enjoying it here though I definitely haven't fallen in love with it like I have done with other countries in Asia or Europe for that matter. There are places in South East Asia that I am desperate to return to and I don't think I will feel that way about Korea when I leave it. Sometimes it can feel like a pretty bland and soulless place that promotes egoism and narcissism and lacks culture and beauty- today I do feel that way about it. I am managing to keep a healthy sense of humour about it all though and the money is piling up for the trip we are embarking on afterwards which is the most important thing and one of the main reasons for this mini-adventure. Have I mentioned this yet? Well, we are hoping to fly from South Korea down to either Indonesia or Malaysia (we want to spend some time in Borneo) and then make our way from Singapore up through Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam to Hong Kong. We will then spend some time in China heading up to Beijing and then take the train down to Lhasa in Tibet via the silk route trail. After spending some time in Tibet we hope to make our way over to Nepal where we will embark on some trekking at the base of Everest. It's all pretty exciting and I love planning things like this. It's a wonderful feeling sitting down together and having a whole load of ideas about what you want to do and where you want to see and piecing it all together into some sort of itinerary with no limits at all. And I think it's important for us to have a focus as it can be pretty taxing here at times and we do miss people from home a lot too.
Anyway, enough of my ramblings- enjoy some shots from our holidays.
No comments:
Post a Comment