Jeju Island Pt.5: Udo!

Udo (우도)! U Island is weird to say, so I'm sticking with Udo [oo-doe]. Udo is a little island off the east coast of Jeju. You have to take a ferry to get there!

So, the first thing we do when we get there is go to rent some kind of vehicle. But you either need a passport or an international driver's license. However, the shop behind the first one was much more lenient, which is good for someone who doesn't have any kind of license and didn't bring their passport with them. Turns out they just wanted one license/ID card for the whole group, which was pretty cool. 

So guess what?

They wouldn't give the girls fast ones, which really sucked. We couldn't go as far as we wanted in our 2 hour time limit. But when the guys graciously traded for a moment, I got my hands on a fast one and it was amazing! I like those things, but they need mirrors to see behind us... 

I really liked zooming around on those things. Except for the speed bumps of course...not very friendly.

Really pretty water but the beach itself was not sand. It was like shells, but it wasn't like shells? I don't know, it was interesting.

But then it was time to go back to the main island.

And that was the last of the greater things we did. When we got back near the hostel, we went back to that buffet. Apparently the group had ate there the night before when Pia and I had pizza. I don't blame them, though.

So our flight was scheduled to leave at 7:15 and our hostel was far away so we had to reserve two taxis to come pick us up at 4:50am. The original plan was to stay up all night (drinking, I guess) but most of us knocked out for two hours, having made it as far as 2am. The rest of the trip was a struggle.

Exhaustion.

Emptiness.

Nice.

And that concluded our trip to Jeju!

Jeju Island Pt.4: Let's go to the Beach Beach, Let's go Get Away

There was a beach right on the other side of the street from Hallim Park, so why not, right?

It was really pretty and of course I put my feet in the water. Kinda chilly.

And then it was time to get back to the hostel. While waiting for the bus we went to the 7 Eleven and I found this dusty little package. I do not like the ice c ream ones. The little pop rocks they put in it to give that cooling effect are not...good... I gave the rest to Pia.

Getting back was dreadful. Pia found it fun, but I tend to stress far too much. My phone was dying and I needed the map to navigate. First, the bus driver told us to get on a different bus cause he thought we were going to a different bus terminal. Turns out he just misunderstood which station so we waited for the next bus. I got it right that time. But this driver was...crazy... He was driving like the bus was timed to explode in 50 minutes and he had to go go go. Turns out that the bus before, the one we almost got on, broke down and he had to pick up all the passengers. Still, he was crazy after that, yelling and swearing with a really strange smile... 

What's worse is that the bus we had to take from the terminal to the hostel had no bus station where it was supposed to be. We ended up watching the bus pull into a gas station and we booked it on over to talk to the bus driver who let us on in the end. 

It was...difficult. But we got back, bought a pizza, and headed towards the hostel.

Jeju Island Pt.3: Hallim Park (한림공원)

After the waterfall, we took like an 80 minute bus ride to the northwestern corner of Jeju to visit Hallim Park. And let me just clarify that I hate the bus system in Jeju, it's real crappy. Bus stops on maps that don't actually exist on the street, bus stops that are extremely far away, bus stops that are just a sign tacked onto a poll, bus stops that aren't labeled on the map but exist anyway. Annoying. A foreign person's worst nightmare. I suggest renting a car if you can drive. Actually, getting to and from Hallim was so extremely difficult, but getting to and from another island off of Jeju by bus was really easy...why?

Before we left, we stopped at the hostel to restore ourselves from the heat. And Pia got sunscreen slathered on her!

Anyway, Hallim Park!! The park is really big with several different attractions, but I don't know if we came at the right time of year... The palm trees were dead and several of the attractions were closed.

Real love birds!

You can tell they've been fed by people too much when they swarm to you...

I drank cactus juice! Not too big of a fan. I like papaya juice (what Pia had) better.

It was sweet of my boyfriend to take these pictures with me~ He looks so happy.

They had three caves here and it was so cool! I had never been in a cave before and it was awesome. Not to mention it was really cool in there compared to the heat of outside.

Like I said, it felt really good.

I was really excited to be there...

My most favorite picture I've ever taken!! I absolutely love this.

Where the cold water met the hot air of outside. I posted this on Instagram and the apparently the park has an account (I shouldn't be surprised), but they were just as excited about it as I was. It was so cool, okay?

YEEEEES.

So he was trying his hardest to mate the female that was chillin' in front of him, but she wouldn't even look his way. I don't know though, cause he was the prettiest in there, if I were a female peacock I'd be flattered... Anyway, my first time seeing a white peacock, so pretty!!!

So awkward.

Rosemary and cactus ice cream........I should have gotten some to at least say I've had it.

And that was the end of the park!