One with the 'Island of the Gods'.

The next day after my arrival back to Korea, I was drained, and my eyes were constantly droopy for not getting a much needed rest. It was crazy having been deprived of sleep for a while, so I slept 12 hours straight. I wanted to sleep longer but I forced my way out of bed knowing I have urgent things to do. I did the laundry, sent things to the drycleaner's, caught up with my reading, and arranged stuff for our trip to Jeju the next day.

We woke up at 5:30 am the following day to catch our early flight. It didn't take more than an hour, and we were soon headed out of the airport. While Chris was making the reservation for the hot-air balloon ride, I was waiting in the car he rented. It wasn't very cold at that time, around 10 degrees or so. It was drizzling, but not enough to soak my jacket. Jeju didn't look any different from the last time I saw it. It was still very windy, like how I pictured it to be.

Chris knew the city by heart as we're frequent visitors, so he didn't need so much help from the maps. As we always did, we went to Yongduam (Dragon Head Beach) first, as it's the nearest to the airport. The wind blew in all direction leaving my hair disheveled all the time.

Then we drove following the coast line, and I can't help but be fascinated by the changing colors of the beach. At some place, it's deep dark blue, and while going further it turns into sapphire, then aquamarine, and even torquoise.

When my eyes got tired of wandering through the beaches, we went to a forest park where we enjoyed the fresh pine scent and the alluring smell of nutmeg. Chris was in a totally different mood, and had his arm resting on my shoulder (normally, he would put his hands warm in his pocket like I do since it's cold and the wind is unbelievable^^). He even kissed me a couple of times when he thought nobody was watching. I asked him why the sudden PDA, and he answered that Jeju has a certain 'pull' in him cause it's a popular place for couples to spend their honeymoon, not that I have any problem with that.

We then drove mostly near Seongsan Ichulbong area. We had mixed seafood soup for lunch there. By 4, he was tired and sleepy and said he wanted to go to the hotel early and take a rest. It was still mildy drizzling and the winds got stronger so I didn't argue with him anymore. We woke up at 9 pm, decided to take a drive and look for a restaurant for dinner. After we ate delicious Jeju samgyeopsal, we went back to the hotel carrying beer. We sat by the glass-encased veranda, and drank beer while watching the waves at night. We woke up early the next day (so~ early that the hotel didn't serve breakfast yet!), to catch the sunrise at Seongsan Ichulbong. It was sooo cold, and the winds were dangerously strong. The clouds were so thick that we didn't see the sunrise. We went to some other places after that, some places I knew like the crater, museums, and the very disappointing mini-mini land where our camera got busted, and we weren't able to take pictures afterwards... Crap!

The other places we went to were all unfamiliar to me, like the two beautiful waterfalls and another sightseeing coast (with lots of Chinese tourists hanging around). Anxiety filled the best of me, the places where we went after the 'camera busting incident' were all unbelievably beautiful, almost surreal in a way. I'm exasperated for not being able to seal those images in photographs! After that, we drove to Jeju City proper back again in preparation for the hot-air baloon ride the next day, but unfortunately, due to the weather conditions, they didn't work. Chris was eyeing for a refund cause he already paid for the two tickets that we didn't use.

The next day was spent hiking in Halla Mountain. By the time we got to the foot of the mountain, it was snowing in large clusters blown by strong winds towards our faces, our hair, and our clothes. It was difficult to stand still. I was shuddering so hard that I clenched my jaw and my hands really tight. Chris stopped to put some chains for the tires. The snow picked up till the ground was completely covered in just a matter of minutes. I've seen snow a lot of times before, but nothing compared to the snow in Mt. Halla. It doesn't fall, it pours... like someone pouring it from a huge bucket above. It was so tightly clustered together that it formed small ice rocks (imagine millions of that, falling together at the same time!), and it created a scrunching sound as soon as it hit our jackets and the ground. We were stopped by the local police at some curb, and told us that they don't allow vehicles to enter, so we have to go there on foot. We walked for 20 minutes in the blizzard-like (Chris calls it ice storm) condition till we reached the entrance of the hiking course. We chose an easy course, cause we didn't have the spiky thing for our shoes, and waterproof clothes. It was so difficult for me to keep pace with Chris cause I'm wearing my Chuck's, and it doesn't work well with snow. Unscathed, we reached the top. It didn't disappoint me, not even a bit. The view was something a person cannot forget for the rest of his/her life. Again, I'm exasperated by being 'camera-less' in a perfect place like that. But the temperature was just too cold to bear, it felt as if the ice seeped right through my veins and bones. We spent a good 15 minutes there before we went down. Whew! Going down was much more difficult and strenuous than I expected. Good thing, it never stopped snowing by the buckets, and the ground wasn't slippery because of the fresh snow.

When we got back to the car, driving became an impossible task for Chris. The previous rain froze and created a film-like cover of thin ice. We slid a couple of times but didn't bump or collided with anything. It was more than lucky..! The next day, we drove some more but we weren't in a rush mode. We had Kalguksu for lunch and ate raw oysters, abalone (our favorite), and other seashells before we drove back to the airport. It was still snowing hard, still making the same scrunching sound, but it melted soon after as it's much warmer than the magical mountain. The winds have become unbearably cold and strong that I was forced to run for warm shelter. Chris flew at a different airline. One of the best things when you're out of the country a lot for business trips, and your mileage accumulated to unfathomable points and you get to ride for free. Oh well..