Day Trip to Busan


The weekend after New Years, Andrew, Shane, and I decided to take a day trip to Busan. After looking up several things to possibly do there, we decided to go to Taejongdae Park (태종대 공원), which is on an island to the southwest of the city called Yeongdo (영도). We took bus 1127 from Ulsan (that goes almost all the way to may apartment) to the subway station on the northeast side of Busan. It only took about an hour and a half. From there we took a 45 minute subway ride to the island on the south of the city and walked across the bridge.


The coast and harbor was filled with more boats than you could possibly count, and in the sky line of the city you could see all the cranes as evidence of  the constant construction.



The weather was gorgeous and sunny. Eventually it got so warm that we were able to take of our coats.


Once we crossed the bridge onto the island, we came across this sign that told us Taejongdae was 6.6 km away, on the far end of the island. We had had no idea that it was so far, but we decided to continue on and see if we could make it there by walking anyways.


The more scenic route by which to walk there was the path that ran along the west side. Here the sun shone warmly on us as we walked and we were able to come across lots of scenic spots including this lighthouse.



We left the lighthouse behind us after a quick stop and soon were far enough away for it to blend into the landscape of the city and the mountains which towered around it. The city's name, Busan (부산), literally means "part-mountain".



At first glance, the path around the coast looked flat, beautiful and welcoming, but as we turned the corner around that mountain in the distance, we realized that path changed from along the rocky beach to follow the cliffs and the flat journey turned into a pattern of ups and downs. The first obstacle of which was this giant rainbow staircase.




The view from the top of the stairs was worth the climb. From here we could see a small fraction of the thousands of ships anchored off the coast of Busan. There was even a little look out with free binoculars that we could use to get a much closer look at many of the ships and even seen an island in the distance that is part of Japan.



When the trail led us back to the rocky beach, the path had become a thin, but nicely decorated, line of cement. On the beach at the end of one of the stretches was a stone, spiral tower, which Shane and I then climbed.



The further we walked, the more and more ships we were able to see. They were never ending. Also, the further we walked, the more we realized we did not wear shoes suitable for walking such a distance.




When the path when upwards to a tall set of stairs again, we tried to walk around to see if we could find a shortcut around the cliff. To our dismay, we would have had to climb the rocks to get to the other side. We had already decided not to and to return to the staircase instead due to our lack of sneakers when some fishermen started yelling at us to get away and not climb the cliff.


When we came up to the top of the stair case, we decided it would be too far to keep walking and that we would never get there before sunset. At the top of this particular spot, there was a pavilion next to a bus stop. We took a bus to try and get to the park, but ended up just going to the other side of the island. It was still cool though, because we were able to see the other side of the city from there.


Since we decided there was no way we would make it to the park before dark and I really wanted to take pictures of the sun set, we took the same bus back to the other side of the island from which we came and watched it from the pavilion. Afterwards, we got beef soup at a restaurant in the city for dinner and then headed back to Ulsan.




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