Jeju Island
Last weekend the other IAESTEs and I went to an island off the south coast of the Korean peninsula, Jeju-do. It’s a very popular honeymoon destination for Koreans and it’s becoming more popular with foreign tourists too. It’s pretty much the Korean version of Hawaii.
We decided that rather that just fly there and back, we would try to get the ship from the mainland to the island. So, we got the train bright and early and travelled to Mokpo, a smallish city in the south-west corner of Korea. From there we got the 6 hour ferry to Jeju. We travelled third class, which meant we all got put in a big room where we had to sit on the floor. A few months ago, before I came here, the idea of sitting on the floor would have been out of the question. It’s just not something we do here. But since I’ve been here, I’ve grown quite fond of the idea. Many restaurants require you to sit on the floor and most of the motels and hostels I’ve stayed in only give you a thin mattress to roll out on the ground to sleep on.
Mokpo
The ferry journey itself was fantastic. We departed Mokpo and sailed through probably hundreds of little islands. The views were amazing and we saw a beautiful sunset. We arrived in Jeju-si and met Yunseok, our IAESTE leader person, and Korean speaker. We bussed across the island to our first guesthouse and settled in for the night.
The next day we went to hire some scooters, but as none of us had an international driving licence (bizarrely, only one person in the group needed one), we couldn’t rent them. Instead, we hired a taxi for the day to take us around for the bargain price of W100,00o.
First stop was the Cheongiyeon waterfall.
Cheongiyeon Waterfall
We followed the stream to the ocean, to another waterfall. Apparently it’s one of the only waterfalls in Asia that falls into the sea… It was much more dramatic and impressive than the previous one.
Waterfall into the ocean.
Next stop, traditional Korean folk village. Not particularly exciting… Jeju is famous for its “stone grandfathers”, made of the volcanic stone (Jeju is a volcanic island), and they are said to guard the island.
Stone Grandfathers
The next day we climbed a smallish mountain called sunrise peak near Seogwipo. Edu and I set off early so we could get up there and relax, but it didn’t take nearly as long as we were expecting. We waited for the sun to rise, and when it did it was completely foggy, so we didn’t actually get to see anything.
Sunrise Peak
After a quick breakfast we headed to catch the ferry to take us to Udo. This island is like a mini Jeju, less touristy, relatively unknown and much less spoiled by mass tourism. The ferry journey only took 15 minutes and at the port we tried our luck to see if we could hire scooters. To our surprise, they let us. The only person they didn’t allow was Yunseok, as he was Korean and didn’t have a driving licence. Again, a little odd, but this is Korea. I’ve come to expect such quirks. So, off we set, scootering around the island. It took a little bit of time to get used to riding the scooters. We took the costal road around the island and it was a little disconcerting to have the sea to one side of you. Needless to say, I went slowly…
Badabadabadabada!
We saw the 8 scenic wonders of Udo in just over 2 hours, including some of the women divers (haenyo) that Jeju is famous for. These women go diving for seaweed and food, and then prepare and serve it on the beaches or on the rocks in almost make-shift restaurants. Fascinating to watch, and quite interesting for Korea…
We spent the rest of the day checking out some lava tubes. As I mentioned before, Jeju is a volcanic island, formed following the eruption of Mt. Halla, which is right in the middle of the island. As such, most of the rock is of the volcanic type (with the methane bubble appearance), and has extremely fertile land (which means they can grow, and are famous for growing, things like tangerines). The lava tube itself was about 1km long and at the end of it was a huge lava tower thing.
Lava tube. The hand pose is (apparently) from a famous Korean drama.
On the last day we climbed up the highest mountain in South Korea, Mt. Halla. Luckily for us, it wasn’t too warm and it didn’t rain all day. When we did climb to the summit (it took about 4 hours) it was foggy again! So we didn’t see much, except for the few seconds where the wind swept away the mist to reveal the crater lake at the top. At the point everyone on top of the mountain rushed over to get a glimpse, and then it was gone again.
Crater Lake, Mt. Halla
Top of Mt. Halla
And that was it! We spent our last night in Jeju-si and spent Monday morning lying around because everyone was too aching to do anything much, before getting our flight back to Daejeon. The flight was awful, probably the worst flight I’ve been on, because of the turbulence. Korean Air are marvellous though, and surprisingly they have a jumbo jet to fly the 45 minutes from Jeju to Daejeon, a relatively small airport.
Overall, Jeju was a fun weekend. I was treating it as my vacation for the year, as I didn’t plan this placement very well as I’m head back to Uni straight away when I get back from here. It wasn’t what I expected though… The tourism information for Jeju makes it seem as though it’s a rural, quiet, paradise island where honeymooners can go and relax for a few weeks. The reality is that it’s a very built up, large, touristy island with loads of hotels, over-priced restaurants and tacky amusements (Love Land, the Teddy Bear Museum etc.). The beaches around Jeju are stunning though. It’s really difficult to get around Jeju if you don’t hire a car. The busses are okay, but they’re all in Korean, and despite the quite high numbers of foreign tourists, still aren’t in English. Luckily for us we had a Korean with us, but without him I’m not sure what we’d have done.
Having said that, we still had a great time. The highlight? Udo. Scootering around is such great fun, and really is the best way to see places like this. Udo is beautiful, and probably the closest to what Jeju was like. No cars, not many tourists and rugged, natural scenery.
