We woke up around 6:00 as our laundry from last night wasn’t totally dry (even after hanging up the clothing on any surfaces and hanging spots we could find overnight), which was preventing us from finishing our packing. Caitlyn threw the laundry in the dryer for a quick 30 minute cycle while we finished getting ready for the day. We chugged some coffees and waters to clear our fridge, and kept on packing. David also took a Zofran to proactively prevent nausea on the boat. Caitlyn was feeling very tired after a poor night sleep (along with some sleep anxiety on nights before big travel) but she trooped through and we got out early at 7:20am for our 9:00 ferry to Busan. We called a taxi as the only other option was walking 30 minutes, with no reasonable public transportation to get to the port.
We arrived right in front of the international port and walked right in to see a huge winding line for the check-in. We jumped in line with our heavy bags (probably around 35 lb for David on his shoulders, and 35 for Caitlyn on her shoulders and an extra 10-15lbs between her purse and a small backpack she carries) and waited for probably 40 minutes, getting sore and sweaty. We finally got to the front around 8:10 or so, turned around and saw that the line was twice as long as when we had arrived. We were thankful to show early, as the website said to arrive 1 hr before departure, but Caitlyn was nervous so we added a good bit of wiggle room. Check-in was super fast and easy, only needing our email with the ferry info and our passports. We even got to choose our own seat area and seat type (one leaned all the way back for sleeping, but they didn’t have any window seats, so we chose the ones that were a little wider but only reclined about 45° but had a window seat). We bought these tickets well over a month ago, and forgot what they included, but remembered that we paid around $15 USD extra per person for reserved seating, as David’s experience on a ferry in Greece was a little tricky for seating.
We went through the walkway and onto the boat, where we learned our tickets were actually on the “premium floor”. This meant huge space for our seats, charger ports next to us, free luxury snacks, and multiple free alcoholic beverages with the best view on the ferry.
Shortly after 9, we were off! We soaked in our last sights of Japan as we made our way out of the port
Unfortunately, the weather was very rough, going through multiple storms rocking the boat in every direction. David instantly became seasick, focusing in on his phone to ignore the rocking of the boat. David took a popped on a motion sickness patch (too late, though…4 hrs for full effect on a 4 hr ferry), and focused all he could on not getting sick. Thankfully, a few days back, Matty B advised David to start drinking when he gets motion sick, as alcohol works really well with his vertigo. David felt almost too nauseous to drink, but after a few beers, the nausea completely vanished! Internet was supposed to be available, but it wasn’t super reliable so instead of working on the blog, we watched The Big Short, which David had downloaded to offline Netflix. It was a fantastic movie and we both highly recommend it. Along the way, we sampled the sweet treats Caitlyn had picked up from the department store, and saved our provided boxes of treats from the ferry for another travel day. We tried a sweet potato wafer which you pipe a sweet custard into (very tasty in both of our opinions!) and a colorful unknown treat, which we hated with a passion, as it seemed to just be a block of sugar bound with a gelatinous substance with a whisper of minty-ness.
As we approached Busan, another storm hit, but we were able to get a slight view of the magnificent port city. We wished we could have seen it with better weather conditions, as it was very impressive.
We finally arrived around 20 minutes late and grabbed our bags that they stored for us and got off the boat. 30 minutes of customs and border patrol and we finally get into the station.
We were planning on finding Korean sim cards in a store somewhere, as websites indicated only the airports allowed pre-orders or sold prepaid cards, but luckily enough there was a KT store in the port terminal (David researched and found that KT was the best option for us). We purchased two 20 day sim cards, which were pretty easy to install, and they also gave us two empty transit cards for busses/trains/subway. The sim cards gave us lightning quick data and offer 3gb of super fast data, then a 512mb speeds of “slow” data PER DAY. We wanted to find an ATM and get some money, but there was none in sight. We tried the taxi app recommended through our research, but it wouldn’t accept the phone number listed on our sim card. We went back and forth between the KT mobile and the tourism information office, before they finally met up together to try to resolve our issues. They told us that the nearest ATM was a 10 minute walk to Busan station (trains and buses) but under a pedestrian walkway for most of it. As far as the taxi app went, it requires a Korean phone number, and our sim cards do give us a phone number, but not one that would work in the app. This whole process, partially due to having to use Google Translate for everything, took well over an hour. We finally decided to walk to Busan station and grab money and try to fill our transit cards. It should be mentioned that Google Maps does not work well in South Korea, so we are also trying to figure out how to navigate and where we can find any buses or trains to take us to our destination. It also should be mentioned that these apps are heavily written in Korean, and many of the English spellings will not work when input, making it very difficult to find where to go to get to our hotel. It was raining, but the lady at information was correct and it was mostly covered. We took in the view of the towering buildings while making our way to the station.
We finally get to the station, our backs, necks, and shoulders super sore from having the bags on for so long, and ready to get on some transport and get to the hotel. We started looking for two things: an ATM, and a convenience store to top off our cards (the back of the card lists a few that will help). We go to information and they don’t really understand, but eventually with the translate app, we get pointed in an approximate direction of both an ATM and a convenience store. We walked in the suggested direction, but after searching for 30 minutes or so, we have absolutely no luck. We had read online that you can find ATMs at 711 and other convenience stores as in Japan, but every one we went to had neither ATM or transit top off machines. We return to information, asking again. The gentleman points in a direction eventually, just as the last person. We try to get more specifics, and after a few minutes, he finally leaves from behind the desk and takes us to an ATM. As for the convenience store, we gave up asking and put it on the back burner. The ATM does have an English option, but it is very confusing and keeps rejecting all of our cards. We eventually learn that we had to click some strange button rather than the one seeming to be a credit card, and finally get some cash. We thought we would probably get a taxi because we couldn’t figure out the cards, when we see a machine that says “transit card” on it!! It was a short line, but right as it was about to be our turn, we see that it says “no top off or refill” and we realize it only dispenses new empty cards. Our morale was about as low as it has been at this point. Lost, confused, only just able to get any money, sore as ever, and feeling very warm at this point with our backpacks and the fact that we had gotten used to the luxurious high A/C everywhere in Japan and in South Korea it is much more mild. We were pretty exhausted and frustrated, so David told Caitlyn to sit and try to figure out how to get home, and he would take the cards and figure out how to reload at a convenience store. It had been well over 2 hours since getting off the ferry at this point, and our bags were extremely uncomfortable. David’s arm was going numb from the weight, and Caitlyn had to switch to carrying her bag on her front as her upper traps were killing her and getting a rash from the pressure. Eventually finding one listed on the back of the cards, yet not seeing a machine inside, David waited in a huge line until finally getting to the front. Asking the attendant how to refill the card, the attendant pointed to a small sign saying “transit card refills. Cash only”. David handed the attendant the two cards and two 10,000 won bills, and the attendant refilled them using his device behind the counter. Finally, mystery solved, and some good news that we both figured it out and had gone to an ATM prior and gotten paper money! Reunited and with money on our transit cards, we worked together to eventually find a subway line that will transport us within 15 minutes or so of our hotel. We began to navigate to the subway station, and work our way through the tunnels, attempting to familiarize ourselves with our new map apps and the Korean subway system. I eventually we found the correct train, though it was packed and we had to ride the whole distance still carrying our bags. We got off, and of course, we had trouble finding the exit, navigating through an underground market. We finally find exit 7, and with the slightly remaining sense of humor, we laughed a little at the enormous stairway going up (we counted…73 stairs). To no surprise, it was raining above ground. We couldn’t figure out how to get the map to display realtime information consistently, so we did get a little lost and went too far. No worries though, it was only a slight detour and we figured it out quickly. We FINALLY got to our hotel around 4:00pm, 3 hours after getting off the ferry (and wearing our bags for 95% of this time). We got up to the room and could barely appreciate that the size of this room is actually HUGE. It is easily double the size of our biggest hotel room in Japan, and even would be considered large for a standard American hotel. We dropped our bags and practically fell onto the floor. After breathing and letting our bodies rest for a minute, we got up and showered, and then laid on the bed and napped.
We got up after a direly needed rest, and got back out around 7:00pm to go grab some dinner (neither of us had a meal today, with Caitlyn only having a few small bites of snacks on the ferry and David holding off entirely due to the nausea).
We found a Korean BBQ place a few blocks away and translated the menu, deciding to share the smallest pork BBQ. They brought out plenty of sides at first, and quickly came with hot coals and the meat. We weren’t sure if we would be handling the cooking or if they would, as we have had it both ways in America, but this time they handled all of the cooking of the meats and vegetables. We were thankful as we didn’t know how to do it as well here, and we were both so exhausted that it was nice to just turn off. The food was pretty good, but our server/chef messed up the coals some and had to replace them, which did overcook the meat a good bit.
It was still pretty early by the time we finished, and we figured we should at least explore the area around our hotel before going to bed. We walked around, taking in the night life and eventually grabbing our iced coffees and some waters before heading back around 9:30. We worked on the blog some and relaxed for a while, our bodies not yet letting us sleep as we had taken a nap recently. Eventually around midnight we went to bed and got the most deserved sleep ever after an absolutely exhausting day both physically and mentally.
Caitlyns thoughts of the day: my first reaction in Korea: people are pushier, people are not as friendly or helpful, there is much more staring if you are white, and there is much less sense of order as compared to our time in Japan. Traveling day is always hard, but these things became much more apparent as we tried to navigate the bus station, find the ATM, get to the subway, get on and have enough room for us and our bags on subway cars, and to navigate the streets to our hotel. After a short nap and a shower and feeling more refreshed to hit the city, I still noticed these same things but my perception changed from it being a hinderance to me lugging my baggage to a hotel to instead being the way of the Korean culture and something I embraced.
Davids thoughts of the day: The first day in a new country has been bad 2x in a row, now. Travel is super exhausting, especially with our bags. The mental aspect of figuring out a new language, culture, and how to do simple things like find a bathroom, find an atm, fill out transport cards, and figure our how to work new apps also adds to the exhaustion and difficulty. We were aware of this feeling this time, and did our best to be positive, but it was still so challenging. Just as in Japan day 1, it did prevent us some from starting things off by initially enjoying the country.
Steps walked: 11,120
Miles walked: 5.33
Bluming Travelers 