Shan in Japan

China is a "way out" place! I haven't been able to update my blog as it seems my blog provider is black listed - as many sites are - by the tightly controlled media laws here. I can't even access major news sites - naturally, I'm talking about the ones that might criticize the Chinese government;-)

Anyway, this is just a test to see if I can update my blog through email. If successful, I'll try to get some photos and posts up soon.

Shazza in China.

http://imageevent.com/shanakin/korea

Some photos of Korea so far.

I've found this cool site where you can plot your travel location - so if any of the places sound unfamiliar to you, click on this: http://www.dokonano.com/shanakin/  I've also created a category for this on the left hand side -> might need to scroll down a bit.　　It's in Japanese but the place names and map is all English.

Four hours east of Seoul landed me in the small coastal town of Sokcho - not too far from the North Korean border.  I think I got the most plush bus ride in my life!  The bus had business class style "lazy boy" reclining seats. My travel buddy for Korea, Andy, kindly noted that comfort travel such as this is all down hill once I get to China;-)

After a busy few days in sweltering Seoul, it was great to get out and breath some fresh air!  Sokcho gave us access to Seorak-san.  This mountain range was really unique.  Reminded me a little of the Blue Mountains in Sydney.   We followed the river up through the valley and spent a night in a hikers shelter.  My silk sleeping bag worked a treat!  We had planned to spend another night there, but as the only food they sell is instant noodles, 3 meals of this made us motivated enough to reach the summit and zip back down by the end of the second day for a feast of Bibimbap.   This Mountain was amazing - will try to up some photos later. 

Back to Sokcho and looking for accomodation was a little bit of a mission.  Being a Saturday, peak summer holiday season we thought it would be hard to get a room.  That wasn't the problem though,  speaking Korean was.  Andy showed me how I need to improve my pantemime skills to get the message across!  It was quite a hilarious.  We ended up with a cheap room across from the bus stop.  I started studying basic Korean and I can see how easy it is to pick up after learning Japanese.

Breakfast consisted of heading down to the live fish markets, choose your fish and have it chopped instantly for you. The obasans in Korea are much more fiesty than in Japan.  One lady started grabbing my arm and poking me in the ribs to buy her fish.  I sheepishly moved on and thought about giving it a miss and going for a less adventurous breakfast.  Andy was keen though - just for the experience.  We picked out a squid, a flounder, some weird sea urchin thing that tasted like a half cooked bitter capsicum and one more creature, I can't remember.  I'm not a fan of raw squid, but this stuff was great.  It was super tender and still wriggling as we woffed it down with red chilly sauce and lettuce.  No skilled sashimi chefs here - the fish was boney and sometimes, scaley.  Enough said here. 

Had a dip in the sea, in my undies.  Water was clean and clear and the beach was nice - white sand.  I noticed there is a fence with huge bundles of barbed wire running along the whole coastline - at least for the northern part.  I guess they are concerned North Korean spies or defecters will be sneaking in during the night??!

I'm back in Seoul now.  After ringing a dozen ferry services telling me that all seats were booked up until the end of August, one place had just 2 seats remaining for this Fridays service from Incheon to Tianjin, China.  Visa should come through tomorrow.  Picked up a weathered copy of the Lonely Planet for China, along with first hand info from Andy and all set to go. 

Will be checking out the DMZ on Wednesday.  

BTW - Korean food is great, beer is not.... 

My Korean beer ranking is as follows: 1. Cass  2. O.B  3. Hite  4. Cafri

They all seem to be made by the same beer company and are watery and sweet.  Just doesn't hit the spot after a hot day like beer should.  Cass kind of passes as beer, but I would rather drink happoshu!  Soju is kind of sweet too.  I still need to do a bit more tasting before commenting on that though.

The first stop - Seoul.  It feels a little like Japan, but the language is different.  I've also found that Japanese is more useful than English here. 

Spent the last few days wandering about seeing all the tourist sites.  Eating lots of Kimchi and doing the usual touristy things.  It's a nice city.  Nothing mind-blowing, but just nice and easy to explore.  I find myself making comparisons and finding similarities between Seoul and Tokyo, or Japan.   It's also pretty cheap!  Who said Seoul was expensive?

Tomorrow I will be heading East to Sokcho on the coast.  Apparently there is an amazing national park there.  Desperate to get out of this heat!!  Might even meet up with an old friend from Nagoya university days this weekend.

Met up with a guy at the hostel who has been exactly where I intend on going - China, Vietnam etc.  He is heading on to Japan soon, so we have been busy exchanging information on each others experiences. 

Once my China visa is processed, I will be catching a boat over to Qingdao on Thursday next week.