Life at Colgate has mostly returned to normal, except I'm a senior and this is my last Spring semester at Colgate everrrrr. Even the library project seems to be getting along somewhat.

In related news, I now have two grad school offers. Aside from being totally awesome, it is a huge luxury problem. It's starting to dawn on me that, within the next two months, I'll have pick a place to study (and spend at least four years of my life). Eek!

Anyway, it's about time I get my Jeju 'diary' on here. It's a little dry, which is probably because I wrote it at night most days (when I was exhausted and very jetlagged). If that bothers you, just enjoy the pictures.

Day 0: Getting to Jeju-do

Today's trip was pretty exhausting. In fairness, it was really two days -- I just didn't sleep much during the flight to Seoul. All in all, I was traveling for 21 hours by the time I got here, where 'here' means Seogwipo on the south side of the island. My trip was broken up as follows:

• Heerjansdam, The Netherlands (my home town) to Amsterdam Schiphol Airport. My parents drove me, and my brother met us at the airport to 'help' see me off. Everything went relatively smoothly so far.
• Amsterdam Schiphol Airport to Incheon International Airport. A ten hour flight from 5pm to 3am CET. I really should have attempted to sleep more, but for some reason it just didn't work. The food was actually decent, which definitely helped. Still, ten hours is a long time to sit still (especially when you're conditioned for the seven-hour trip from the US to The Netherlands). Ouch.
• Incheon Airport to Gimpo Airport (both near Seoul, South Korea). Gimpo is Seoul's 'old' international airport. These days it handles a lot of the domestic flights, including my flight to Jeju-do. I must have looked somewhat lost at Incheon, because after a few minutes of roaming the airport, I was approached by a taxi driver. In spite of my jetlag-induced slow wittedness, I realized that this was going to be expensive. Unfortunately, time was running out for my connection at Gimpo (clearing immigration and customs had taken a while) so I went along. The guy first took me to the SK Telecom booth, where he helped me acquire a cell phone (for a stunning $2 per day). Then we went over to the cab and sped towards Gimpo, where I paid him a good $70 for the ride and the help.
• Gimpo to Jeju Airport. At Gimpo, I ended up at the gate about 20 minutes before boarding. Unfortunately, the plane was late, so we all got to hang out at the gate a for another 35 minutes. The flight to Jeju was fairly uneventful, except for some turbulence.

• Jeju Airport to The Hotel. At Jeju Airport, I made an effort to look less confused than at Incheon earlier. I went to the tourism office, where I received another map of the island and a viewbook. They informed me that my hotel, Seogwipo Resort, had recently changed its name. They also pointed me to the bus service across the island. A quick phone call to the hotel revealed that I would, in fact, have to get there on my own -- there was no direct shuttle to the hotel.

  I debated getting another taxi for a minute or so, but the bus was literally right outside of the door. Luckily, the intercom messages on the bus still referred to my hotel as 'Seogwipo Resortu,' as I hadn't quite caught the new name. At my stop, it turned out my bus ticket was for a stop further, but I was able to convince the driver that I needed to get off anyway. Once outside, I found a taxi in about ten seconds, a personal record. After some explaining and some map-pointing I was quickly dropped off at the Traveler's Hotel Jeju, formerly the Seogwipo Resort Hotel. When I checked in, I was handed a large package from the US -- the keyboard I'm using to write this!

  At this point it was around 5:30pm Korean time. I checked out the room and the balcony view, and turned down the heat from 28 C to 24 C (Koreans like their rooms nice and crispy).

The Room (and, more importantly, the shower and the bed)

The room featured Korean-style floor heating in addition to a vent from the central heating/AC department. The TV had Korean channels exclusively, and a couple of them had 'Happy Together'-style shows on them when I first checked. I ventured out onto the balcony to take some pictures (my room faces west and has an awesome view of the water in the distance towards the southwest). Then I decided to open up my box and put my new keyboard to good use. Both the box and the packaging were quite sturdy, so it took me a while to pry them open with... a tea spoon. After that ordeal it worked instantly...

At this point, I took a quick shower and passed out on the bed. I woke up around 8:30pm. I was still quite tired, but also somewhat hungry. I ate at the hotel restaurant, which closed around the time I finished eating. After some green tea, I went back to the room. I called Kaleena and The Parents, and then went straight back to sleep a little after 1am.

Day 1: Walking Around

After yesterday's round of traveling, I didn't have much trouble falling asleep. The next morning, I spent some time organizing my trip and my room, and I ate lunch at the hotel. Around 2pm I felt 'adjusted enough' to go for a walk, much to the surprise of the security guard. After a good ten minutes, I was intercepted by a taxi driver who basically kept talking to me until I agreed to come along. I decided it would be nice to have a ride to the International Convention Center (replace v with b' to get that across in Korean), and that's were I was about ten minutes and a few thousand Won later.

My original plan was to go in and see if the people at the ICC could help me acquire a bicycle. The weather was somewhat uninviting for a bike ride, though, with increasingly harsh winds and the occasional snow. I decided it would be more helpful to ask about bike rentals after the weekend, when the weather was supposedly going to be better.

I spent most of the afternoon in Jungmun [??], the giant resort right next to the actual town of Seogwipo. I actually got some nice pictures of the coastline and of various other things, including some waterfalls and the local tangerine stores. I had dinner at a Korean restaurant -- bibimbap [???] and kalbitang [???]. The guy who let me in also provided instruction on how to eat various items, which was both helpful and amusing. I now officially grok Gimchi [??] as well -- drenched in soup anyway. I'm going to stop translating stuff now...

After dinner, I spent another hour or so walking around Jungmun. The complex, which hadn't been very busy during the day, was mostly deserted by then. It proved hard to find a taxi/bus as well, so eventually I just went to the nearest giant hotel (the Lotte, a major Korean brand) and grabbed one from their parking lot. Back at the hotel, I took a quick shower and called it a day after some more Korean TV shows.

Day 2: The jetlag that caught up.

My second day in Korea did not go as well as I had hoped. My original intent was to walk around for a bit (like the day before, but not as long...) and then return to the hotel to work on some of my remaining graduate school applications. Unfortunately my system finally caught on to the fact that I'm not just 8 hours ahead of European time; I'm also 14 ahead of US Eastern time. As a result, I didn't manage to fall asleep until late in the morning. By the time I woke up again, there was about 30 minutes of daylight left.

All in all, I made a good day out of reading the island viewbook, submitting one of my grad school applications, and the occasional chat in the hotel. I watched some TV before going to bed, and I noticed that Korea is very much gearing up for this year's World Cup in Germany. There were two channels that were showing constant reruns of the '02 World Cup, in which Korea won 4th place. There was a lot of emphasis on Guus Hiddink, their coach at the time. A Samsung PAVV (large-screen TV) commercial featured Guus Hiddink, simply sitting outside on an empty terras, apparently revisiting his successes.

Day 3: Heading east

During the preceeding days, the weather had gone from pretty terrible to somewhat tempting (in terms of me getting on a bike, anyway). It was still somewhat windy, though, and some of the roads were still quite slippery. Even the taxi drivers slowed down for some of those ice patches near the hotel.

I actually managed to clock some sleep, so I woke up at a reasonable hour. I decided to finish my tour of the Seogwipo coast as far as possible. I started at the International Conference Center, like two days earlier, but this time I headed east. I stuck to some of the major coastal roads (so that I could find my way back). After following the coast for a while, I went further uphill and into some of the random towns along the road. I ran into plenty of seafood restaurants along the way, but these looked mostly empty and somewhat uninviting.

I decided I would try to reach Yakchun-sa [???] before heading back. This turned out to be too optimistic -- by the time twilight set in I was still about five miles away from the temple. I found this slightly frustrating, but I decided my pictures of Jeju-do's basalt southern coastline would have to do. Aside from that, a dog had been chasing me on the way there, and I figured it would be unpleasant to have that happen in the dark.

Back at the town, I had some errants left to run. First of all, I needed some groceries -- shampoo and toothpaste, most importantly. And yes, I had been going for a couple days without those items. I apologize I was also close to running out of shaving cream. I had made myself a shopping list with these items in Hangul, but I was able to find everything at a convenience store without resorting to the 'point and say after me' method. I was temped to buy some candy, but considering my recent bout of dental non-hygene I decided against it.

Dinner was very much overdue by the time I picked a restaurant. I decided to have some seafood, so I ordered a maquarel stew (from an English-language menu, unfortunately). This turned out to be the wrong decision for a slightly starved, mostly clueless foreigner. I didn't realise the maquarel would come with the bones firmly in place. While I have some control these days over my Korean (thin, metal) chopsticks, this was slightly beyond my skill level. The bizarre thing was that the fish was actually very good (even for a fish non-lover such as myself). The situation was torturous (not to mention embarassing). I "persevered," though, and managed to eat most of the meat without killing myself.

After sitting still for a while (in awe of my own performance... perhaps) I got up, paid, and left. It was time to get back to the ICC, where my ride would be at 9:15pm. At the hotel, I watched an annotated Go match on TV before deciding I really need to catch up on my speaking/listening skills.

Day 4: Sangbang-san and the Hamel Monument

It was about time I went a little further out and away from Seogwipo (and especially from the Jungmun resort). I decided to head west and visit Sangbangsan, the 300m peak that is just on the horizon as seen from my room in the Traveler's Hotel. The taxi ride along the coastal route was absolutely gorgeous, and made me wish I had the opportunity to drive around by myself. On the other hand, the driving here seems somewhat hectic and well... accident prone. Again, a lot of areas were perfectly snow free, but in other cases we'd round a hill and find only one lane on the other side (the other lane being a giant mount of snow).

At Sangbangsan, I got to pick between a small temple up against the mountain and the Hamel Exhibition down by the water. From where I was, the south face of the mountain, the mountain went pretty much straight up. Without the option to get on top of Sangbansan, I decided take a walk near the Hamel Exhibition. As it turned out, there was a path all the way around the adjacent Yongmeori Coast. The entire area was fairly busy with tourists (the first large crowd I'd seen so far), and the cliff side itself seemed almost exclusively made up of groups of three: a couple (average age: late teens to mid 20s) plus photographer.

The cliff was filled with small groups of fisherwomen selling various cooked sea creatures, offering trays, chopsticks, and small plastic stools to their patrons. I took a picture of one of these ladies. She was sitting behind a shallow bowl filled with a single head-sized octopus. These women as a group were quite uninhibited, speaking loudly with each other and with the Korean tourists.

The rock formations surrounding the cliff were pretty intruiging, with stone bridges connecting the areas where there were gaps in the natural rock. By the time I rounded most of the cliff, I got somewhat over exited. Instead of taking the steps back up to the exhibit, I continued climbing the rocks (in fact, I didn't realize there were steps in the first place). After a minute or two, I realized I wasn't really going anywhere (except for more rocks and larger gaps between them). I also realized some of the taller rocks I'd been jumping down from would be quite difficult to reclimb. After a few minutes I was back on track, though.

Still not realizing there were steps to where I had come from, I went back around the cliff to take more pictures. One of the fisherwomen made some "AROUND" gestures, but by the time I ran into her I was already most of the way back. I had a quick look around the souvenir store, which featured Dutch trinkets similiar to the ones we have in every tourist store in The Netherlands. They also had a photo booth where children could wear e.g. traditional Dutch head gear.

The exhibit itself, inside the ship model, was actually quite interesting. There was a fairly detailed account of Hamel and the conditions surrounding his 'landfall' on Jeju-do. There were several models of Dutch vessels, and the usual puppets enacting things such as treating injuries on board the ship. The bottom deck of the ship was a bit of a surprise -- it was almost exclusively dedicated to football (the soccer kind), with a large section assigned to Guus Hiddink. It included things like childhood photos in addition to the usual signed balls and team pictures.

By the time I got back to the base of Sangbangsan it was getting close to sunset, so I got some pictures of that before calling a taxi. The initial conversation didn't go so well, but after a few minutes I got a call back, and another fifteen minutes later I got a cab back to the hotel. There I had dinner, after which I worked on some graduate school applications.

Day 5: Moving North

After four days in Seogwipo, it was time to head over to Jeju-si and explore the north of the island. After packing everything back into my suitcase I went downstairs for some lunch at the hotel's 'Beer Bar.' At noon, I had one last look at my room's awesome view before grabbing my stuff and heading downstairs to check out. I enquired what the easiest way would be to get to my new hotel, which resulted in a taxi being called for me.

The taxi ride to Jeju took a little over half an hour, and I arrived at my new hotel around 1pm. As it turned out, the hotel was mostly deserted. At my new room, I took a shower and relaxed for a bit.

Refreshed and eager to do something interesting, I decided that today would be a good day for the Jeju Folk and National History museum. On my way out I noticed a bunch of people with picket signs, but I couldn't quite figure out what they were up to (although it did explain why half of the hotel security staff appeared to be guarding the front door). But more on that later...

The museum was great, illustrating everything from the sealife to the geological composition of the island, and the lifestyle of the islanders at various points in history. Surrounding the museum was a small park, displaying various stone grandparent statues and models of the various type of rock that can be found around the island. Unfortunately most of the museum itself was a designated 'no photo' area, even those areas holding the non-ancient items (such as the geological models). I decided to behave, leaving me with only a couple of pictures of the sealife display.

After some more pictures outside of the museum, I ventured out into Jeju-si for a bit. This area is completely different from the Seogwipo/Jungmun area where I was up until now. While I never actually made it east far enough to see Seogwipo proper, the southern area was very much a dedicated tourist area. Jeju, on the other hand, seems to be more of a proper city (although most of the hotels are clustered in a somewhat separate neighborhood). It's still very touristy, but there seem to be actual places for people to live here that aren't hotels.

After a short walk around I headed back to the museum to get a ride to the hotel. After dropping off my bag at the room, I headed back down to work on my last grad school application. After that was done, I decided dinner would be good. This is where I realized why I had gotten a lower-than-advertised rate -- an awkward conversation with the front desk revealed that there was a strike going on. A few mental leaps and bounds later I realized that explained the people I had seen 'demonstrating' before.

At this point, the guy at the front desk seemed ready to duck for cover, so I turned the conversation to restaurant recommendations. The general gist of his advice seemed to be to head right after exiting the hotel. After grabbing my jacket from my room, I went back to confirm that. Unfortunately this second session didn't lead to anything more specific, so out I went.

I spent a good while walking around and examining places to eat. It was easy to tell I was in the touristy district with jewellers, night clubs, and fashion stores in every other window. The streets were very busy and a little bit stereotypical, with giant neon signs adorning everything. It was an impressive change compared to the daytime, when the street didn't look nearly as enticing. I somewhat regretted having left my camera behind, but I figured I didn't want to carry the thing around for everything.

After about an hour or so, I found myself back on the street of my hotel without having eaten anything. The restaurants I had encountered were difficult to gauge in terms of what they served and, well, how things worked. Some of them had giant glass fish tanks showing off the goods, like those I had encountered on my trip along the coast, east of Jungmun. I figured I would try for some kalbi, since I hadn't had any yet.

After some more walking around and looking for the word kalbi, I gave up on the attempt and went to a second floor restaurant named 'Panorama.' The stairway that led up to the restaurant was very grimy, with an open door showing a western-style toilet with, among other things, the sink lying on the floor next to it. Fortunately, the scenery upstairs was reassuringly less scary than the stairway.

The food on the menu appeared to be somewhat of a hybrid between Korean and 'Western' foods. I decided to go with their hamburger. The burger, it turned out, was just that -- a burger in a deep plate, covered with sauce and onions. It came with rice and some of the regular Korean 'side bowls,' including gimchi, and with some barley-type water. The burger + sauce were nothing extraordinary, although I found it tasted great with the gimchi. Together with the rice it was actually a pretty solid meal.

The restaurant was set up mostly in terms of booths overlooking the busy crossing below, which was entertaining to watch. If I had had my dictionary with me, I might have been able to translate some of the banners, but alas.

Day 7: A visit East

I woke slightly later than planned today, but that didn't stop me from thoroughly bothering the front desk staff. I wanted to visit some sites to the east, and without a bike or a car I was going to need someone to take me there. The particular site I wanted to visit, the Sangumburi crater, was a good 45 minutes away. This was one of the first 'attractions' I had added to my list when I first started planning my trip, so I was pretty excited about finally being able to visit it. It was also one of the sites I originally wanted to visit by bicycle, but my experiences 'on the road' so far had made me slightly wary of venturing out there on my own. This was a bit of a shame, because the weather was, for once, excellent.

Anyway, a taxi it was. It turned out the trip was going to cost me about as much as renting a car for the day, but for that price I'd basically be taken care of. I was running slightly low on cash, so I tried the hotel ATM; didn't work. I got instructions to get to the bank, which was supposedly easy to find. After walking around for a bit, I finally ran into a giant building that said KEB, some random stuff in Korean, and the word 'bank' in Korean. M'duh. Inside, I was quickly escorted to an ATM that accepted foreign credit cards. It worked...

Back at the hotel, my cab was ready (and had probably been waiting), so I hopped in and we were on our way. As it turned out, I had possibly the nicest taxi driver in the world. When I explained (in English) that my Korean wasn't exactly up to par with regard to... well... anything except transliteration, he quickly grabbed me a Hangul-only map of the island and told me (in Korean) to find the Sangumburi Crater. He seemed quite pleased when I pointed it out to him, congratulated me for a bit, and then continued to hum along with the radio.

At Sangumburi, he informed me that he'd be sticking around, so I could leave most of my stuff in the car. When I got out, he came along and basically demanded the use of my camera. He turned out to be quite the photographer, carefully directing me to where he wanted me to stand. After I purchased my ticket to the trails surrounding the crater, he headed back to the car for a bit, so I assumed he'd be waiting there. A few minutes later he came running to catch up, slapping me on the shoulder when he did. He explained, in gestures, how he had just gone to the car to take the keys out, and when he had turned around I had been gone. Oops.

He walked up with me for a minute or two, taking some more pictures of me along the way. He then announced he'd be heading to the car, looking somewhat caught between that and coming along all the way. So on I went, up the outside slope of the crater. The view around the crater was absolutely gorgeous, and by sheer luck I was there at just the right time to have beautiful lighting. The sun was edging down towards Halla-san to the southwest, and some of the lower peaks on the north slope of Halla mountain looked stunning. Seeing this type of stuff was also a little bit of a relief, as I had been worried I'd miss out on it due to my lack of a car.

After taking some pictures of the scenery towards the west, I headed further up the slope of the crater. The crater itself turned out to be beautiful as well, albeit with slightly less ideal lighting. Standing on the edge of the crater was quite impressive -- it really was a mountain-like shape with a hole of maybe 100m inside of it (I forget the exact numbers). It's not hard to believe the claims that the eco-system surrounding Sangumburi is unique -- the crater's shape is such that different parts of it are in different climate zones.

I walked around the crater for about an hour, at which point I headed back to the parking lot. There I found the taxi waiting for me, along with 100 or so school children neatly lined up and waiting to get in. The driver waved at me, as did some of the school children.

Back in the cab, we debated what to do next. The driver wanted to confirm that we'd be back at the hotel by 6, which was fine by me. I suggested we might visit Bijarim forest, but he indicated we'd be late getting back. Instead, we settled on the Songeup Folklore Village. This was a fairly short ride from where we were, and when we got there we went through the same ritual. I basically followed him around and posed occasionally. The folklore village had some of the same things I had seen at the Folklore museum the day before, but life sized. After the initial round of pictures, he proceeded to explain in big gestures what the various buildings were for. I found this incredibly amusing and, well, nice of him.

Among the more stunning things I saw on my trip so far was the traditional Jeju toilet, complete with a live pig! I had heard of these, so it was great to finally see one in its full glorly. For the uninitiated: it is basically a stone seat, about a meter above the ground, with a slit in it through which you do your thing. Your 'thing' falls straight into the pig pen. Ideally the pigs only consume the thing after you're done, but I've read online that in some cases they manage to get their snout into the space under the seat...

I went around taking some more pictures, while the taxi driver went into a shop, apparently to visit a friend. When we both returned to the car, he was carrying around some tangerines. He shared one of them on our way back to the hotel.

Day 8 Jeju-si

The original plan for today was to see Jeju city itself, and possibly take some pictures of some of the more interesting hangulizations (i.e. originally non-Korean words transcribed in Hangul). Some of those are quite amusing, and they can be used easily to demonstrate Hangul basics. Knowing how these work helps a great deal, because they can frequently be spotted along with the (typically English) original.

The neighborhood I'm in is extremely vibrant, as mentioned before, with the major brand stores on one side of the hotel and a lot of Korean restaurants to the other. As I was walking through the neighborhood, I felt less inclined to take pictures, and more so to just take in the thousands of sounds and, more importantly, pay attention to the traffic. I didn't take the time to look at it thoroughly, but it would seem the traffic lights here work... differently. The fact that they're at the far side of the crossing for each respective side doesn't help---it means you can typically see at least two sets of lights that do not apply to you. I'm not sure about the sequencing, but one thing's for sure: waiting for a pedestrian light can take its sweet time. There is no audible indication (such as the 'clicking' in The Netherlands), but there is a voice indication if you push a button, apparently

After exploring the 'neighborhood' for a few hours, I went into one of the 'family market' stores located on literally every street corner (along with cell phone companies, by the way). I got some groceries before returning to the hotel.

This might be a good time to clarify something about the strike that's going on here at the Crowne Plaza. It's not a quiet absense of food from the hotel. Every afternoon there are 50 or so people outside of the front door with a sound van and megaphones. They sing, scream, clap, and chant. They are loud enough for me to hear them from my room (on the opposite side of the building, on the 8th floor).

There was a discussion on Arirang (an English-language channel on Korean culture) about the Korean protesters that were arested in Hong Kong. Part of the discussion was about why Korean protests were typically so loud and, well... unconventional. The strike here appears to be an example of this, and I can imagine having such a loud group in front of the door can be very damaging for a five star hotel.

Anyway, so except for the strikers, this was mostly a quiet day. I saw a good chunk of Jeju-si, although I would have liked to see more...

Day 9: Moksokwon

Today I scheduled a visit to Moksokwon, the 'park of stones and trees.' That probably doesn't sound terribly exciting, but like the Sungumburi crater, it was one of the first locations I added to my list. It was also relatively closeby; only about 20 minutes by car.

It was cloudy and rainy today, but as it turned out that was ideal for a visit to Moksokwon. Situated in a forest (obviously), the place smelled awesome because of the rain and the humidity. It contributed to the serene atmosphere of the place. As far as rocks and stones go, it was actually quite captivating. Some of the works were genuinely artistic, especially when held up to e.g. the park surrounding the International Conference Center in the south. Although I was surrounded by flocks of Korean tourists, Moksokwon seemed less touristy than some of the other places I'd visited. The stone grandparent statues, for example, were the real thing rather than the generic ones found pretty much everywhere on the island.

In addition to the exhibit outside, there were several exhibits located in Jeju-style huts (stone with 'braided' thatched roofs). These included clay figurines, some of the which were quite stunning. The most fun to look at, though, was a folk story set up outside, depicting 25 scenes using oddly shaped rocks gathered from around Jeju-do over an extended period of time. The story itself reminded me of some of the Asian short stories I read at the Wolfert, back in the day when I was still in the business of writing and editing those. While I don't remember the details, the theme of the story was the (re)unification of ideals and reality.

My fellow tourists were quite friendly, and I got involved in yet another conversation that quickly turned to the topic of Guus Hiddink as soon as my Dutchness became known. I've found that, in general, Korean kids are somewhat less reserved than their elders. In this particular case, a group of boys debated loudly about how to say 'Where are you from?' in English, until I decided to go ahead and tell them =] This earned me some cheers and a couple of pictures without the auto timer.

Day 10: Up the mountain

After I returned from Moksokwon the other day, I had some planning to do. I was intent on getting in one last item from my original list: to go hiking to the top of Halla-san, the tallest mountain in South Korea. I decided to go with the Eorimok trail, because it was one of the easier trails and the closest one to Jeju-si.

When I went to the front desk of my hotel it turned out I was in luck; the guy on duty knew the trails and seemed eager to take care of things for me. He suggested I take the Yeongsil trail back down instead of backtracking along the Eorimok trail. That way, the trip would be shorter and I'd see some different scenery. He was also able to tell me that the trails were mostly snowed in, so my travel time would probably be longer than the indicated times.

With that settled, we took care of transportation and a wake up call (just in case). I was mostly packed by the time my wake up call came. Downstairs I was in for a pleasant surprise; my taxi driver was the same guy who had driven me to Sangumburi. The front desk person told me the Yeongsil trail was closing soon (I think), so I was to go up Yeongsil and down Eorimok.

The trip up to the trail was a hazard -- it consisted of winding roads that were often completely snowed in, and it was foggy as well. Along the way, my driver analysed (and approved of) my gear (jacket, sweater, pants and boots), and made sure I had enough food and water. After about 45 minutes we got to the start of the Yeongsil trail, only to find out it had been closed early. I was handed a map of the trails, and we were instructed to go to Eorimok instead. The ride there was along the same route (we had passed Eorimok on the way to Yeongsil), but the fog had gotten slightly worse. Another 20 minutes later we were at Eorimok. I had the driver's phone number at that point, so after I got a ticket I was good to start heading up. I was told to return by 2pm and give the taxi a call.

The trip up the trail was amazing. There was snow everywhere, as expected, and the trail started right next to a steep cliff. The snow was pretty treacherous, especially next to the 'trail proper,' where it hadn't been condensed. My taxi driver had already warned me that I could easily end up waist or chest high in the snow if I wasn't careful. The trail itself was more reliable in terms of footing, but also more slippery. Most of my fellow hikers were wearing spikes, which made them a lot more efficient at going up the trail (and more succeptible to falling through when they stepped off the trail...).

After about 10 minutes I took a first break, to get my water out and to break open an energy bar. I was back on track a minute later, but after another 30 minutes I seriously needed a break. I was about a kilometer out, and I was seriously out of breath. Apparently my poor Dutch lungs were having some difficulty with the moist, cold, thin air. After about ten minutes of sitting in the snow I felt slightly better. I decided the jacket had to go, because I was warming up nicely from the exercise.

At that point I was able to keep a steady pace all the way to the top. I stopped briefly at the 'haflway' point, to take pictures of the other folks sledding and generally entertaining themselves. This was the first large clearing along the trail, and further down the forest gave way completely to an amazing snow landscape. The direct sunlight made it a lot warmer here, and the air was less humid.

For the next hour or so, I took a lot more pictures. The view was pretty spectacular, but the awesome perspective was difficult to capture with everything being white. My camera was basically stuck at 1/1000 second exposures, occasionally going as high as 1/1500s. (This turned out to be an odd quirk; in 'Manual' mode the shortest exposure possible is 1/1000s, although it's possible that I screwed up the focus on my manual attempts ).

A little bit further along, I caught up with a small group of Korean tourists, one of whom started talking in English. This caught my attention. It turned out that they were, in fact, talking to me. This conversation went along the usual lines (what am I up to, howcome I'm traveling alone). We were still talking when we reached 1700m -- the highest we were allowed to go -- so I got invited to eat lunch with them. My energy bars were quickly dismissed as 'not food,' so I was set up with some rice, gimchi, and a noodle soup bowl. Admittedly, this was a lot better than what I had been planning to eat...

When everyone was done having lunch, a giant group of Korean tourists got behind a banner for some group pictures. This warranted somewhat of a picture frenzy among everyone. I had the (dubious?) honor of being in many of them. After a few minutes of this we collectively headed down the mountain.

The trip down was a lot easier to manage, which gave me more time to look around and enjoy the scenery. Now that I was a little more rested, the people coming up the mountain looked awfully tired. The temperature had dropped a little, and some of the people coming up were seriously purple in the face as a result. It wasn't quite cold enough for me to put my jacket back on, though.

I was back around 1:45; my taxi driver had done a good job of estimating how long the trip would take me. I had some trouble calling him, though, because it wasn't clear to me which part of the number was his area code. Actually I couldn't even tell if the problem was with the number of with my phone. I went to the ticket counter for help, and they ended up calling him for me. Thirty seconds later -- before I had the chance to walk back to the parking lot -- my cab pulled up and I was on my way home.

Back in Jeju-si I took a hot shower (in hopes of still being able to walk the day after). After coming to my senses for a couple of hours I went out for dinner at Panorama. The folks there were quite happy to see me again, and I quickly got directed to the same booth I had been in previously. I had some fried pork this time, and it got served on a single plate (like my burger) with the usual side dishes of gimchi, lotus root and various other things. It felt somewhat festive, especially because of the warm welcome.

Day 11/12: Packing and the long trip home

Needless to say, I slept very well after my trip up Halla-san. My last day in Jeju was going to be a slow one, mainly because I had planned it that way. As it turned out, I wasn't a giant knot of muscle aches. As a matter of fact, I felt surprisingly energetic.

Early in the afternoon I decided to venture out into Jeju-si for a bit. I wanted to take some more pictures of the local storefronts and such, and I was up for a hearty lunch. After some walking around I found another second-floor bar/cafe/restaurant called 'Modern Time' (or something along those lines) that looked promising. It looked somewhat similar to Panorama, with large booths made up of comfy couches along the windows. As it turned out, they served kalbi (or at least an ever so slightly westernized version of it). It was a bit of a splurge for lunch, but I hadn't had the chance to eat ribs yet.

The people at this restaurant were, once again, extremely friendly. I talked with the host for a bit, transcribing the occasional word to see if I heard correctly. Most of the conversation took place in English, though, which he spoke quite well.

At some point the host brought along an 8-year old boy, who introduced himself in English (unfortunately I wasn't sure where his last name ended and where his first name started). We talked for a short while, with the host translating the rest of the conversation. The kid then stared at my eyes, drew a little closer, and ran off with a giant grin once he had verified that they (my eyes) were blue. Highly entertaining stuff

The food was delicious. After lunch I spent a good chunk of the afternoon outside. I visited the local electronics store to have a look at some Samsung laptops. They turned out to be next to the electronic toilet seats, and they were pretty much as slick I had imagined them to be. I also bought some groceries for my trip.

Later that night I decided to return to the same restaurant for dinner. This time I went for the seafood pasta dish, which turned out to be huge. It was also rife with such wonderful things as squid, muscles and giant shrimp -- not my usual fare. Still, it tasted great and I was quite happy once I finished it. Today was definitely a good day for food. Even though it wasn't 'traditional' Korean food, I felt the squid made up for that somewhat...

That night I went to bed relatively early, after I finished packing. My sleep was a little unruly, much the way it usually is before I travel.

My trip back to Amsterdam was mostly uneventful. I got a cab from my hotel to the airport, about a ten minute ride. I was at the airport barely an hour before my flight left, so there wasn't much of a wait (this also goes to show how amazingly efficient Jeju airport is). My flight to Seoul was a little unusual -- I got moved to the second row because the entire plane was filled with school children.

At Gimpo I took the bus to Incheon, spending all of $6 or so instead of the $70 it had taken me two weeks earlier. The shuttle bus had awesome seats, which caused me to nod off for a bit. At Incheon I had about two hours to return my cell phone and get some breakfast. Having splurged on my last two meals, I topped it off by going for filet mignon at an airport restaurant. I then returned to my gate, where the KLM people were pretty much ready to start boarding.

A good 11 hours later I set foot in Amsterdam, slightly dazed and much more tanned than I had left.