The south end of the beach at Hua Hin, Thailand.
Where are Kevin and Ruth now? Hua Hin, Thailand.

Where are Kevin and Ruth going next? Maldives on March 23rd.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

A long travel day

I think we traveled about 250 kms (155 miles) as the crow flies and it took us 12 hours to do it! But everything happened according to plan, including a great evening with our new friends for the next three days!

It was an early start to the day. We were up at 5:30am!

We had to take the bus from the south side of Jeju Island to the north side in order to catch the ferry back to the mainland. And we were taking a different ferry and it was scheduled to depart at 8:20am! And it was an hour bus ride just to get there.

On the bus at 6:19am. Sorry for the fuzzy picture, but I was feeling a little fuzzy at the time!

The bus from Seogwipo to Jeju City was 3,300 won ($3.80) each for the hour long trip. We had walked to the bus stop from our hotel, and were lucky that a bus was sitting just getting ready to leave. The drive was uneventful, except for the bit of a laugh we had at the guy who fell asleep on the bus and missed his stop. He was snoring like a locomotive most of the trip, and we figured he must be going right into the city. When we got there and got off the bus, he stumbled off and was talking to us in Korean, looking really sheepish and shaking his head. We could tell he had missed his stop. 

We got off the bus, and hopped right into taxi for the 4,000 won ($4.60) taxi ride from the Jeju City bus terminal to the ferry terminal. It took about ten minutes and we were there. Stood in line for 10 minutes and paid 26,250 won ($30.00) each for the two and a half hour trip.

And that was it, we were on the boat!

One for you Paul!

Looking back at Hallasan Mountain, the highest point in Korea.

Not many people on the ferry.

We sat down and had a game of cribbage.

Our room!

The second class (cheapest) tickets include access to your own shared room. Pretty basic, with no seating. Feel free to sleep on the floor though, as many Koreans do. You can see that they supply (rock hard) pillows.

Arrived in Wando. Neat place, we could easily have spent a couple of days here.

Looking at Wando from the back end of the ship.

Here's the ferry we arrived on.

We could have taken another 3,000 won taxi ride, but decided to walk to the bus station. There was a small tourist office in the ferry terminal, and the girl gave us a local map and directions. We stopped along the way and bought a bag of peanuts and a bag of dried fish. The stuff is a little chewy, but it's tasty and full of protein. A good snack and very popular here.

We had an hour and half wait for our bus, and we should have found a way to stash the bags and go for a walk. But we didn't, and just sat around the bus station. Made sure to use the facilities before our bus ride because there are no facilities on the buses in Korea!

Ruth took this neat reflection of our bus as we drove by.

We had to take one bus to Suncheon, and then transfer to another bus from Suncheon to Yeosu. Dirty windows again, so sorry...no pictures from the bus.

Tom and Elicia met us at the bus terminal.

Tom operates a blog that talks about hiking in Korea, and we had contacted him about one of the hikes he had done. Next thing you know they're offering us a place to stay! They're originally from Wisconsin area, and are here in Korea teaching English.

What a great young couple. They remind us of us, only 25 years younger!

They took us for a drive, and we went for dinner, and did a little sight seeing.

Elicia, Tom, and Ruth

Dinner!

Yeosu has some very cool bridges!

Wow..cool lighting on this bridge.

What a great welcome...thanks guys!

Today's travels...follow the red line!

12 comments:

  1. Sounds like an interesting day and nice couple that you met up with, enjoy your time there.

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    1. It was a long day but the scenery was beautiful so the trip went by fast. Tom and Elicia are super people and we seem to have lots in common, there is no lack of topics to talk about.

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  2. Interesting! That was a bit of an arduous travel day.
    Curious to know what brought you to visit this particular part of the country! I guess that's coming up in a blog post, lol :-)

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    1. It was a long day but it wasn't hard work. The gorgeous scenery made the trip go by fast.

      We had no particular reason for visiting here except that I saw some beautiful pictures on the South Korean Tourism facebook site and saw that it was an off the beaten track kind of place, which is right up our alley. We are not going to be disappointed with our choice either.

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  3. Fun meeting new friends. I have never heard of Yeosu. Looking forward to what we see next. Very interesting to follow along!

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    1. Yeosu is a small city in the southern part of South Korea. I looked like a pretty place that was off the beaten path. In just the short time that we have been here we already like it.

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  4. Sounds like a very busy day. I'd have had to write it all down to know when and where to get the bus taxi ferry bus.......you guys just sail right through it all.

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    1. Other than knowing that we had to catch the ferrry in Jeju City for 8:20am and that we knew which bus take to get from Seogwipo to Jeju City, we just winged the rest of it! We knew we needed a bus from Wando to Suncheon and then another one from Suncheon to Yeosu but had no idea what time they left at until we got to the bus stations and then we also had to find the bus station in Wando from the ferry. Luckily it all went well.

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  5. What a fantastic time you guys are having, and THANK YOU for sharing! Love that you've connected with Elicia and Tom...just goes to show how incredible and widespread the 'net' is and how easy it is to find friends far and wide!

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    1. We are so happy that we have connected with them as well. They are full of information and seemed so totally happy that someone actually wanted to come to Yeosu just to see it (this is not a place that is high on the tourist scene in Korea). They love Korea and are so happy to share their experiences with us. Yep, the internet is an amazing thing!

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  6. Thanks for that great picture, I feel so honored! :c)

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    1. So glad that you enjoyed it Paul. As soon as we saw it Kevin said he had to get a picture of it for you.

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