Busan, South Korea

My introduction to South Korea, (the 69th country I've visited, depending on which counting site you use) wasn't that pleasant. I arrived at Busan International airport, managed to get first in line for immigration which is when I realised I hadn't been given a landing card and customs form to complete. You get these on the airline, but I spent the whole journey snoozing, so I had to source forms and by the time I had completed I was well and truly at the back of the queue. 

South Korea flag (before anyone spots it, I know it is from the back)

Once picking up my bag I hit a problem. The first stop in an airport is always to withdraw local currency from an ATM (my bank Norwich and Peterborough allow free foreign currency withdrawals and is a MUST for any savvy traveler) however none of the 9 ATM's I tried were VISA compatible. There was a 10th which promisingly had the word Global above the screen, but sadly it also had a sheet of A4 stuck to the screen with Korean writing which I took to mean 'out of order'. 

By now it was getting late, (about 21:30) and all the money exchange places had packed up for the night. I had $44 USD but couldn't change it. Thankfully the airport staff let me pass back through customs back to the baggage collection area where an exchange office was still open. With South Korean Won I was able to catch the metro to my apartment.

My apartment in Busan (7th floor)

I was staying with a family which I had organised through AirB&B. The condominium was a luxury pad and I had my own room. The bed however was traditional Korean style with a mat about the thickness of a duvet on the floor which you could heat up. It was quite a hard bed but all was nice and clean.

Korean style bed didn't do my back a lot of good

Getting money was my first objective the next day, so I set off to find an international bank, Citibank was just around the corner, but these didn't accept VISA cards either. I began to worry my $44 USD worth of currency wasn't going to last long. When I eventually found a bank, the Industrial Bank of Korea, that worked as the cash machine made the sound it make just before it gives you the money I made an audible cheer and a camp mini fist pump, such was my relief.

Finding breakfast was a challenge, no menu's were in English and no-one could help me out. I found a cafe that had pictures and ordered what I presume to be a spicy mixed noddle salad. Very nice it was. The girls in the cafe watched me struggle with chop sticks for a while before handing me a fork. Had they not have done I could still have been in the restaurant now finishing off that breakfast.

Korean style breakfast - the red stuff was spicy

With that drama out of the way I could walk to the beach. On the way I found a small square with a hot spring running through it. Mostly old Koreans were there relaxing with feet in the spring listening and singing along to a singer who was belting songs out via huge speakers.

Hot springs in the park

The beach was nice and big with many sand sculptures been made. The place was clearly gearing up for the summer season when the beach is sun parasol to sun parasol. The day I was there it only had a handful of people dotting about. The sea was very cold when I had a little paddle.

Busan Beach

Busan had some very impressive buildings and is clearly a place of wealth. Looking at some of the yachts in the harbour some of them wouldn't have looked out of place in the South of France

Plenty of money about in Busan

I'd read up quite a bit about South Korea and one thing I wanted to try was a Jjimjillbang. I read that one of if not the best ones of these was located in Busan, housed over three floors in the largest department store in the world. A Jjimjillbang is a spa, half of which is gender segregated with a strict no clothes policy and the other half is mixed where you get given some shorts and a T-shirt to wear.

The male only part is the 'wet' area which has many bathing pools ranging from very cold through to too hot to sit in for long.  It also has a wide range of hydrotherapy pools, saunas and steam rooms. The etiquette is to shower in front of everyone (naked of course) using a coarse cloth to scrub yourself all over, it was like taking a scrubbing brush to your skin. From the moment I got into the changing room I was confronted with naked men everywhere who were parading and not giving a care in the world, lets just say I found it all quite uncomfortable.

Getting into the hydrotherapy pools was also uncomfortable as you had jets of hot water pummeling you EVERYWHERE and of course I didn't have swimming shorts on for protection. My ticket into the spa was about £7 and entitled me to 4 hours stay. I didn't hang around long in the gender segregated area and felt a lot more comfortable once I had donned my outfit and headed into the mixed area.

Me complete with clothes in the foot spa

I was loads better in the dry area where it housed around a dozen themed sauna's all of which had explanations in English what qualities they did for you. I was much more relaxed and could talk to the others at the spa (those that could speak English).

The main common meeting room in the spa

I tried each room, some I stayed in for longer than others as some were uncomfortably hot. Others were ultra relaxing. I particularly enjoyed the Roman Room, the Pyramid room, the SEV Room and the Yellow Earth Room. In the end I was rushing to sign out before my 4 hours were up. I felt ultra clean and relaxed, well worth the money, still not quite got over the naked experience yet though.

One of the Sauna Rooms in the mixed area 

Choosing a restaurant for the evening wasn't easy. There were hundreds just across the road from where I was staying but most of them just served up massive dishes, by massive I mean enough for 4. Dining alone isn't something that they cater for. I found a place with pictures and a brief description of what the dish was, I went for spicy sausage soup and in true tradition style it came with loads of side dishes. I washed this all down with a hite beer, and no, nobody had scratched the S from the beers title.

Korean style evening meal for one

I had big tourism plans for the next day which was to be my last in Busan, most of which didn't materialise due to a slow start in the morning and a very extended lunch break. I visited the fish market which had loads of sea-food nicely arranged. I called into the raw market where you could pick your fish and they would chop it up and present it to you on a plate. The chef's around here had an easy job, no need for any cooking just a knife. I was very tempted to try it, but just like the previous evening you couldn't just order a small amount.

Shell-fish at the fish market

Octopus still wriggling about in the raw fish market

After reading about one bloke in the main market that was very helpful I headed for Jacky's seafood stall. He did me a deal prepared me half a squid dish and half an octopus dish. He had a stove and cooked most of it, but left some raw for me to try. It was all delicious but again so much food. He told me that the locals have Soju with fish. Soju is a very cheap white rice liquor that is between 17 and 40% alcohol. It comes in 35ml bottles which was always going to take time for me to drink on my own.

My first bottle of Soju

My seafood lunch with all the trimmings

My meal was massive and took my ages to get through. The trimmings included sea snails which after closing my eyes and going for it I quite liked them. So helpful was the guy at the restaurant he decided once I'd broken the back of the dish to announce that he would make me a fish soup for free. I said OK but only a small amount as I was already full. What came out was a massive pot of soup which was bubbling away on a stove on my table, This was 4 or 5 large bowl fulls and took another hour of so to polish off. What a lunch, a great experience but it did kind of ruin my big plans for the rest of the day.

The tourist Information (which is excellent in all of South Korea) showed me a tower to go up and it was in walking distance. It was slow going walking the lunch and Soju off but Busan Tower offered fine views of the city as it was a very clear day.

Busan Tower

One more tower selfie

Busan Tower and statue

I had asked many people I'd met where next to visit in South Korea. I had 14 days in total so still had 11 nights before my big adventure was to be over. Most people advised me to go to an island just off the south coast of South Korea Jeju-do. It sounded a very nice place but required a flight to and from and I wanted to mainly stick to land travel. I opted for a Jeonju, which is a touristy traditional style place located north-west of Busan famed for delicous local food. It was a 4 hour bus ride, but the bus was very comfortable and the scenery was lovely.

Next stop Jeonju