So I posted the pictures - now to try to tell the stories that go along.
We rented a car for this adventure and John drove. He is such a brave soul - the drivers here scare the bejeezus out of me. But he did great. We even figured out how to use the GPS - not without a few blips but that is to be expected by now.
So we set off on Sunday morning. Loaded up the SUV we rented and headed out of Seoul. With all my parents luggage (we dropped them off with Joe at the end of the trip to stay the night with him and then get to the airport from there) it was kind of crowded in the car. But we managed to cram in and got out of the city pretty quickly.
The countryside was so beautiful - really amazing mountains green with trees. We made a goofy mistake at a toll booth when John went in the wrong lane and it was the FastPass lane so there was nowhere to pick up a ticket which proved to be a problem when we tried to get off the highway to pee and find some lunch. We had to go to the official building and communicate about our mistake and then they just had us pay the toll and go on. These kind of things seem almost normal to me now.
Because it was Sunday, no restaurants were open in the little town we stopped in so we ended up in a bakery with pre-made sandwiches and gross snacks. But we felt fed so on we went. We had the address of the hotel we wanted to stay in. I had seen a blog post about a trip to this area and the blogger had raved about this place so I e-mailed her and she sent me the information about it. John tried to call to make a reservation as she had suggested but didn't get anywhere over the phone so we decided to take a chance and show up there. We figured it was a Sunday night after a big holiday so we thought it would be easy to find a room. We put the address into the GPS and off we went.
We followed the GPS until we missed a turn - turned around and then it showed up that we were at our destination when we were in the middle of a tunnel. HHHMMMM didn't seem right. We decided to get off the highway and fish around. It was pretty hopeless but I was so determined that we got out and tried to ask a local where it was. It worked!!! He got us on the right road and there were signs from there up to the hotel. It was beautiful (I posted some photos in the earlier post).
Not that it was without trouble - we got registered and went to find our room. Netta and I jumped out of the car and went to check out the room. It was really nice 2 rooms and a bathroom shower and simple kitcheny area (really only a sink and fridge). I suddenly realized that it was completely empty - no beds or furniture. I looked in the closets and found some yos. Yos are thin mattresses that Koreans sleep on on the floor. I was worried about my parents having to sleep on the floor but they were game. It ended up being fine and with the heated floors it was kind of cozy. It was quite cold in the mountains.
Then we all went to the restaurant to get some food. It was very Korean food and Netta refused to eat any of it. Also my dad felt he couldn't eat there. There was a convenience store next door so they went to try to find food there. Not much luck. My dad ate funions and digestive biscuits for dinner. Netta was more involved. I had a box of mac n cheese but nowhere to cook it. She insisted and I found a microwave in the store. I used boiling water and put it in a bowl stuck it in the microwave then I added the cheese? sauce to the water with the noodles and ta da. The lady in the store I'm pretty sure thought we were crazy but she let me do it. Thank goodness. Netta ate the mac n cheese and we were finally all fed.
Then we pretty much turned in for the night.
The next day we awoke to rain - yuck - our "out in nature" vacation seemed a little hard to do with the rain. But Netta insisted we try to do the rail bikes that we had also read about on the same blog. So off we set. It was a crazy drive there - lots of curvy roads. We made it there and the weather was dreary but not raining. We ate some pasta and then waited for the rail cars.
People ride them down and then they ride back on the train pulling the rail cars behind the train. It is an old railroad that is no longer in use and they have set it up with these bikes. It is a nice steady downhill - a very fun trip through beautiful farms and canyons. There were some weird fake animals along the way. But all in all it was a great time. As usual I am glad that Netta convinced us to try and go. During the ride some guys snap a photo of you and then try to sell it to you at the end of the ride. Dad and Netta's was really funny but he didn't want to pay for it so he tried to take a picture of it - oh my the salesman was not pleased.
After the ride we decided to drive back via a short trip to see the ocean. Netta has really been missing the ocean and we were so close that we figured we would try to dig our toes in the Korean sand. John endured a lot more driving on curvy roads and we made it to the ocean after dark. We didn't mind except that there was a huge fence there topped with barbed wire. We figured out that because it was so close to North Korea there was a fence preventing you from going on the beach - or preventing North Koreans from coming over the ocean after dark. It was pretty sad but the girls found a patch of sand and dug their toes in anyway. They even found some shells and some folks were setting off fireworks which was fun to watch.
Then we drove home and collapsed exhausted.
The next day we had to head back to Seoul but decided to take a short hike before we went. As it turned out the place we stayed had an easy accessible trail up to the top of a mountain so up we went. It was great for my mom and Olive to be able to hike with us.
That's about it for that trip.
Since then we have attended the Bucheun World Intangible Heritage Exhibition and the DMZ but Olive is up from her nap and there is a huge mess of dishes that also need my attention. So those stories must wait for another day.
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