Day One of a Two Day Trip

Since I would be flying back home to the United States on Monday, and Heather's family would be leaving for their next home in just over a week, we were running out of time to do things in Korea. With the urgency for adventure, we packed our bags for an overnight trip in the South of South Korea.

This was another trip we would be doing with the Walkers, which just works out perfectly. The kids all really get along which makes the adults super happy.

The first stop on our two day trip was the Bamboo Forest. It was already incredibly hot right when we got out of the car and we still had a little hike to take through the forest.

The forest was such an incredible sight; I never thought I would see anything like it. The bamboo was super thin yet it grew so high; I'd love to see how their roots work. More than roots, I was excited by the possibility of seeing a panda bear. There likely wouldn't be one, but I was holding out hope!

The kids pointed out these mushrooms which were almost impossible to see. They were on a steep decline going away from the path. I would have loved to have these kids with me in Europe so I could experience it from their perspective! They point out some of the most incredible things. 

Before I knew it, we ran into some panda bears! They might not have been real, but I was excited to see them anyway--so was Monster! 

There was a super random art museum in the middle of the Bamboo Forest. I think it was a commentary of the evolution of art and the issue of destruction. I really liked Kevin's perspective on it. He made a comment about the "neoclassical nature" of all of the work of art despite it being a modern replica of da Vinci's Mona Lisa. Neoclassicism was a style which came up in the 1800's essentially because of Napoleon Bonaparte. Mona Lisa was a painting from the Renaissance. 

We were all pretty unimpressed with the museum but we were excited for the ice cream sold there since it was super hot.

The bamboo forest used quirky posts for their lamps. Sister Walker got a picture with all of the posts that we saw since they were so fun!

There was a cute pond with cute lily pods and cute fish and it was overall very cute. My sister Lauren would always send me pictures of fish when she saw some so I tried to do the same, but my pictures never went through!

The next stop on our trip were the green tea fields. When we finally got there, it was as if we had entered inception-the dream within a dream, where things don't feel quite right. There weren't any people around and some of the buildings were locked while others weren't. It was pretty spooky. 

We found a green house that had all sorts of weird plants. A lot of the trees had leaves as big as me!

These cacti almost looked like thumbs.

We found a restroom which was inside the green tea museum. We weren't interested in going inside the museum, but the workers were nice enough to let us use the restroom. I have a theory it's because so many of the kids are cute and blond. There is a huge preference for light colored hair in Korea; it's something I didn't realize existed until I got out here! The workers encouraged the kids to color in the lobby while they doted on the cute kids. 

When we were ready to go back outside, it was time to check out the green tea fields; they were gorgeous!

So many things were set up for photo ops. Getting your picture taken is considered a huge honor in Korea, so these photo ops made a lot of sense. The kids definitely had a blast with them!

Sister Walker saw a pagoda at the top of the mountain and it didn't seem to be too far away. Sister Walker, Heather, Big Sis, and I started hiking the green tea fields to the top of the mountain in order to see the pagoda while the men stayed behind to watch after the kids. This sign that we saw encouraged safety, at least I think that's what it's saying!

Either we were on the wrong trail or took the wrong turn, but we didn't end up making it to the pagoda. At the top of the mountain that we were on, was a big gym-like center where someone could work out. We were all exhausted so we doubt it ever got used!

When we got back down, Kevin was excited to show Heather a secret photo op that he found, which was definitely better than the exercise unit we found.

We all got big drinks of water and headed to our AirBnb. Korean homes are super cool in that they typically don't have any real beds. This one had two and then a bunch of mats for people to sleep on. One bathroom had a slanted ceiling, which would have made showing weird. They also had a bidet that I was pretty scared of! We could smell kimchi being made upstairs and the smell never really went away.

When we were at the Airbnb, we got a call from the people who were watching the family dog, Bailey (a very small golden doodle). The dog is so light weight, you could think about nudging it and the dog would move a mile. She got in a little accident and one of her little legs broke. Big Sis was devastated. We looked into going home first thing in the morning, but since the dog was already at the animal hospital, there wouldn't be anything extra we could do for her. Bailey was in good hands and there was nothing to worry about, so we would just want to be back in time to see her after surgery.

For dinner, we made burritos and after, tried to get Monster to go to bed which proved to be impossible! The older girls were also hesitant to go to bed; everyone was just having too good of a time! Little A must have been absolutely pooped because I think she went right to bed. After everyone went to bed, I knew I had to take a shower before going to bed. It was too hot all day long. I forgot to have the water heater on and the shower was painfully cold and memorable.

The next day, we would be going to the beach and I was so excited for a repeat Cinque Terre experience: I would read on the beach and listen to the waves and it would be incredible.