Korea for the 4th time - May and June 2022 - Page 8

I got off the subway at the main junction station of Seomyeon and headed up the hill in the direction of that small mountain and its beckoning antenna's.

It is steep before even getting to a hiking trail, but there is still a sporting field to enjoy on the side of the mountain.

The map I use said this was the way, through the temple, the sign translated said 'NO WAY, not a hiking trail'. Time to find a different way then.

Presumably due to the unfriendly attitude of the local temple this old persons outdoor gym has no old people. There was no one around anywhere.

I found a nice staircase trail to follow. Today's entire hike was.. manicured. Huge trees here...

It did not take long to get to the top, here is one of a few viewing platforms. You can get close to a 360 degree view from this peak. Down those stairs is a cafe, but it is not open at this early hour.

A bit of view.

Here is the old and the new. In the foreground are 5 smoke stacks, used to send signals to the city. They do not look that old to me, maybe they still relied on smoke signals until sometime last Thursday? Behind it, the new tower that replaced the smoke signals.

More view, more viewing deck.

I spotted the next peak over and decided to head towards it. The path between them was almost wheelchair accessible, you could also follow the road if you want.

However, the next peak over, you cannot go to the peak. Here is an old military bunker, I assume on the top there is new military gear as there was razor wire everywhere.

I found a nice path that circled around the military stuff. This looks like a plantation of some kind.

Then I got back to the road again, and found another cafe, this one only opens at noon. I really think most people looking for a coffee on a mountain would be looking before noon, but I am sure the cafe knows best.

The path down involved piles of rocks. I think they were cemented into place.

Not a lot of chance for a view on the way down, but when I saw the bridge I knew where to go next.

On the way I passed the local juvenile detention centre.

Then descended through a few more enormous trees.

As I descended down to the beach I passed the local Melbourne themed cafe. Coffee here is about $10 a cup.

Behold the beach. Recently the site of the qualifying for the Asian SUP championships. I though 'SUPping' was just for people who want to float on a thing and not move all day. So I wonder if the championships is a race or a stay still as long as you can contest.

It was pretty cold here on the beach today.

Korean school kids on excursions generally wear safety vests like this.

One end of the beach has this nice sunflower garden. Yes they are all real.

I wandered all the way around the bay thinking it would be the best spot to photograph the bridge. It was not. So instead I photographed the shore from afar.

And then, finally walked back to where I was earlier to get one last photo of the giant bridge. Off the left of screen it curves around about 60 degrees without hitting the shore and continues across another bay. Over to the right it joins another bridge across another bay and goes to the island I was on yesterday. So wherever you are in Busan enjoying a sea view, you see a bridge.

Hotel cat, in all his glory! AT LAST!

Now for some market shots, here is an alleyway full of neon lights.

And a food alley, looks good in the fading light.

Next up, Chinatown, quite a large one too.

This is one of those optical illusion things where if you take a photo in the right spot it looks very 3d. I photographed the photographer.

Korea has no concerns about educating Koreans about Chinese war heroes. I doubt there is a similar mural of Tojo.

LITERALLY across the street from Chinatown is Texas Street. Everything in Texas Street was closed.

I have no idea. Wait yes I do, they are all buoys.

The local sewer street. It smelled like a sewer.

Tonight's shot staring into the sun. Most of the cloud was gone now.

I had traditional Korean poor person food from the local market, gimbap and tofu stew. Very good.

Now for the Lotte Department Store roof. The roof garden is very large.

The deck above the garden is also enormous and I had it all to myself. I hung a moon.

More roof garden before we get into the view. That enclosed grass area is a dog park. There is a doggy day care / dog grooming salon alongside it.

Here is the view back towards my hotel and the fish markets.

That is the island I went to yesterday.

And finally, the view in the other direction back to where I was earlier today. I think I climbed all the mountains in the above 3 photos.
Tomorrow I go to Yeosu. I have not been there before. It is a small place, 5 hours away on the slow train.

Bujeon station. It was 3 hours until I would next take my mask off for food or water, so it was Dunkin Donuts or nothing. The coffee was decent.

My train, the same Mugunghwa class as last time.

Not a lot of people got on here, but it stopped at 25 or so stations, people came and went.

The view was mountains, farms, tunnels. The farms still have high rise apartment buildings in Korea.

I crossed the road and took a photo of a street in Suncheon. Not a lot to see, lots of cafes.

Suncheon station, astronauts on the left.

The inside is much like any other Korean station. It is a high speed station too.

A freight train went past while I was waiting.

Now my hotel room in Yeosu. It is unusual. Carpet is stained. Room is huge, bed is huge, a full computer and monitor no one would ever use is provided. TV has 999 channels of internet streamed stolen content.

Bathroom has a 10 foot long spa bath, not all pictured.

My room does however have a view. Now to work out where I am in relation to things. No subway here, so more exciting bus rides ahead.

To get from my hotel to the main part of town I could get back on a bus, hike over a mountain, or find a way around the edge of the mountain along the water. I was not 100% sure it was possible to go around the water, but it was, very interesting walk.

This is the 'road'. In times gone by I suspect this was all a floating village.

View of where I was headed to. There is more to the town off to the right of screen around another small mountain.

This is the road, they painted the pedestrian recommended access in red. It is suitable for bicycles also, murals of people riding bikes are painted on all the walls.

A turtle boat! They are really called that. I was learning that Yeosu is where the Naval headquarters were located in the 1400's to defend Korea from of course, the Japanese.

Here is a famous naval commander.

I think behind where I am standing preserved inside a big shed is the original wooden naval headquarters, or whats left of it. I may investigate on another day.

Part of the very quiet main shopping street. All the fish markets were teaming with people.

Yes.

I love an overpass. One of the many markets on the right. There are a few canals running through the city with markets backing onto them. I assume they used to throw all the fish guts into those canals, but it is not the case anymore, everything here is very clean.

And here is my terrible dinner. It was one of only a few places open that were not doing clams or octopus. I wanted a rice bowl thing, not available, ok then how about the pasta, also no, hmm, what do you have still available? It was THE WORLDS LARGEST EVER SCHNITZEL or pizza. Should have gone pizza, although pizza had clams and french fries (chips) on it.
So, this schnitzel is seriously bigger than any I have seen before, and then it comes with rice, chips and garlic bread. Of course I did not eat it all, but even still I have drunk about 2 litres of water since eating what I could. Should probably go hiking tomorrow then...

My hike started about 2km west of my hotel, further away from the city, near a Starbucks. Useful info in case anyone wants to find the trails I used.

The first ascent up Gubongsan goes past graveyards. The islands in the bay have a few golf courses on them. I suspect quite a few of them are resort islands, people like me are not permitted to go there.

The early path up Gubongsan was good, and 5 out of 6 paths all day were good, more on that a bit later.

Here is the view towards the older, touristy part of Yeosu with all the fishing related tourism.

A view back down to the starting point of the various golf course islands. I will say view lots of times today.

Nearer the top of Gubongsan the path became boulders. I appreciated a bit of a change.

Those are all parts of Yeosu on the far side of this small mountain range, further away from the ocean. I will be visiting none of these places.

Almost at the summit. I like this photo for some reason. Will I be able to get to the actual summit today?

Yes, Standing on the summit marker I celebrated with a selfie.

View from the summit was good. Tomorrow I will go walk over those bridges and visit one of those islands, the main touristy things to do.

My next 2 peaks are in shot here, in the middle of the screen. The closer one is a bit shorter than this one, the one behind it right smack bang in the middle of the shot is exactly the same height as this one, to the metre.

Gubongsan had a nice spot to sit and enjoy the view. Descending from Gubongsan was the main route most people were taking up to the summit. It was by far the busiest part, I only saw 10 other people, but most of the day I saw no one else at all.

Back down from Gubongsan, it is time to go up Janggunsan. You have to cross a road.

The path up was pretty good, no other people, through a plantation.

Halfway up, here is a view of the parts of Yeosu I will not be visiting. The presumably non fishy parts.

Looking back on Gubongsan. I like typing these mountain names over and over.

The path down from Janggunsan started like this. I came to a fork, the left fork continued to Maraesan, the right fork went down to the city. I went left... It then became very steep, hard to follow, and filled with spider webs. I had regrets for the 30 or so minutes it took to get back down, but I was determined to go to the third peak! I am assuming the right fork down to the city is much more developed.

Eventually I came down from Janggunsan (pictured on right), brushed all the cobwebs off, crossed over the little houses in the valley by going up staircases that are apparently roads, and was ready to go up the last peak of the day, Maraesan.

The path up was ok at first, eventually it joins a different path up from the city again, and is much more developed, I would go back down that path.

On the way up for the third time today.

The two earlier peaks are on the right of screen. You can see the communications towers on each.

And now the view from the top of Maraesan. The wooden sloped decking in most of the pics is for paragliders to run down and launch from. Sadly no one was doing that. A couple of other people arrived on the summit while I was messing about.

Here is a view down a different valley of some farms you can paraglide over, then land on that highway.

And here is a view back to the main part of Yeosu. You can see the train station on the left, where I would descend to, and the world expo site just to the right of it.

ABSOLUTE thirst trap.

People love these shots with something in the way of the view.

The descent down to the city was largely stairs, and came out at another graveyard. I had passed a few today.

I couldn't have the graveyard be the last photo of the day, so here is where you really come out and join a road through some apartments, just off to the left of the screen.

Vegetable market, ingredients for my dinner came from here.

Not much of a photo, but when I came past on the bus earlier there was a line 100 metres down the street. Now there is a shorter line, but still a line of girls waiting to buy chocolate coated strawberries. They are about $5 each! This is why young Korean's cannot afford a deposit to buy a house.

1004 stairs. Nice.

OK, the sun and cloud were doing great things this evening, so expect a few into the sun shots.

First appearance of the cable car, which I guess is now the most photographed thing in Yeosu.

I walked further around the coast than last night, a few places like this started to appear. Holiday apartments at the top.

Thats a hard no from me.

I have heard this Paul Frank guy is famous. I wonder if this is official or just someone banking on Paul never finding out.

I started to hit the hundreds of places with the identical menu. Every place had an as seen on tv, and photos of celebrities that had been there.

There were a few groups of cars owned by Korean Princelings, I guess the horrible orange wrap on the Mclaren is why I chose this group for the photo.

The sky was being really weird!

More cable car, more of that tomorrow, although rest assured I will not pay to go on it.

What is going to emerge from that cloud?

Under the bridge, with the presumably government approved Korean conformist in every way menu places.

Last sky shot, bridge and cable car.

How about that for a healthy dinner? I paid about $15 for it which is a lot in Korea, but totally worth it. I did not order the drink, but the clearly gay owner / chef brought it out for me and said 'with my compliments'. Cool. Must be my fantastic hair.

And then on my way back, Chinese style mass dancing, on a small scale. Although here you get to pick your own music, China has 12 approved songs for mass dancing, with Little Apple being the most recent addition in 2014.