Bussling Busan

The pool, hooray, much better than shopping!

Ruffians in the posh lobby.

lots and lots of patries.

Nampongdo Shopping district.

Enough shopping already!

Babes in the city.

the kids loved this graffitti to their Nana..insisting that we photograph it for her, cute!

Hotel lobby.

A beautiful walk just around the hotel we stayed in on Hyundai Beach.

Temple details of cherry blossoms.

Statue of Confucious

Along the way...

View from hotel window.

City lights.

Hyundai Beach by night.

Mmmmm, i like it Mom.

Mini cakes and moon cakes.

beady cake eyes.

Shopping.

The trees at night.

Window art.

first contact.

Ruby-blu the popstar.

Sisters.

Pizza for supper!

that Dunkin Donuts.

Ice skating rink near food hall Shinsegae shopping mall, Busan. They had a Korean drm performance, very exciting.

Inside out.

Along the way.

Many seagulls followed the ferry, perhaps they thought we were a fishing boat?

Amber dreaming.

Sardines!

The ferry lounge, where we had some very odd snacks indeed.

We managed to get out of Okpo a few weeks ago, and took a short trip to Busan, which is the second biggest city in South Korea, next to Seoul of course. The wind had picked up in the afternoon , so the passenger ferry was cancelled, which left us to take the car ferry instead. River was beside himself, his expression priceless as all the cars drove up and onto the ferry from the terminal ,which is down the road from our house. They really packed us in like sardines, poor Jon could hardly squeeze out his door once we had parked, no mercy! Busan is rather like a massive Okpo, we stayed near Hyundai beach, which looked like it could be good fun come the warmer weather. There was alot of shopping and the kids enjoyed Dunkin Donuts and the swimming pool at the hotel. There were a couple of interesting things to check out, and as we only had a couple of days we will have to return and check out the amusement park and massive Buddhist temple, as well as the ice skating rink! Leaving later than planned to return home, we missed the last car ferry, so decided we would drive back, it is usually a two and a half hour drive. Usually. We struggled to find accurate directions, and took a few wrong turns, at one point wandering around the back alleys of Busan, driving for half an hour before we even left the city! It was fascinating, however, but would soon turn ugly as we struggled to find some road food for supper. Again the Vegetarian Dilemma, confounded by the language barrier. Jon was quickly slipping into that bad place that one finds oneself inhabiting when extreme hunger is accompanied by incredible frustration. We have asked several Koreans to write down what a vegetarian meal is, but nobody seems to really get the concept. We have to laugh as mostly when we show our little pieces of paper with our requests scribbled on in Korean, people look confused, and then nod vigorously before offering us something with ham, which vegetarians eat right? or crab sticks, I'm guessing there are not too many Korean Veggies! At a traditional roadstop Jon tried in vain to order a meal of noodles and rice minus the meat accompaniment, but was met with utmost incredulous expression, when an angel of mercy made an appearance in the form of a Korean businessman, who had a good understanding of English. Thus it was that the evening was saved, and the family's empty stomachs fulled, with a yummy , meat free, noodle veg and rice surprise, complete with seaweed salad and kimchee. Yum.