Already time for another travel day?? We awoke nice and early to finish up packing before heading out to our next stop – Gyeongju. While checking the room and making sure not to leave anything behind, we noticed that the fridge had a little surprise for us. We must have forgotten about a little bit of soju left in a bottle near the back, so Caitlyn proudly filled her mug and enjoyed her packing juice.
We left with a lot of extra time, as we could only buy bus tickets at the station itself and not online and didn’t want to risk being stuck in Busan. These travel days seem to be getting easier and easier as far as how heavy and burdensome our bags feel. Thankfully the bus station was just off of the subway line, so it wasn’t too tricky to find.
They had plenty of available busses to Gyeongju and plenty of seats, so we bought tickets for one leaving in about a half hour. The terminal had a few small cafes and convenience stores, so we grabbed some drinks, a cream cheese flavored bread treat, and a small packaged hotdog with onion and cheese sauce for breakfast. The hotdog was not great, but the bread was amazing. We ate quickly and kept our eyes out for the bus. When it arrived, we tried to figure out where to put our bags, and the driver pointed to the luggage bays on the side and said “pull!” We loaded our bags in the only compartment with room, and hopped on the bus to our assigned seats.
The seats were incredibly spacious with plenty of leg room. These intercity bus drivers are also much more calm, making it a pretty easy and scenic drive. After about an hour, the bus pulls into a station, but only a few people stood up to get off. We were confused as Naver Maps seemed to indicate we were in the correct area, but as far as we understood the bus only went as far as this station. Anyways, we hopped off, grabbed our bags, and the bus left the second we closed the luggage bag door.
Looking around and confirming with Naver, we did get off at the correct station. Luckily, our hotel was a mere 4 minute walk, and the weather was holding up nicely. Gyeongju is a very different city from Busan. It is much more modest and “real”, with tons of family owned restaurants in every block. Instead of 100-story skyscrapers, 10 and 12 story hotels dominate the skyline. Soaking in the new scenery and in great moods, we made the short walk.
We arrive at the G House hotel, and as we assumed, were told we could leave our bags and come back to check in around 3:00 (it was around 1:00). We left our bags and headed out to start knocking things off of our list.
Gyeongju is known as Korea’s “museum without walls”, being home to loads of UNESCO World Heritage sites as well as dozens upon dozens of other historically significant areas. Ready to have some lunch, which headed towards Hwangnidan-Gil street, our first stop in Gyeongju. This area felt like a small beach town. Tons of cute shops and restaurants on every street with tourists driving around in these small golf cart-like vehicles.
We passed by dozens of restaurants that we made note of for lunches or dinners, eventually deciding on one restaurant that looked like a good meal at a good price. We walk in and are seated and given an English menu. We decide that at the prices they offered for such impressive looking food, we would each order a meal and share. We got the steak tartare bulgogi bowl and a meal with brisket, scallop, and bokchoi.
The sides come out looking amazing, and with some new ones we haven’t yet had. One of our favorites was a cold dish with small cubes and pieces of some type of meat with a delicious red paste. We didn’t know what this was, but a few days later we learned it was “changnan-jeot”, or fermented pollock intestines. This is definitely one of the cases where it was too delicious to care what it is. The server asked if we wanted to cook the meats and bok choi or if she should, and we decided to let her do the work. She set up a small gas range on our table and translated “you should sit inside, hot oil splatter” and we realized that she was advising us to move over to the seats next to us as to not get covered in oil during the cooking process. A few short minutes later, the food was ready. She showed us how it should be eaten, with a piece of brisket on the bottom, then a sliver of scallop, a piece of bok choi, some wasabi, then our choice of one of three condiments on top. The tartare bowl was also delicious and came with a huge amount of beef.
We ate as much as we could, and just about finished everything. Back to the streets, we walked around for a while before the weather looked like it was taking a turn for the worse. We decided to pivot the plans today for something indoors, but figured we would walk back to the hotel first to check in. In the way out, Caitlyn grabbed a coffee as energy is a rare commodity in travel days. Our walk back took us through a park filled with giant grass mounds that appeared more man-made than natural. Our research, and as confirmed by the plaques, told us that these were ancient burial mounds. These varied in size, but were absolutely massive. We wanted to appreciate them more, but the sky was darkening more and more and we knew we could come back as the park was in close proximity to our hotel.
We checked in, surprised that they did not ask for ID or a passport for the first time. Up to the 5th floor to our room. The room was fairly large, but extremely simple and devoid of any charm. The bathroom was a large shower room with all of the utilities in one area and a drain in the floor. The bedroom had a small desk in the corner and the only amenities were a comb, a hairdryer, and a tube of toothpaste. The small TV did turn on, but we couldn’t figure out how to get it to any stations, so we gave up on that. Looking out our window, we saw it was pouring at this point, so we planned to start with the Gyeongju National Museum.
Umbrellas in hand, we walked to the bus stop and eventually load on to the bus. Within 15 or 20 minutes, we got to the museum bus stop. We were delighted to see that it was free admission, but a little disheartened to see that the museum is a series of buildings that we would have to walk between, as well as outdoor monuments and statues.
We quickly head into the closest building and see that it is the Silla history building. We learn a bit about this ancient Korean kingdom, and look at all of the different stone tools, bronze knives, and other interesting artifacts. The first half of our visit was awesome…until the children arrived. Dozens and dozens of roughly 5-12 year olds in multiple school tour groups came barrelling in, completely ignoring the rules posted to be quiet in the museum. Now, we know that kids will be kids, but the chaperones did absolutely nothing. One kid kept loudly mooing at the top of his lungs. Unable to focus enough to read, and unable to see half of the exhibits with kids walking in front of us to push their faces up to the glass, we grew a bit frustrated. We noticed that many of the kids were FASCINATED with us, staring more at us than the exhibits. Some came running up to us to say “hello” and wave, while others excitedly smiled at us and talked to their friends. Towards the end of the history hall, a lovely woman walked up to us and asked us where we were from. She was very excited, and introduced herself as a history student in college on a visit with her class. She was elated that as Americans, we wanted to learn about her country’s history. She asked us about our itinerary for the trip and confirmed that we had great plans. She was so kind and polite and had a great English vocabulary. After being so frustrated with the kids, this was exactly what we needed to boost our spirits. We parted ways and continued along.
We spent about 2 hours in total at the museum, running between the buildings to avoid the rain, until finally it was 6:00 which meant the museum closed. David’s favorite thing at the museum was an extremy old boat that they found at an embankment along with an oar. Caitlyn’s favorite thing was seeing the progression of stone tools from barely looking like the tool described (a “hammer” was just a rock that they found with markings showing it was used to repeatedly smash things) to being instantly recognizable as a tool such as a well-constructed knife. We headed back towards our hotel, stopping by a convenince store for some beer and soju. We forgot to mention it in Busan, but last night when in our room eating dinner, we had purchased a bottle of beer and had no bottle opener in our room. We spent a few minutes getting creative before opening it with a small pair of nail clippers and brute strength. Remembering our pain and all the cuts on our hands, we also purchased a tiny bottle opener. We walked about 10 minutes back to our hotel and hung out there for a little while. The rain wasn’t horrible anymore, and we wanted to get some dinner, so we started looking up some places to eat. Strangely enough, in this area of town, almost everything closed at 8:00pm. We eventually decided it would be easier to walk around and find a place with its lights on and work from there. While walking around the streets, we realized that Gyeongju bus drivers are equally as crazy, if not more than the ones in Busan. Around 5 full seconds after the light turned red, a bus came barrelling through the red light, not slowing down even a little. Thankfully we were on the other side of the road, so it wasn’t too close. This, in combination with how the cars here really don’t seem to care if you’re at a pedestrian walkway, led us to decide that we needed to be extra vigilant when walking around. We found a Korean BBQ place that looked good enough, and went inside. There weren’t many customers inside, and the man who came to seat us confirmed that we would be okay with being done by 9:00 (it was like 8:25). We told him thay was no problem, and sat at a table to look at the menu on the tablet. With no English option, we used our phones to translate, tapping “add item” as we went along. The second we had chosen two beverages and 2 meals, seemingly out of nowhere, the gentleman appeared and hit the submit button for us and walked back to the kitchen. We both held in laughter at his eagerness to get our order and get home, but we totally understand. We ordered a simple beef Korean BBQ and a side bowl of ramen for our 2nd dish. The sides and BBQ came out first. The sides were nice, and also had the fish side dish we had loved earlier (though not quite as good).
Caitlyn expertly cooked the BBQ while we awaited the ramen. Eventually the ramen was delivered, steaming and bubbling. The ramen was nice, and clearly used at minimum the noodles from a prepackaged noodle like you would get in a convenience or grocery store. We ate very quickly, using the garlic cup trick from earlier, and paid our bill right before they wanted to close. As the rain was still persisting, we decided to just head back home and get a good night sleep as opposed to heading back to a more populated area.
David’s thoughts of the day: In all if Japan we saw maybe 5 overweight or fat people. In South Korea, we saw well over that many in one day. South Korea is still very healthy compared to the USA, but it really shows how much the Japanese are thin and have healthy weights. Also, Koreans love corn. There are corn dishes at a lot of food stalls, and often things that probably don’t need corn have corn or corn flavor added.
Caitlyn’s thoughts of the day: Whereas in the USA, taking bus transportation is considered a slow method, it is definitely not the case in S. Korea. We did the intercity bus transportation from Busan to Gyeongju today, and we were flying down the highway passing cars left and right.
Steps walked: 18,627
Miles walked: 8.97
Bluming Travelers 