The map wasn’t updating as well as it should have been. I still got the GoPro up for the time lapse, but it would have been better to mount it earlier. I got the scenic side of the entry, but the ship turned away from the city. I did get some of the harbor traffic after we docked.
Looks close to the bridge….
We just made it. A bigger ship just isn’t going to make it into the port. This is why you can see the port guide showed the docking location so far away.
The one tour I wanted to take was cancelled before I could even book it, so I decided to say ____ it and go off on my own despite not having South Korean money.
Today’s port guide…
Today’s onboard activities:
The ship wanted $20 for a round trip bus to the city center, but if you could walk a football field (it’s really only like walking back and forth on the ship three times) you could arrive at the nearest metro station.
Today’s visa stamp, literally a sticker they put on the back of your passport.
I walked over to the metro station and found an expensive ATM to get 70,000 Won (a little over $50). I think it charged me nearly $5, but when you are saving money by not doing a tour through the ship it’s totally worth it.
I bought a day pass for the metro for 5,000 Won, a good deal – or so I thought.
I took the metro to the national university stop to change lines.
I found out that it was a different company and needed an additional ticket – 1,600 Won each way. Still reasonable.
After arriving at the station I grabbed a taxi and showed the driver the card I got from the visitor information people at the port that wrote the name of the temple in Korean for me.
A few minutes later I was at the Haedong Yonggung temple without walking very far at all. It was now almost 10 AM.
I spent about an hour at the temple. It was nice and I really liked the wish lanterns.
I grabbed a taxi to head back to the station, but they didn’t know where I wanted to go, luckily I had taken a picture of the train token and the driver figured it out.
I had about 12 minutes until the next train departed so I had time to use the bathroom before it arrived.
Once I got back to the normal metro I took it to the stop which appeared to be close to the cultural village.
In fact the Gamcheon cultural village was a hike uphill to get to it. There were some interesting things to see along the way while hiking.
I managed to find the entrance with the visitor center.
The visitor center sells a map for 2,000 Won. You need a map. With the map you can collect stamps at many different locations and get postcards.
One of the first stops was actually the best, it was on overlook of the area. They refer to it as the South Korean Macchu Pichu or Santorini, but it is really Cinque Terre.
I walked along the route and took a ton of pictures.
There was an interesting cotton candy place that made animals out of the cotton candy. They wanted 5,000 Won which I thought was a bit too expensive to make my dentist angry.
Luckily I didn’t fall for the “148 stairs to see stars”. It was just a bunch of stairs that make people dizzy for walking up them.
I didn’t take the longest route possible as I was feeling like I was running out of time.
At the end of the course I thought I could walk down the hill to a metro station – I was wrong – I had to walk back uphill to the starting point.
Luckily after the starting point it was all downhill to the metro station.
I took the metro to Jalgashi Market since I had a little time to spare. This fish market was huge and had everything including eels, skate, flounder, lobster, crab, crayfish, squid and who knows what. And it wasn’t on ice, they had live seafood. One batch of crab was literally trying to escape.
I walked to the next metro station and there was a bunch of underground shops. I wanted to make another stop, but I didn’t want to push my luck.
I took the metro to Busan Station, made my way through the station past the inflatable guide to the overpass.
I took a couple of pictures on the way back to the ship from the train station.
There was a neat design on the drains by the port.
Once on the ship I set the GoPro up for a time lapse of the departure. My mount broke (again), but luckily I had spares with me and I have the GoPro secured with a wire.
The fancy screens on the ship change every day and have really good representations of the ports the ships visit.
I had dinner in the main dining room. It was acceptable, but not spectacular. I had the pork dumplings and cherry tomato bruschetta for the starter and the roasted herb crusted striploin for my main.
For dessert I tried the Princess love boat dream which was pretty rich.
I went to rest for a bit before the magician, but what was supposed to be a short nap turned into the end of the day. I had whooped myself with who knows how many miles of walking.
Today’s timeline, a bit messed up because of having the phone on battery saving mode doesn’t keep the GPS on.
