After finishing a 12 hour flight, the last thing anyone wants to do is get on another plane. But in order to visit a slice of paradise, that's where we found ourselves: on a commuter flight bound to Jeju Island. Jeju Island is a volcanic island off the coast of Korea, and a popular vacation destination for Koreans and Japanese alike. Jeju Island used to be the honeymoon destination, much like Niagara Falls, but now enjoys all types of tourists - especially tired Californians. We were met by our tour guides at Incheon airport, but didn't really meet them until we got off the plane and on to charter buses at Jeju airport. From the airport, we travelled to the Manjanggoul volcanic Lava Tube - (which I misread to say "Love Tube" - Tired eyes from the flight, that's my excuse) a 1 km underground tunnel carved from the lava flow. It was quite cool in the tube, and slippery to boot. We walked the length, and then back again. As we ascended the stairs back to ground level, we were met with the hot, steamy and sticky humidity that is June in Korea. It honestly felt like a sauna. I was warned by my friend Jane that Korean weather is not friendly to curly-haired girls. She was right. I quickly donned a hat, and was good to go.
It was at this point in the trip that I started playing the "Have you seen Aidan?" game. The game lasted well into the tenth day, and boy did it get tiring. Most of the time, I was content knowing that Aidan was "somewhere:" I didn't need to know exactly where. As long as he was on the bus when it was time to leave, I was cool. Only a few times was I worried about his whereabouts; because, after all, it *is* Aidan. Unfortunately, other people didn't have as much fun playing the Where's Aidan? game, so I towards the end of the trip, I got a little stricter. (Ask Aidan if that's even possible....)
After the Lava aka Love Tube, we headed for our first meal as a group - Korean pork BBQ. I took pictures of almost all the meals we ate: the food and its presentation is beautiful over there. (Except, maybe, if you don't eat pork.) As the tour was split into 2 buses, we tended to group together at the eating tables by bus also. Later in the trip, we mixed things up a bit, but at first, most people stuck together with the groups they knew from their respective Tae Kwon Do studios. I will later go into Tae Kwon Do Eating Etiquette (not as fun as the Etiquette Bell.) Suffice it to say from this quasi-feminist child of the 70's, I didn't handle it with quite the grace of some of my fellow martial artists. What I will say now about the first meal together was that is was wonderful. We learned that the lettuce leaves were used for rolling up cooked pieces of meat, rice and condiments "like a fajita!" There is a name for this type of meal, maybe I'll look it up later. The condiments that are served with the main meal differ from restaurant to restaurant, but essentially compose of kimchi (of varying spiciness) and other root vegetables marinated - some in vinegar, others in chili sauce. Other than the grilled meat - which was delicious EVERYWHERE - the condiments were my favorite parts of our meals. Rice and seaweed soup were the other side dishes consistently served. Water was always served - often in chilled small metal cups. Coke and Kin Cider (like sprite) and Hite beer were usually available for purchase running anywhere from 2-4ooo Wan. (The dollar was about 1200 wan to 1 dollar)
The next stop was a traditional folk village on Jeju Island - and a working village at that, as people stilled lived in the houses. There was an elaborately painted temple (our first of many to come on the trip) as well as homes with unusual thatched roofs. The unusually thatching is due to the heavy constant winds that fall on Jeju. Jeju is known for a few things: it's delicious mineral water (of which we bought many bottles) and it's orange groves - mandarin oranges in particular. As it wasn't orange season, I didn't feel the need to try the local delicacy. But we did bring back some chocolate covered orange candy for Colin. The oranges were in all the gift shops and stands of them lined the entrances to the visitor/tourist traps. It was a quick tour of the folk village as it was pouring rain. Add in the factor that we were still in the clothes from 24 hours before when we left LAX... well, you get the picture.
We were in great shape (not!) to roll into our 5 star accommodations: The Shilla Hotel. Watch out Shilla, here come the loud, stinky Americans. Wow. What a place this was. A slice of paradise overlooking the sea. The rooms were amazing (bidet in every bathroom!!) if the beds were a bit on the hard side. Aidan explored the hotel while I had a quick power nap and then we all showered (phew!) and dressed and got ready to go to dinner. Freshly caught fried fish was on the menu for dinner, which I think might have gone over better with people had we not all been fighting jet-lag so hard. (Aidan joined in the "anti-fish" train and nearly got popped by me in the process- I did back off, sensing his jet-lag, but I let him know that trying all the food was a requisite in staying on the trip) I enjoyed the meal - and even tried the dried anchovies coated in chili paste and the deep fried________(something. Don't know what it was. Don't really want to know either) I drew the line at jellied pickled crab bodies. I'm sure they were good, but I just couldn't do it. After a mass departure from the restaurant to the local minimart outside, many of the tour filled up on ice-cream bars: especially the "Meloni" brand of melon Popsicle which would find their way into most people's hands after many meals. It was a definite hit of the trip. That night, during the DOWNPOUR outside, I learned that Aidan snores. Hooray.
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