Jeju Island: Island Bliss

Summer in Korea is a complete and living hell. I say this with as much love as I can muster, but it has to be said. While the entire countryside and the mystic mountains are quite compelling, the actual weather and feeling of the air to your skin is more of a hyperactive slip-n-slide. Putting it simply, it is damn muggy. While there are days I enjoy the weather, much of my exploration revolves around dreams of air conditioned environments. So what does a person do on such nasty weather?

Recently I went to Jeju. Jeju, is a southern Island, about an hour flight from a nearby airport. The island itself was amazing. There is pretty much a million things to occupied oneself with, and even more so plenty of picturesque landscapes to mull over during some downtime.

I recently went to Jeju with a nice entourage consisting of: Myself, Keziah (girlfriend), Chris (Kez’s roommate), and Christie (a friend). We left Friday at about 12:00 and arrived in Jeju at about 6:30 or so. From there we rented a car and let our adventure begin.

As I mentioned, there are a ton of things to do in Jeju. So, rather than remark upon each area, I’ll just remark on only two of the highlights of the trip. My two highlights of Jeju were Sunrise Peak and Hallim Park. Both of these are quite popular tourist destinations, so finding them via a google search won’t be too hard. Sunrise Peak is an amazing volcanic crater on the far east coast of the island. In fact, Sunrise peak even stretches out on its own connected strip of land that it faces the sunrise as its own entity. It’s about a half an hour hike to the peak, but I’d say it’s definitely worth it. The view is amazing and even the hike itself is interesting as it curls around different rock formations along the way. It’s a straight up shot with several steep staircases and the area itself is littered with butterflies. Just. Wow.

Hallim Park is another of the quite popular tourist areas in Jeju. The drawl of Hallim Park is its amazing variety of sights all packed together in a decently priced package. Hallim Park contains: A beautiful beach, a bird zoo, an exotic plant conservatory, three caves, and a folk village. There is actually even more in this area, but I chose to keep the list short. The sights to see were quite amazing, and you can see that the Koreans really went out of their way to create such an impressive layout of plants and statues amongst the quieter parts of the area. Worlds really can’t express how cool this park was, so I will include a couple of pictures below:

All in all, the whole island of Jeju was amazing. The company of friends was equally enjoyable. Everyone I went with was easy going and like-minded (for the most part). No drama, no in-fighting. Just pure island bliss. One of my favorite moments on the island, besides the scenic views, was just sitting on the beach over a beer and light conversation. I plan to hit up the island sometime before my time in Korea is up, and anyone who is looking for some pristine beach fun is invited.

Song: Lady Gaga – Bad Romance