A quick trip

Busan is where I asked to be stationed on my application to be a teacher in Korea. For many reasons I'm glad it didn't work out, but I've been wanting to go there since I got here. There was never a good time or as much time off as I thought I needed. Plus, Kenneth works most Saturdays so I would have had to go on my own. So, last weekend when he had the whole weekend off, I booked us a hotel and train tickets and we were off!

It actually wasn't that smooth. I booked a hotel Friday morning without checking the train tickets. Because I left it so late, all the good train times were gone. Normally it's a 3 hour train ride. we had to take a 5 hour one that didn't get us there until 1:00 on Saturday afternoon. When we got to the hotel, they didn't have our reservation. I showed them the email confirmation I received from priceline.com who I booked through. Turns out, because I used my credit card earlier in the week to pay for my Nigerian tourist visa, my credit card company froze he card becuase of all the Nigerian scams out there. So, even though I got an email confirmation the payment didn't actually go through. It took a while to sort that all out. We got a room, but it ended up being so much later in the day than would be ideal to tour a city. But, we made the most of it.

Smoothies for the train ride

Excessive packaging for this disgusting vegan blueberry crumble cake.

We hit up Korea's most famous beach (I purposefully booked the hotel right near the beach knowing I wanted us to spend a lot of time there.), Haeundae Beach. It was beautiful even in Fall. We walked along the beach as the sun set, watching kids play in the sand. I don't think I've ever worn shoes on a beach before - first time for everything!

I love how the waves left lines in the sand.

This man was fishing. We thought he was ridiculous fishing on the shore,

 but he caught one as we walked by!

Later, we went to the aquarium which featured a mermaid show.

My kind of penguin

Nemo

That evening, we went for really terrible Mexican food. Either it was Koreans not knowing what goes in a taco, or they were trying too hard to be unique. They featured nachos with corn and Parmesan on them. A lot of items had eggs and bacon on them. We found a few things to eat, but it wasn't amazing. Luckily earlier in the day we had a great burger and chicken Caesar salad!

I took Sudafed and then drank a Long Island iced tea. Oops!

There is a famous fish street that I wanted to avoid. Instead, we ended up walking right down it. Luckily, it was midnight so half of the shops were closed. But, many of these eel restaurants were open. Not my thing!

The next morning we went to a beautiful temple on the water. It was really beautiful!

Starbucks holiday drinks cheers in the back of the taxi!

On the way up to the temple, they had some delicious snacks to try.

Loved these zodiac statues, especially the one with the scarf.

Shrine to offer blessings for traffic safety.

 I touched his belly. Does that mean I'm pregnant? I failed sex ed. 

A couple making a water offering

I really like this pic

And this one

Altogether it was a quick trip, but a fun trip. I was able to get us train tickets on the way back on the quick train, which was smart move on my part. Sunday ride home on the train should be as short as possible! I'm really glad I got to go