19 Oct 2014

Gujeolcho Flower Festival


We were lucky enough to visit the Gujeolcho Flower Festival (구절초 제전). Or in other words, the Siberian chrysanthemum festival. The festival takes place for 10 days every October. I found out about the festival by coincidence on a Friday night when I was phone teaching and a student happened to tell me she would be visiting a flower festival on the weekend. This sparked my interest and so I asked her where and she asked her mom for me. I then mentioned it to a teacher and she said she had been the week before. She gave me a few pointers how to get there and we decided it would be a pleasant trip on what may be one of the last hot days of the year. 
The festival was held at Okjeongho Lake Gujeolcho Theme Parknear Jeongeup. The park is basically a large natural area with paths winding all over. The festival is famed for its Siberian chrysanthemums that cover the floor of a forested hill, the largest chrysanthemum hill in Korea. To me the flowers look like common white daisies and I didn't know they had such a fancy name. In their large amounts they looked particularly impressive though. 

At the festival there were also fields of cosmos and sunflowers. The flowers were really beautiful and of course I loved photographing them. There were many fields so there was plenty of space for everyone to enjoy taking pictures in the flowers. We wondered around the grounds and then found a spot to enjoy our picnic. Luckily we packed a picnic as we are not very adventurous when it comes to Korean food, and there was only some rather interesting looking food at the many food stalls. 

We tried to do a bit of research before we went and find out exactly where we were going, but there was not much English information available as the festival is not one of the bigger well known ones. It is featured on Korea’s Miss Flower promotional video which tells you the best places to see flowers throughout the year. It was not the easiest place to get to and took quite a while. We first had to catch a bus from Jeonju to the town of Jeongeup and then another bus to a small village called Sannae-myeon. From there, there were shuttles to the festival area. The 2 bus rides were each an hour long but we had a bit of a wait when we got to Jeongeup because the buses were very infrequent to Sannae-myeon. The scenery on the drives was very beautiful and we could tell when we were getting close to the festival area as flowers started to line the roads.  Many people tried to help us along the way even though we couldn’t understand them much and we scored some chestnuts on the bus ride home from a kind lady who showed us how to go back. 
The entrance cost was 3000won but free if you wore something with flowers on, which I planned ahead for. 

It's a pity the festival is not better known, especially amongst the English community. We were by far the only western people there and one man even asked us how we knew about it. I didn't even manage to find it on the list of Korean festivals. A trip to this festival is well worth it and a perfect place to visit during autumn as the temperature starts to cool down. 

13 Oct 2014

Korean Kindness

I was inspired to mention the attitude of people in Korea because it never ceases to amaze me (in a good way). While I may not agree with all aspects of Korean attitude (such as their treatment of animals), Koreans are in general such kind, friendly and welcoming people. There have been so many examples of kindness in the past few months we have been here. Often it's an older lady trying desperately to engage in conversation with us, helping us at the supermarket, laughing and patting us when we are on a bus or giving us some food like chestnuts, rice cakes or candy. Other times, it's the old men who spend their days hanging out at the local bus station, and once they understand we are from South Africa, they can't stop talking and getting excited even though we have no clue what they are saying. 

I felt like mentioning this today because of the positive experience I just had. This weekend I managed to leave my sunglasses on a bus which I of course was really upset about. After mentioning it to a colleague, she managed to make a whole lot of phone calls and track down the bus driver we had had. He unsurprisingly remembered us and had found my glasses. He then had delivered to the school an hour later. I am so happy and grateful. Only in Korea...

All for now, Happy Monday!!


8 Oct 2014

The tea plantations of Boseong



I had wanted to visit the tea plantations of Boseong for quite a while, but it had always seemed so out of the way. I am pleased now that we got around to it. To get to Boseong from Jeonju, you either need to go via Gwangju (bus) or Suncheon (train) to the small town of Boseong  and then catch a city bus to the plantations. The round-trip transportation takes a couple of hours and takes a bit of effort making sure you are heading to the right place. So while we were in the Suncheon area, we decided it was a perfect chance to visit Boseong . 


We went to the most famed plantation, Daehan Dawon, and although there are others in the area, they are apparently not nearly as impressive as Daehan Dawon. This plantation covers 1.7 million m2 with a farming area of 5.7 million m2 and 5.8 million tea plants-in other words, it is huge! Daehan Dawon has become quite a popular tourist destination and when we got there at 10am, there were already so many people there. 


This plantation is beautiful and much more impressive than the Osulloc plantations in Jeju. The bushes reach all the way up the mountain, which gives a beautiful view of the farm. We walked up to the top, which was quite steep with many stairs and even ropes to help you. Thank goodness I changed into trainers from my slip slops, as they definitely wouldn’t have been practical and everyone was wearing trainers or hiking shoes. I am also pleased that we didn’t visit the plantation in summer as it would have been way too hot but was perfect in the warm autumn sun with a cool breeze. 


There are quite a few paths spanning over the plantation, and once you are off the main ones, it wasn’t too crowded. 



After we reached the top to admire the beautiful views, we wondered back down in the cool forests, passed a waterfall or 2 and headed for the café where we tried some green tea ice cream. 







They sell all sorts of green tea flavoured things. The ice cream was so delicious and we bought some green tea candy and chocolates too. 


I thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Boseong and I think another trip may be in order in the winter months when the rows of tea bushes are covered in snow. 

6 Oct 2014

Suncheon Bay and Garden Expo

Suncheon City is known as Korea’s eco city, and fittingly so. We caught a train to this southern city as part of one of our long weekends. It was a sort of the spur of the moment decision as the holiday weekend crept up on us and with no plans, we took the advice of one of Dean’s teachers and headed to this coastal city. We were a little apprehensive as Suncheon barely featured in my Korean tour book but it was worthwhile visit and should perhaps be given more credit. Suncheon is near Yeosu and the train ride is just over an hour from Jeonju. 

Suncheon Bay Ecological Park is Korea’s first coastal wetland and it is listed as one of the world’s 5 major wetlands. The wetland plays an important role to migratory birds and is teeming with fauna like crabs and mudskippers. 

At the top of the hill in the background is the Yongsan Observatory.
There are boardwalks that snake over the reads with look-out spots to watch for birds and look at the mud below to see the hundreds of crabs. Walking across the wetlands you get to a rather steep hill that you can walk up to reach the Yongsan Observatory and get a good view of the wetlands. The round-trip to the observatory was a good 40 minutes and thank goodness for the breeze and the drop in humidity as the walk was rather steep and tiresome. 


Some beautiful views from the top-looking over the wetlands and to the farmlands in the distance.
Another of Suncheon’s sites is Suncheon Bay Garden. This garden was host to the 2013 World Garden Expo and is still open to the public and well maintained. Another World Expo I had never heard of, but the Garden Expo was started 150 years ago in Europe and it showcases different gardens and flora from around the world.  I think there was a ticket special while we were there as we bought tickets for 2500 won that allowed us entrance into both Suncheon Bay Eco Park and Suncheon Bay Garden, so it was a great cheap visit! 



The garden is absolutely huge and you could definitely spend a good couple hours walking around. As we got there towards the end of the day, we only had about 2.5hours to explore and we didn’t come close to seeing it all. 


There are 2 sides to the garden and they are connected by the “Bridge of Dreams”. The one side is filled with themed gardens from around the world and the other is where the Korean garden, wetlands and more “wilder” gardens are. 

A view from the gardens towards Suncheon City in the background.

The Bridge of Dreams. The walls are covered with thousands of tiles of drawings done by Korean
school kids and they have drawn their dreams.
As a person who loves flowers and nature, Suncheon was a great visit for me and I loved all the opportunities to take photos of the beautiful flowers. I’m definitely enjoying taking photos and learning a lot with my new camera!




A trip to Suncheon is an easy day trip from Jeonju although we did opt to spend the night at a motel as we planned on doing some more things in the area the next day. 

5 Oct 2014

Wondering the Ihwa Mural Village

On the actual day of Chuseok during our Chuseok in Seoul, we wondered around Ihwa Mural Village. It was a great idea for Chuseok day as many things in Seoul were closed and the Ihwa Mural village is simply an array of murals scattered around a neighborhood. The village is set on Naksan and the neighborhood winds up the “mountain” with many alley ways, steps and steep paths. 


The murals around the Ihwa village were painted as part of a project by the Korean Ministry of Culture and Tourism in an effort to promote the area and make it a bit of a tourist destination. 


As the area is a real neighborhood and home to many residents, it was peaceful and quiet. It was nice escape to be away from the busyness that is Seoul, so much that it doesn't feel much like you are in Seoul anymore. There were only a few tourists taking pictures and walking around and unfortunately as it was Chuseok, most of the quaint looking cafes were closed. 


As you can tell by this heavy picture-fulled blog post, I definitely recommend a visit to the Ihwa mural village if you are in Seoul. There are many murals to be spotted, and believe it or not, these are only a handful of them. The village is easy to access and just near the Hyehwa subway station. My word of advice is, wear practical shoes as there are many many stairs. 


My blog has moved

You will be automatically redirected to the new address where you can still find all the Jeonju Living Posts :).

If that does not occur, please visit http://handfulsofmoments.com/blog'.