NOV 5 - WE WALK FROM ONE BEACH TO ANOTHER - OUR LONG WALK.

November 5^th, Tuesday

            We are on our own today.  Between the two of us we figured out that we tried to use the debit card as a credit card.  1.). It wasn’t a credit card 2.) we could (fortunately) give it the correct pin – 5 digits required and we were only allotted 4.  We also figured out that if we were to see Sunny today, we weren’t, she could have translated the receipt the machine spit out.  AHA!  Charlie had a brain storm and suggested we go to the concierge who spoke some English.  It worked.  He read on the receipt that they had rejected our request!  Whew!

            So we had a lovely breakfast, then decided to take our walk from Haeundae Beach in front of the hotel to Suyeong-gu Beach.  The drive from one to another didn’t seem so long.  Sunny implied it would be quite a hike.  Of course, she was right.  We figured out later that it took us about 2 hours out and 2 hours back.  We also guesstimated that that was about 6 km (4 miles) each way.  Good grief!  The walk retraced most of the steps we took with Sunny.  Past our beach, along the cinema walk with photos and sculptures.  Past the large IPark condominium with wonderful curved sides – all different.  Past a trump tower (yech).  Around the yacht club and a boat dock.  Over a bridge.  Along a commercial fishing area with crab traps, nets, glass floaters, and all sorts of other fishing equipment.  Finally onto Suyeong-gu beach.  Actually, after covering both areas, I like our beach area better – but the challenge was fun.  We decided after marching to what we declared the end of the road, we walked back toward the “beginning” of the beach to find coffee and a snack.  Our choices, Starbucks, Holly’s Coffee, and something called Tom N Toms coffee.  After checking out each, we decided Holly’s bagel and cream cheese was the best deal for a substantial snack for our walk back.  Last thing I would have expected in Korea, but…..  It was great.  Refreshing to have a quiet sit.  Then we trudged our way back to the hotel following our path out fairly closely.

The building decked out like a Christmas package was actually a collection of restaurants.  We opted to go back to out local street since none of these looked 1.) like a bargain or 2.) very tasty

Hotels along our beach

A view of where we stood yesterday looking out to sea.

The bridge above had a fireworks display the night before.  This was a popular destination for the beach next to ours.  Since zillions of people came out to see it, I'm glad we avoided the views.  

Modern condos

Crab traps in commercial fishing area before the other beach

Some views below of the other beach area.

The strange Korean coffee shop with great coffee and really good bagels and cream cheese!

Lots of pictures of different kind of sailboats.  English can be tricky.

            For dinner we originally decided to try the restaurant building that they had tied up with a red bow.  There was an amazingly expensive Korean BarBQue.  Naw.  We also rejected a fish and chips.  Eventually we wandered back to our ?Haeun-Daero ? Street.  It’s got a pedestrian walkway down the middle and is basically one long restaurant row.  We opted for another Korean BarBQue.  It was quite tasty – not as good as the one Sunny took us to, but pretty good.  Back to the hotel and sleep

NOV 4 - BUSAN TOUR DAY 2

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November 4^th, Monday

            We had a lovely breakfast at the hotel.  Nice layout nice food not crowded.  All in a we’d rate it a 10.

            Sunny picked us up at 9 AM on the dot.  We drove off, eventually to see a Buddhist temple at the top of the mountains.  We made a stop, however, first at the BIFF center first.  It’s a fascinating building with the largest cantilever roof in the world.  There are posts that come out of the ground if a typhoon comes to town to keep the thing stabilized and stop it from blowing away.  The BIFF building is devoted to film.  There are film libraries, a number of screens, and lecture halls.  Really a fun building inside and out.  Hard to get photos of an enormous place, but I tried.

The square on the ground is a place where they put in poles to support/protect the huge roof of the place if a typhoon comes in/

View of the street behind BIFF from inside

Kind of looks like a regular movie theater.

Upcoming shows

View of BIFF from across the street.  You still can't get the scale of the place.

The photo above is a group of condos near BIFF.  Most of the Korean condo buildings looked like this.  Notice that they are numbered.  Since they are clustered in like groups, it must help you find your way home.

            Our next stop was Beomeosa Temple.  A Buddhist monastery/temple at the top of the local mountains.  Obviously, we drove, but a number of people took a metro, to a tram, or metro and hiked up the mountain.  Not an easy schlep.  Many of the classical Korean Buddhist temple pieces were there.  Three entrance gates, each with a different set of columns holding up the roof.  A large number of chapels around the main court yard – again with the Quan Yin the most popular.  The roofs set against the mountain peaks were beautiful, as were the trees turning colors.

The top of the roof has a design which we saw all over Korea.  It's supposed to represent a bird's wing.

We are standing near one of the temples with Sunny.  She is a wonderful guide!

            We drove down the mountain and our next stop Sunny kept calling the “lego village”.  It’s Korean name is Gamcheon.  It began as a slum area where people displaced by the Korean War built small railroad flats on a hillside.  Around 2007 the city? Locals? Decided to pretty things up and each owner of these small places painted them a different color.  The result is delightful.  We walked around the rim of the place and through some of the house-lets.  It’s become an artists’ center and some of their works were on display.  Very interesting place.

Notice the kimchee jars here too.

Narrow alleyway in the cluster of buildings

Views from the top toward the sea.

The sculpture above (Le Petit Prince) is a very popular spot to get your photo taken.  The girls were doing just that - notice the Hanbok clothes.

            We then stopped for another one of our enormous lunches.  This time it was a wonderful Korean BarBQue.  Delicious salads, pickles, and the meat was excellent.  It got cooked for us which was also very elegant.  Looks like were headed for another Whopper Jr tonight.  OOOF.

            After lunch we drove to Jagalchi Market which is the sea food market in Busan.  We started upstairs among the dried fishes.  I was amazed to find myself enjoying dried abalone!  Dried fish skin!  Who knew?  We then went downstairs to see the tanks of fish.  The sea worms were there (One of the few things I remember from our last trip to Korea), but so were tanks and tanks of every kind of fish you could think of – flat fish, rays, eels, parrot fish, mackerel, cod, and a myriad of fish I didn’t recognize.  There is a long thin fish that Sunny called a sword fish (not the billed fish I thought but thin like a sword).  Fish sellers were in the building and all over the place outside too.  Kind of amazing.  We then wandered down a long alley way called the Gukje Market (International Market).  They sold food, and about everything else you could imagine.  A local doughnut – round but filled with nuts.  Looked pretty good, but I was still stuffed from lunch.  They also sold fish cakes on a stick.  To the unaware (like ourselves) it looks like fried doughnut – but it’s fish cakes of different kinds.

Every kind of fish you can imagine was dried and out for sale.

Really fresh.

The sea side close to the market

Fish cakes are one of the local specialities.  The few we had were quite good.

            Although that was the official end of our tour, Sunny offered to take us to the sky trail off the FiveSix Island.  We had to put booties on our feet and we could walk over glass plates to the end of a pier.  The view was gorgeous and the weather was perfect.  Beautiful end to the day.  We said good bye to Sunny and the driver.  This was the best tour I think we’ve had.

Both our local beaches are visible from here.

            After we sat in the room for a bit to rest – then off for our Burger King feast.  After dinner we decided to get a beer.  Found a likely spot.  There were dinosaur design on the table.  Beers were supposed to be $3 for 300 cc.  Somehow they only cost $2?  Oh well, good deal for beers.  Went to a Post Office Bank ATM and somehow couldn’t figure out how to get money.  We have a receipt – but no cash.  We’ll have to go back when the bank/post office opens tomorrow and hope they speak enough English to understand “cancel, cancel, cancel”.