Day 14. Departing Jeju. 17 April 2024

Awake early after another blogging issue, still not sorted overnight. But think I finally got it back and running and updated mid arvo. Phew.

A brief visit to the Botanical Gardens at 9am with gardens representing countries – Italian, French, Japanese, Korean and native Korean. Also a monster of a hothouse with observation tower. Worth a look.

Then to Hyeonjae Beach. A white sand beach which wasn’t putting on its best show in the overcast misty morning light. The sand had shade cloth pegged over it, with a strip near the water that was actually sand.

From there we were back to the Jeju airport for a flight back to Busan. The morning was really cloudy/foggy with poor visibility.

As we flew over Jeju we got some fair view of the highest peak – Mt Hallisan and could clearly see the volcanic craters of some of the smaller mountains. The island had far more built up areas than we expected and it was great to each have a window seat – thanks to the work of Susie M to organise this.

As we neared Busan there were lots of islands and we could see lots of aquaculture too – some we have been told is seaweed, others fish farms.

Flying into Busan also enabled us to capture the extent of high rise apartment blocks/complexes that have been blowing our minds. The density of population calls for putting as many people on a piece of land as possible. Also clearly visible from the air was the vast area of flat land covered by hothouses and farming. I guess you need lots to feed the millions.

From Busan we picked up our van and headed for Gyeonju. (Both Jeju and Gyeonju are vying to host the 2025 APEC Sunmit) The trip was pretty uneventful, Alex was explaining a bit about a lot of things. Some I could keep up with other bits not so much. It’s a complicated history of dynasties and wars etc. then the story of Korean men seeking wives from overseas.

Arrived at Gyeonju, grabbed a sandwich for lunch and headed for hotel which is once again in a complex/area of large resort hotels clustered around Lake Bohunbo. On the way we spotted a nice line of cherry blossoms along a walking track. Susie and I went to take some pics. Can only imagine how stunning this is at its finest.

Arrival at hotel about 5:00. Couldn’t get a drink till 7:00.

We had a mineral water and installed Suzie’s newly purchased eSIM. It was a little challenging but we got there. Suzie has been complaining of very slow Internet speed for the last few days on Jeju Island. Turns out she’s burnt all her data and was actually 5 GB over her 10 GB Sim card so it seems they would’ve shaped her speed but didn’t cut her off. A new eSIM plan purchased online before departing Jeju was successful launched and she seems to be good to go.

Coincidentally, I had used my 5GB plan which I updated this am and I somehow resuscitated the blog app and we seem to be good to go.

Dinner at the hotel after a small G&T. I had a very tasty and hot Thai yellow Chicken curry and shared a dumpling. Then to our rooms to phaff about.