We decided we were going to try the Royal Shrine today since it was closed yesterday. So since we are subway experts now, we didn't waste any time getting there. I guess we both need to be a little bit more like our mother on trips, because when we got there we realized that they were guided tours only and we missed it by 20 minutes! Wahh! The next one wasn't until 12 and we just didn't have enough time to squeeze it in. Todd and I are excellent at paying attention to details. Ha!
However, that didn't bother us. We just walked down to a popular river walk that is built below the roadway. It was a beautiful sight and very serene. Have you noticed so many things are "serene" here?
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| Crossing on the gorgeous river walk! |
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| The River Walk below the roadway. Absolutely beautiful! |
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| A great escape. I could spend hours here. |
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| A neat waterfall towards the end of the walk. |
We then headed down to an area called Insa-dong. The main road is full of little shops full of art, antiques, souvenirs, and tea houses. Every alley way even had small little shops with beautiful, beautiful pieces of art. We did some damage in this area and bought several great items.
Next we grabbed our luggage and headed to Seoul Station. We took the nearly 3 hour train ride down to Busan. The ride was smooth and the scenery was great. It is much more rural outside of the city. You don't see much action until you get down towards the coast...at least that's what I gathered while my eyes were still open!
Katie met us at the train station, we embraced and squeezed each other's cheeks, and headed on our way! We then hit up a Korean BBQ restaurant. This is very popular among Koreans and it was a blast!
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| The beginning of our Korean BBQ. Yummy! |
At Korean BBQs, you choose from a variety of sketchy meat items. We settled on pork neck & skirt steak. Katie is the true chef, so we let her work her magic. If I get sick from raw meat, she's paying all my medical bills!
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| The chef herself hard at work. |
We also had a side of Kimchi soup. Kimchi is VERY popular in Korea and is eaten with almost every meal. It is a traditional Korean side dish made up of fermented vegetables and seasonings. It is considered spicy and it is very delicious. I'm a fan! They also love to dip their food in things, so all those surrounding bowls are different things to dip your meat in.
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| Todd feeding his face. He's a pro at that. |
Todd loves it! I always capture his best moments. As you can see we eat with chopsticks. He's very good at it (per usual)...I could use a little practice.
When we were finished we went next door to a small bar. Katie said Koreans love to eat and will often make a night of hopping from one place to the next eating a variety of different foods. Now I know why I'm such an oinker! It all makes sense. We had a nice beverage and enjoyed some chips and cheese sticks. Very native of us! Going out is fun because you get to meet new people. For example, we got to meet the probably 50 year old director of all the hospitals in Busan last night. He had an assistant with him and he came to speak with us because the director wanted to "cheers" with us. Come to find out, he thought I was very much "his style" and wanted to cheers some more. Hey, I could stay here and never have to work again. Sorry, Tyler!
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| Enjoying an evening in Busan |
That random girl is from London and is a friend of Katie's friend that is also visiting Busan. She was great to visit with and has been traveling Southeast Asia for about 4 months now. It is a very common thing to do after you graduate from university. So we had a great day despite spending half of it traveling. We have a great view of the coast here. Looking forward to our adventures today!
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| My view for the next week. |
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