South Korea 2022 Day 3: Jeju
DAY 3: 28 NOV 2022
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| Cliffs at Seopjikoji Coastal Walk |
A new day has begun!
After checking out, we realised our airbnb was surrounded by tangerine farms.
I could literally pluck a tangerine but nah...that will not be nice of me to do that.
Before going to bed last night, I searched for suitable cafes nearby for breakfast.
Seogwipean bakery (서귀피안 베이커리) came up during my search on Naver and it opens at 8am.
The bakery was conveniently located along our route to Seopjikoji.
The parking lot was rather empty when we arrived.
It started to rain and the winds got stronger the moment we parked our car.
We made the right decision of having breakfast before sightseeing.
We arrived at 9am and some pastries such as their signature croissants were unavailable as they were only baked between 9 - 11am.
I got myself a hot dog bun while Zhi Sheng got the red bean bread.
Initially, we didn't have the intention to get a drink.
However, the staff politely informed us that we each had to get a drink and hence, I got a cafe latte while Zhi Sheng got a hot chocolate.
After ordering, the staff will issue a buzzer to you, take your bread tray and prepare the drinks.
While waiting for our drinks, we chose an indoor table with sea view.
We could see the dark clouds slowly moving away as we had our breakfast.
The sun started peeking through the clouds and we were good to go!
Off we went to Seopjikoji (섭지코지).
We had to pay a small fee of 1,000 - 2,000 krw for parking.
The coastal walk was beautiful and comparable to some of the Aussie coastal walks I have been to.
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| All In filming location |
Seopjikoji was also the filming site for a famous kdrama "All In".
This was one of my first kdramas I watched with my family.
It was the era where we bought or rented dvd or vcr to watch drama series!
We continued to stroll along the coastal pathways towards the lighthouse.
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| Stairs leading to the lighthouse |
Having enjoyed the scenery from the lighthouse, we continued to walk further ahead and found an area where Seongsan Ilchulbong stood in the background.
That was when we realised there was another carpark which was probably free.
We then walked over to an arc swing near the museum for some photos.
As we were running a tight schedule today, we decided to make our way back to the car and head to our next destination: Seongeup Folk Village (성읍민속마을).
I remembered visiting a folk village during my last visit to Jeju with a tour company and I thought it will be nice for Zhi Sheng to see a folk village here.
The drive took about 30 minutes.
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| Canola flower field |
Admission to the village is free.
The folk village was quiet with only a handful of tourists which is good because people were staying here too.
After wandering around the folk village, we moved on to our next location:
Ttarabi Oreum (따라비오름).
Parasitic cone in korean is known as oreum and we found this place on Google Maps.
The drive was relatively short from the folk village, however, we had to take a small road which was narrow and bumpy.
Thank goodness we did not meet any oncoming car along this stretch of road.
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| Ttarabi Oreum |
We were surprised to see a few cars parked at the carpark because this place is really ulu.
All of them were locals who went on the hiking trail.
We decided against going up the trail and took pictures near the entrance of the oreum.
If you are not interested in hiking up the oreum, I suggest that you give this oreum a miss and spend more time at other attractions.
After 10 minutes, we left the oreum for Boromwat, a floral park.
As usual, it started pouring when we arrived at our destination.
After pondering for some time, we decided not to enter the park because it was 1pm then and we had 2 more places to visit with long drives in between.
And so, we drove to our lunch place: Myeongjin Abalone (명진전복)
We parked at the free parking area outside the restaurant and headed to the restaurant.
The restaurant was full with many waiting outside at 1.30pm.
The menu is pasted on the restaurant walls and it has pictures to help non-Koreans understand what the items mean.
We filled in our order slip and passed it back to the staff.
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| Rainbow after the rain |
While waiting for our turn, we walked along the pedestrian walkway by the coast.
I spotted a rainbow from afar and remembered the many rainbow encounters I had in Perth.
After about 25 minutes of waiting, we finally got a table.
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| Grilled Abalone |
This was what we ordered:
Grilled abalones (30,000 krw)
Abalone sizzling stone pot rice (15,000 krw)
Rice porridge with abalone (12,000 krw)
The grilled abalones were the star at our table.
Chewy yet tender and juicy.
The fish came as a set with what we ordered which we were not aware of.
We truly thought they sent it to our table by mistake.
Zhi Sheng does not like to eat fish with bones so I picked out meat without bones for him.
Unfortunately, I was not successful at times haha.
He stopped eating the fish after having fish bones in his mouth, oops.
It was a feast for us but we managed to finish most of our food!
This was my best meal for our entire trip and I am still thinking about the grilled abalones...
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| Wind turbines |
After a sumptuous meal, we headed to our last attraction of the day:
Manjanggul cave (만장굴)
The cave is located North of Jeju and we are making a detour today due to yesterday's change in itinerary.
The entrance fee is 4,000 krw for adults and it takes about 50 minutes to explore the cave.
The last admission time during winter is 4pm.
There were about 109 steps down to the cave.
Yes I counted because I was so done with stairs after Hallasan.
As you go deeper into the cave, the temperature gradually drops.
It is definitely advisable for you to bring a jacket as the temperature dropped by at least 5 deg C.
The walk in the cave was relatively easy even though the ground was wet and also uneven due to the lava flow before it solidified.
We were pretty lucky to be around a particular group of visitors as light shows were operated during their cave tour.
We stopped to watch some of the shows!
We were done with the cave at around 4.15pm and slowly made our way to our airbnb in Seogwipo.
The both of us were looking for 2-storey apartments or studios during our stay in Jeju.
Tonight's airbnb is a duplex apartment and we paid S$105 for one night.
Zhi Sheng contacted the host and informed him of our estimated arrival time.
The drive there took at least 1.5 hours.
It was the toughest and craziest drive this trip because we not only had to drive along the mountainous route in the dark but also in fog and rainy conditions amidst all the speed cameras.
Kudos to Zhi Sheng for driving well!
Our airbnb had a private parking lot right next to our home entrance.
We met our hosts and they shared about some house rules and how to use the heaters etc.
We were only a 10 minutes' drive away from the market.
Thank goodness we had the car GPS because it had the option of navigating to the carpark directly.
It will be challenging to find the carpark entrance on without that function as we were literally weaving through lanes after lanes before reaching the entrance.
The market had many food and souvenir stalls, including stalls selling Jeju oranges and tangerines.
I felt that it was slightly more crowded here compared to Dongmum market.
We had a tough time deciding what to take away and decided to go with the stalls with the longest queues.
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| Korean fried chicken stall |
As we were still full from lunch, we bought 2 food items and drinks from the convenience store.
Most of the patrons at the fried chicken stall were koreans.
Zhi Sheng was the only foreigner and the ahjusshi told him a queue number which he didn't understand.
Thankfully, the ahjusshi remembered Zhi Sheng as the foreigner in the queue.
When it was our turn, he called out "foreigner" in Korean and passed him the fried chicken.
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| Black pork with abalone |
Our first dish is black pork with abalone (10,000 krw).
The staff were generous with the amount of fillings.
These were deep fried till it was crunchy on the outside but still moist on the inside.
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| Sweet chicken |
The second dish was sweet chicken (7,000 krw).
The staff coated the chicken with batter before deep frying them.
Thereafter, the chicken were brought to another wok to coat the outer layer with sweet sauce.
The chicken was still crispy when we ate it back in our airbnb!
This was the best fried chicken we had on this trip.
How can I go on a trip without trying the local beer?
I bought the Jeju wit ale for 4,000 krw to go with the chicken and black pork.
Tastes like your regular pale ale.
We were watching the South Korea vs Ghana world cup group stage match while having our dinner.
It was a deja vu moment for me when Ghana scored while I was in the toilet yet again.
*Sighs*
Anyway, that's the end of day 3!
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