Went on an awesome trip last weekend. Emily, Chanelle, a co-worker friend, and I went on an Adventure Korea trip to Geomundo/Baekdo. Adventure Korea is a company that offers a bunch of different day and weekend trips all around Korea. Since we had a three day weekend we decided to take a trip with them.
We went to Geomundo/Baekdo. This is basically a group of around 100 islands off the southern part of Korea. We left on Friday night at about midnight. We drove through the night on a charter bus. It was probably one of the worst bus rides ever. I sat in the worst possible seat...second to the back row. The smallest amount of leg room on the bus, and then my seat partner was taking up half my seat, I think I was right by a heater because I was sweating non stop, and my seat partner took her shoes off and had the WORST feet odor ever. I think I got maybe a total of 45 minutes of sleep.
We arrived at some little southern port city at about 6:30am. We had about an hour to wander around until we caught the 8am ferry to Geomundo, the island we were staying on. I've only been on one ferry in my life I'm pretty sure, at least I only remember one ferry ride. I think it was maybe a 20 minute ride down in Gulf Shores, Alabama to Dauphin island. So, I didn't really know what to expect from this ferry ride. Well as is turned out the waves were pretty big, and a bunch of people on our trip got sick. We were rocking around so much. We sat on the second floor. When you looked out the window it basically went from seeing only sky to seeing only waves, and back and forth and back and forth. If I hadn't been so completely exhausted I probably would have gotten somewhat sick too, but luckily I felt alright.
We got to the island and checked into our hotel. I'm pretty sure the proprietor of the hotel/motel we stayed at was a witch. We all agreed. A good which though. We wanted to get a picture with her before we left, but she shot us down because she thought her hair wasn't good enough or something. We got to our room and of course no beds, but rather mats on the floor, and no hot water till 5pm. We had lunch, went on a little hike to a British cemetery and the beach, took a nap, ate dinner, and went to bed. We were all pretty tired, and there wasn't much at all to do on the island.
The next morning Emily and Chanelle went to breakfast as I tried to squeeze a few extra minutes of sleep in. When they got back they said that three people from our group were missing. They hadn't returned after our little hike. We were catching a 10am ferry to go around to see all the other islands, so we were all discussing where these people could have gone. There was a pretty much full on search and rescue going on, with announcements being made over loud speakers, and our guides sorta freaking out. Well about 10 minutes before we set sail our guide says, "They found them, they are over there." He points across to the other island that is connected to the one we stayed on by a bridge. So the three people get dropped off by the ferry via police car. We all thought they just maybe decided to get a different hotel or something. Nope. They went hiking, got lost, and ended up sleeping in the woods. WHAT?! Yeah, that's what we were thinking too. It was a pretty cold and rainy night. I don't know what made them just give up. We were on a pretty small island. They sorta looked like people who might get lost out in the woods and spend the night though.
So we went on a nice sight-seeing ferry ride to see all the little islands, and then came back to have lunch, and go on about a 4 hour hike to a light house. It was a beautiful day. The hike was pretty awesome. Amazing views. I even got a little tan going on my nose and cheeks. We ended the hike back at the beach. The water was pretty cold, but we put our feet in anyways. It felt pretty nice after a decent hike.
We were supposed to leave the next morning on the 10am ferry. That night was rainy and super windy. I forgot to mention that along with the witch that ran the place, we were also pretty sure that the place was haunted. So that night when it was raining and windy the windows and doors were rattling a bunch. Apparently I was the only person who was waking up and hearing these things, but I finally had enough at about 4am. I thought the window in the bathroom was cracked open a bit which was make it rattle. After laying awake for about 15 minutes I finally got the courage up to go into the bathroom to shut it. I left the door to the bedroom open though, so Emily and Chanelle could hear me scream in case I got shut in the bathroom by some ghost and needed help getting out.
Anyways, when we signed up for the trip there was a little disclaimer at the end saying that in case of bad weather we might have to stay on the island an extra day blah, blah, blah. I didn't take it seriously at all. I thought it was just something they had to put on there for whatever. Well, we got up to catch the 10am ferry after hearing the wind howling all night. They said they waves were too big. We were supposed to come back at 11:30 to check again. 11:30 turned into 2pm, which then turned into 3:15. They then told us that the ferry was not going to go out that day because the wind and waves were too bad. None of us could believe that we were actually stuck on this island. There were about 50 people on this trip, and we all had to call the directors of our schools telling them that we wouldn't be able to make it into work the next day because we were stuck on an island. Really the worst part was the fact that the only thing they had to eat on the island was fish. I'm not a big fan of fish. I basically ate rice, potato chips, and cookies all weekend.
We finally made it out the next morning. After a decently calm 2 hour ferry ride, and another 6 hour bus ride we made it back to work for our night classes. Luckily our directors and supervisor are super nice. They weren't mad at all. They were more worried about our safety.
As usual, the weekend was an adventure for sure. It was a really great weekend though. We had a lot of laughs. It was really nice to get out of the city for awhile, but it was also pretty much just as nice to get back to the city, where you know where you can get things you need, like pizza, easily. The island really was pretty beautiful though. Definitely unlike any landscape I have ever seen. It's good to be back, but I'll be ready for our next adventure after I catch up with a little R&R this weekend. Here are some pics from the weekend...enjoy.
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