Our Last Month!

In our last month in Korea, Tyler came to visit us! So of course we jammed as much as we could into our last month for him and for us! We were ready to leave the school but not leave Korea. It felt like home to us. During our last month we went all over!
We took Tyler to Busan! I wanted to show him the tropical, warm side and ofcourse the beach! Again, we went with some other co-workers and off we went! Tyler was super impressed with the fast train! As soon as we got there we found a pension and off to the beach we went! We spent the day, drinking and eating there! The next day I took Tyler to Yonggungsa Temple! He threw a penny into a well and got it on his first shot! Everyone around us was so impressed!

Other highlights were going to a local park, getting fried chicken and beers! It started to poor rain but our group had a great time! Colleen took us to Oeam Folk Village. It was an old town that still lived like they did a long time ago! We had an amazing lunch and watched how they used to live.

We took a trip to Seoul because I really wanted to see the war musuem. It was amazing! There were so many beautiful structures and old warm vehicles. The group of us went to see another palace and got to see the changing of the guards! Then we went to the breweries! We went to Angel's Head and Craftworks! All the beers at Craftworks were named off after the mountains in South Korea. I also took Tyler to Big Buddha and got ourselves some Buddha beads!

We definitely had a couple nights out drinking and going to the Norebang! Who could not do that before you go! Tyler visited the course and the kids absolutely loved him! And lastly, we took him to have Dog! Our friend, Sunbin took us to a restaurant. I did not order it, but it comes in a soup! Not totally horrible! I think Kip knew though when we came home!




Tyler left a couple days before we did. It was a sad goodbye. I loved the kids I taught and I loved the country we were in. We made lifelong friends and grew so much stronger as a couple. My kids all made me a goodbye song and speech and we had a goodbye party in the evening with our co-workers. Jay and I had an amazing time and I know I loved sharing this experience with him. I know whatever happens in our life we will be fine because we can throw ourselves into any experience. I wouldn't have wanted to do it with anyone else!

Summer Vacation!

During our week long summer vacation Jay and I decided to go to Taiwan and Jeju Island! We wanted to pack in as much as we could before we had to leave! We started in Taiwan where we flew into Taipei. We got to our hotel and settled in. We had pre set up some tours while we were there. Our tour picked us up and took us out for dinner at a Mongolian Restaurant! The food was delicious! Hot pot and stir fry! They then took us to Snake Alley where you can actually eat snake venom, we opted out of that! We then went to Longshan Temple, it was very beautiful. We found it very interesting how different the temples were constructed! We stopped at Taipei 101, the 2nd tallest building in the world! We didn't get a chance to go up it, but we could tell it would be amazing!

On the second day, we travelled to Wulai! An amazing hot spring area. We took a city bus there and were extremely pleased we did. The entire way we were following a river and we were looking over into the gorge the entire time! Wulai was beautiful, full of temples, hiking and amazing scenery! We stayed in a hotel where there was hot spring water piped into our bath! We overlooked the town! We found a public hot spring where people from the town come to bathe. It was a very neat experience!

The next day we took the bus back to Taipei and explored the city. I had tea with a tea shop owner, went to the electronics market and went for reflexology! We had to get to bed early that night since we were getting up early to take another tour. This one was a flight up to Hualien. We were going to check out Taroko Gorge. It was breathtakingly beautiful. The gorge is all marble, however it was hard to see since a storm was coming and the water was all muddy. We had an aboriginal lunch the headed back.


On our last day we went to a taoism temple and Chang Kai Shek memorial. There we watched the changing of the guards. We really were impressed with the tours we took! We flew from Taipei (which was a Hello Kitty themed plane) back to Seoul, spent the night in Cheonan and busse to Busan where we took a plane from there to Jeju Island! Quite a wild couple of days!

If you ever go to Jeju, rent a car, it makes it so easy to get around! That night we went to Love Land. A very sexual and hilarious park filled of sexual sculptures and art! The next day we went to Hallim park. It was a great park that covered all of the natural aspects of Jeju Island. We went through subtropic gardens, went in underground caves and saw lava rocks. On the way back we went to Hyeopjae beach, very relaxing!

We stopped at Sanbangulsa and hiked up to the Buddha in the rocks. It was very spiritual! Went to Cheonjiyeon Falls then headed back. We had heard that black pork meat in shabu shabu was the meal to have in Jeju so we found a place. They were so nice, they kept bringing us more food! There was fresh veggies and clams, which were brought in while we were eating! We also visited the Manjangul caves. It is all under ground made from cooled lava. It got very cool down there!


The next day we went to Illchubong! A beautiful extinct volcano! It was really neat driving up to it! We hiked to the top! On our way back down we went to the black sand beach hoping to watch the Haenyeo Women dive. However, they never did... but swimming at the black sand beach was amazing!

On our last day we decided to hike Hallasan. It was a last minute decision so we had to get up super early so we could get to the top and down in time to get to our plane. It was pitch black while we started. We made great timing on the way up but somehow on the way down we slowed our pace. I was glad we did it! It was a jammed pack holiday but we loved every minute of it!