Mt Bukhansan

So I didn't think the day I voluntarily agreed to climb a mountain and actually go through with it would ever, ever come however Saturday 17th October 2009 was that day, and the mountain was the Baekundae Peak in Bukhansan National Park, apparently the world's most visited National Park. Bukhansan is situated just north of Seoul, South of Munsan so is fairly 'local' - despite this fact it somehow took us 3 hours to get there - longer than it took to actually get up and down the peak itself. Baekundae Peak is the highest peak in the park at 837 metres (above sea level??) and climbing it was possibly the most terrifying experience of my life and the closest I have actually come to death.

To cut a very dull 'Why it took us three hours to get there' story short I'm going to cut to the chase and explain that thanks to the detour via Seoul and having to take a bus from Seoul, we managed to meet this great Korean dude called Sonny who became our voluntary guide for the journey. I don't think he realised what he was letting himself in for. Essentially he gave us our route, and helped us navigate our feet into the right place. The first half was steep but dealable. The second half was hell, the rough terrain turned into sheer rock face which we had to pull ourselves up with the aid of ropes and steel fencing that was attached to the mountain, luckily there were several Koreans around to give us a much needed boost, and to grab us so we didn't slip and splat ourselves on the ground. It was like rock climbing but without the harness. The views we got from the top were worth it, incredibly beautiful, we could see all of the National Park, and most of Seoul that was stretched out infront of us. The route down was far less stressful and thanks to our Korean guide, we were able to go through a 'No Entry sign' (all the Koreans were doing it) and through Guknyeongsa Temple and see The Grand Buddha, a giant Buddha that sits within the temple grounds and is an incredible sight. After the hike, we headed to one of the outdoor restaurants for Korean Pizza, Barbecue Pork, beer and Soju with Sonny to say thankyou to the poor guy for the stress we put him through. We then went to another retstaurant (now sure how this happened) where we had more soju and beer, this very bizarre almond jelly salad and a potato pancake... again traditional Korean dishes. The salad was great, it was the most salad-like thing I have seen since arriving in Korea although the Almond Jelly was rather odd... Climbing the mountain was amazing and I am going to go back at some point and climb one of the other three peaks. We also had and idea of climbing Seorokasan, which is towards the East coast - its a great adrenalin rush and it made me feel amazed... if a little pained the next day!

I'm a happy climber....

In climbing mode....

The team! Our Korean friend Sonny, Me, Kyle, Amanda, Shauna, David, Jenny and Jesse!!

Rewarding ourselves with food a, beer and Soju....

Itaewon

Itaewon is the 'Foreigner's area' of Seoul and it wasn't a place I was particularly up for visiting, I wanted to be surrounded by Korean's when in Korea not surrounded by drunk American soldiers etc. However I had planned to go there at some point as they have a bookshop which sells English books (it was closed), they also have loads of different food places. We went to Itaewon on both Friday evening (post Zoo) and Saturday eveing for dinner. The first night heading to an All American Burger joint have a mass of comedy moments and some amazing yet pretty pricey burgers. The second night we went to this beautiful little restaurant called The Flying Pan, it sells the most amazing sandwiches, and I think I ate the most amazing Chicken and Avocado sandwich I have EVER eaten there - or maybe I just think that because I am in Korea where sandwiches are rare and buying Avocado's would require re-mortgaging your house.

Dubai in Photos

Korea Ahoy...or not

From decision to arrival it was about six months of planning and it was all somewhat slapped in the face when I arrived at London Gatwick on Monday 31st August with my Mum and 3 heavy bags of luggage to be told my flight was delayed. There had been 'issues' in Dubai and the flight left late and would arrive in London late, therefore leave London late... resulting in me arriving in Dubai late and in fact too late for me to make my connection to Seoul. I had 2 options, say goodbye to my mum and jump on a bus to Heathrow... or stick around take the flight and instead of spending three hours in Dubai, spend 23 hours... for various reasons I decided I would go with the second option and my journey to South Korea ended up starting with a mini break in the United Arab Emirates!

The original flight to Dubai was supposed to land at midnight and I would have 3 hours chilling in the airport before getting a flight to Seoul at 3am.. however we left 3 hours late and as we hit the tarmac in Dubai I swear we passed the Seoul flight leaving...however.

Now I have never flown long haul before, I have never been on a plane for more than 5 hours (and that was a delayed flight to Tenerife!) and I had never flown with Emirates before, although I had heard good things about them and to be honest it wouldn't have taken alot to make me impressed, and despite the delay and extra stress it caused me I was very impressed by the end.

On arrival in Dubai and feeling slightly angry, I got in a queue along with a bunch of other angry people not really sure what was going to happen, the queue took forever, for some people who had missed there connections it was a wait of a few hours however for me I knew flights from Dubai to Seoul went every 24 hours at 3am... I was there for a while... It was in that queue i made my first 'friend', Andy, a guy heading to China to teach english.... his flight to Beijing was as regular as mine and left at 320 am everyday.. so armed with our boarding cards, a hotel voucher and the good news we didnt have to check out our bags then check them back in again we headed through security and off into Dubai.

I knew Dubai was hot, however because it is hot Dubai is also very air conditioned inside the terminal... to get to our hotel we had to take a shuttle bus and that bus was outside the terminal and stepping outside was like hitting a brick wall of 40 degree heat, it was surreal to say the least and something I was not expecting and throughout my whole time there was something that I did not get used to at all... the air shocked me everytime. We caught the bus to the 'Millenium Airport Hotel' which was gorgous and managed to check ourselves in and then headed off to our rooms to get some sleep. Through conversation we had decided we both wanted to make the most of our time in Dubai and decided to meet up at some point after we had woken up to go and do some exploring.... I mean we had a lot of time to kill and I didn't want to waste it staring at 4 walls.

I woke up at about midday and headed down (with my food vouchers) to the hotel restaurant to grab some food, which itself was amazing - there was a huge buffet with a colossal amount of food and at this point I was feeling a little bit hungry... shortly after I found Andy and we headed out to explore Dubai....