Beaches and craters.

We arrived on Jeju island in the evening by plane with hoards of Korean tourists touting straw sunhats. From the airport we took the bus to the Jeju city bus terminal where we caught the last bus leaving town. It dropped us off at the closest beach to the West of the city. By the time we got there it was dark and we were unsure what the camping scene was going to be like. I suggested we stop for the night on one of the patches of grass in the parking lot thinking that it was the best we were going to do. When we saw the beach actual beach my hopes of good camping plummeted. There was a small area of the sea sectioned off with a few very bright spotlights shining on it. The water was maybe knee deep, but there were many lifeguards. Not exactly the serene beach that I envisioned on a subtropical island. But Jeremy didn't lose faith and we kept walking along the shore to find a fairly large area of sand and grass where there were quite a few tents set up with people sitting around... camping. We were stoked and set up our new tent for its first use.

The next day was one we would have liked to forget for the most part, but one we will not for a long time. The reasons for wishing to forget are mostly surrounding issues with buses and going places that turned out not to be anything like what we expected and far from what we wanted. The reason for not being able to forget is singular: sunburn. Between waiting for the bus and walking to where we could catch another bus, we got fried. I didn't even think about the sun because we weren't doing anything in particular, like going to the beach or going on a hike, but the little sun filled moments added up. It is maybe three weeks later and I am finally starting to stop peeling. My arms (and Jeremy's too) are splotchy because I have patches of peel from that first day and patches of fairly dark tan from the rest of the trip. Needless to say, we were very conscious of sunscreen from then on. Two good very good things happened that day however.

One: We climbed up Seongsan Ilchulbong (Sunrise Peak). It is a small volcanic crater. It only took us maybe 20 minutes to get from the base to the ridge, but those 20 minutes were ruthless. The heat was hardly bearable. I sweat a few liters of water out and as we were reaching the top I remember thinking to myself that it felt as though my head would explode. As we climbed those last few steps, however, and stood on the edge of the crater itself a cool breeze off the ocean hit us. It felt like heaven. I'm sure I laughed out loud as I stepped from that heat into that refreshingly cold air. When we had driven past the crater earlier that day it had been completely shrouded by clouds, but when we climbed it it was clear and looking out over the island behind us and over the crater and the ocean in front of us I was pretty darn happy.

Two: We ended up staying that night at Pyoseon beach. At first we couldn't find the camping space there and we were less than impressed as we had been so many times that day, but then Jeremy spotted it. It was a large grassy space with a few trees up a few steps from the beach. It was lovely. We ended up staying there several nights and then even coming back there later in the trip. We laid around and read. We ate, we swam, we watched the ever changing sky. Just relaxed.