Dog Mania

Good morning friends, I hope that everyone is keeping warm out there, I know it is definitely getting cold here and we are anxiously awaiting the first snow fall. We have had quite a weekend in Seoul once again. While staying warm has been a bit of a challenge, we still managed to get out and about. We began our weekend with date night on Friday which consisted of a wonderful dinner at CPK (California pizza kitchen) and then went to an American movie. In between dinner and our our movie we also ventured out to see a few Christmas lights. I just wanted to show everyone the wonderful decorations and lights around the city. Here a just a few of the many...

This past Saturday I am happy to report that after taking a leisurely hike on Achasan, we took Bear to the Baus House...A dog cafe. We were accompanied by our NZ friends once again and it was quite a site to behold. First I must say that despite being a cafe, they only serve a select drink menu due to the chaotic presence of 25 different dogs. Purchasing a beverage allows access to the cafe and you can then buy as many dog treats as you like or merely chase the dogs around and play with them. Being dog lovers and all we were quite excited for this new experience. While I would recommend it once, I myself probably would not return. It was just a bit to unsanitary and crazy for my likings. We did have fun however playing with the gigantic husky, two devilish Dalmatians and one very rambunctious Bichon Frise. At one point in time one of the two Dalmatians decided to leap onto our table, thus spilling our NZ friend's drink directly into his lap. Thankfully, the staff were very quick to respond not only to our spillage but in cleaning up all dog waste. They even provided a lint roller and air-spray to manage the after affects. Bear seemed to do OK with all the excitement but he was a lot more content to sit in my lap than go chasing after any of the dogs.

Our next journey began on Sunday after church with a trip to Namsan Mountain, which is a very touristy destination. Many people go there to overlook the city, visit the tower with the revolving restaurant, or place a lock on one of the many lover's trees. David and I had been here once before but wanted to go and watch the traditional drumming and swordplay reenactment. We ended up taking the cable car all the way up and back down the mountain due to the cold weather. Once we got to the top everything had been decorated for the Christmas season. They had a very lovely silver Christmas tree along with several lights and Fake enlarged Present boxes for a photo opportunity. We managed to make it just ten minutes prior to the reenactment so we got a fabulous seat. The show was absolutely wonderful and we of course got loads of pictures. Well, I hope you all enjoy our photos, and keep the comments coming, we love you all and miss you!

Thankgiving

Well, I apologize for the lack-there-of with my posts lately. I fully intend however to remedy that shortly. I have a few fun things to mention today so I guess I will start with my Thanksgiving festivities. David and I have decided to remain here in Korea for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. Not wanting to compromise on the holiday fun we have made some other plans. On Friday evening David and I decided to go to our NZ friends house for a somewhat Thanksgiving style meal with some other American teachers. We had chicken, mashed potatoes, non-homemade turkey with stuffing as well as some Korean-style sweet potato casserole and a salad. The food was pretty good actually and I managed to make both Apple and Pumpkin mini pies. We even had Pillsbury biscuits, thanks to some army connections! Overall we had a really great time celebrating with our friends. Now, David and I were a little unsure about how the holidays would be celebrated here in Korea. We didn't think many people would have Christmas decorations or trees with ornaments or any of the other must have traditions. Much to our surprise though we were very wrong. Right before Thanksgiving hit the entire city of Seoul slowly began to cover itself with Christmas!!! All the restaurants and stores have trees, the building have bushed and trees decorated, even our favorite shopping area has loads of light up reindeer and snowflakes. It is absolutely wonderful! I managed to get a small tree at the Lotte Mart and we have it nicely decorated in our apartment along with some exciting stalkings and a red poinsettia. So needless to say, it is beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

Another really exciting thing to report on was our last weekend. We managed yet another trip to Buchansan mountain with David's colleague Michael. This time however he brought along his female language instructor and another Korea friend named Victor. While the company was fabulous, the mountain was another story. I always enjoy a challenging hike but every time we venture to this particular one it manages to kick my butt! This time was no exception. It was a very muggy day and a little cold at ground level. The weather didn't stay like that for very long tho. After about two hours we made it to the top and in was below zero degrees Celsius, absolutely freezing and the winds could have blown me away. I was so happy to finally make it back down the mountain, but I will say I got a wonderful view and a great workout from the trip.

 

After our hike on Saturday we then went to church on Sunday, the first Advent. The week prior however, David and I were asked to do a short script in front of the congregation and to light the first Advent calender. Well, come Sunday morning we both got up there and really had a lot of fun with it. I was able to light the candle without burning down the church and I managed not to stumble during my speech, praise God!

Now it is Monday morning and I am sitting during the lunch period at Seoul Foreign School. It is my first day substitute teaching here and I love it. While waking up at 5 am was not real fun, I have enjoyed being back in a school setting without actually having to do school work. Today I am with the sixth grade teaching a humanities class. Mainly it is just reading and assigning book work but the kids are a lot of fun and I have met some wonderful American teachers that have been here for over five years. I will be posting more updates on my subbing but until then, its coffee time for me. We miss you all very much and hope you all send us Christmas Cards.

Many Blessings

Three months In

It has been almost a month since my last post. We have had quite a lot of stuff going on this last month and things are finally beginning to slow down. David has taken a short trip over to Yosu (down south) so I thought I would take the opportunity to update you all a bit. For starters, we recently returned from a last minute trip to North Carolina. We had to say goodbye to David's younger brother whom passed away after a long battle with MD. The lord finally decided to take him home and we have found peace in the knowledge that he is now whole and the suffering has ceased. While the occasion was sorrowful we were still very grateful to have been able to spend time with family and friends. Upon our return to Korea we have been doing our best to get back into the groove of life here in the city. I had my interview with Seoul Foreign School and are now awaiting my health exam so that I can get started subbing in the near future. This past weekend David and I were also very fortunate to have been invited on another hiking adventure.

This time David's colleague Michael and his wife asked us to hike Buchansan Mountain with them. Buchansan is the highest mountain in Seoul and it also provides the best view for miles. This hike was unlike any of the others we have partaken. It was far steeper, far more rocky and far more adventuresome. There is one leg of the trail in particular that require you to hoist yourself up the mountain by grabbing onto the built in railings. After about two and a half hours we reached the peak. The view was breath taking to say the least however, my favorite thing about it was that we were so high up, the cities sky rises shrunk to allow a perfect view of all the different mountains.Remarkably, even though the hike was quite advanced, Micheal's son Harry came with and did the entire thing right along side us. Koreans really are fantastic hikers and its easy to see why they love it so much.

After our hike on Saturday we also attended the International Fireworks Festival downtown. I wish I could say that I really enjoyed it but it was far to crowded for that. It was so busy that people were actually pushing us down the street even though there was no where to move to. The festival features fireworks from three different countries and while they put on a good show, we would have enjoyed it more had it not been so overwhelmingly packed.

Anyhow, David and I are doing well back in Korea and we are getting ready to take another trip back to the states in about three weeks. We are really looking forward to seeing our very good friends Ben and Ale tie the knot and we cant wait to see David's family yet again. I can also report that David and i just celebrated our three month anniversary and we are still going strong! I will do my very best to update a bit sooner next time. Until then,

Thanks for reading...

Chuseok Extravaganza

I am at a loss as to how to begin this blog. I have so much to mention about David and my week that I will have to do my best to summarize it all. I wrote in my last blog that Chuseok was coming up and because of the holiday David had last Friday through Wednesday off from work. While he did a little bit of business here at home on Friday and Wednesday for the most part we got to go and do anything and everything. The weekend was very busy but we both had a lot of fun and got to experience just a bit more of Korea in the process.

On Saturday we had a very special lunch date with a lovely Korean couple that were introduced to us through family. As it turns out there is a twelve year old boy living in Florida with David's aunt's best friend. This boy is the son of the couple we had lunch with on Saturday. After getting in touch with them through email they were very eager to meet with us and offered to take us out for lunch. Upon their arrival we were greeted with a hug and I was given a very nice gift in light of Chuseok. We ended up going to a nice little area not far from our apartment and had some more traditional Korean food. Now yes I may of had to suffer through the meal a bit but the company was well worth it. Rahni (the wife) was absolutely wonderful and has now designated herself as our new Korean mother. As it turns out her husband is also a civil engineer here in Korea so David and him had a few things in common as well. The rest of Saturday appears to be a blur however so we will move on to Sunday.

Sunday morning David and I decided to return to Seoul Union church to give it another go. We are still undecided upon churches but I happened to make a wonderful connection with one of the expat teachers there. She told me about how the local school was always looking for substitute teachers and she promised to pass my name along to the coordinator. It was definately an answer to prayer seeing as how I am looking for things to keep me busy during the week. After church on Sunday we then ventured over to Cosco, which was all very exciting until we actually got there. Lets just say there was a line to get into Cosco, an even longer line to go down the escalator and some extrememly pushy Koreans that made it rather hard to enjoy our shopping experience. We definately learned our lesson, going to Cosco during a national holiday is no good. We did however manage to get some great American made items and I plan to return at a later date to get some more :D.

Now Monday was probably the most exciting and most tiring day of this saga. Monday is the day we journeyed to EVERLAND! And yes when I said journeyed I ment it. Everland is the fifth largest theme park in the entire world and they were offering discounts to all foreigners. Naturally, who wouldnt want to go. We made the trip with our good friends Grant and Joy and left around 9:45 after dropping Bear off at Kindergarden. Since most Koreans leave the city to travel home during Chuseok we were under the impression that transportation would not be that crowded. While that is true of the Koreans, every foreigner in the area it seems turned up to go to Everland as well! In order to get to Everland we had to take a bus, which we had never really done before, and will never do again. The first bus that arrived was so full that we could not fit and had to wait for another. The second bus that arrived thirty minutes later was also very full but we managed to squeeze our way on. That was not the best idea however. There were no seats available, the bus was full to the brim and we had to ride back to back for 50 minutes inside a bus with little to no aircontitioning. Might I add, we were traveling through the windy roads of the mountain countryside which made it all the worse. Anyhow, we finally got there and I was able to walk off my motion-sickness about an hour later. The theme park itself had some really good qualities as well as some less desirable ones. We were dually impressed with the worlds highest wooden roallercoaster but were not as happy with most of the other rides. We definately enjoyed the animal attractions and those alone are worth a return visit. They have an entire zoo built into the park and we were able to enjoy two seperate and equally wonderful animal shows. They also had a safari but we were unable to go through it because the lines got to out of control. All in all we really enjoyed the trip to Everland but we are not real anxious to get on another bus to go there again.

Finally I will end our adventures on Tuesday, the Chuseok holiday. We celebrated the event with a trip to Mr. Harris' house that evening. Accompanied by David's boss Ron and his wife we rode the subway over there to partake in a traditional Chuseok meal. Im sure by now you know how much I enjoyed the food, but David was genuinly pleased with it. Mr. Harris lives in a beautiful apartment like most Koreans in Seoul and we were able to meet two of his children as well.

Alas, it is time for me to study up on my Korean for our language lesson tonight. Missing you all back home, send some food :D

Happy Chuseok

Two Months of Forever

Well it is official, I have been a married woman for a whole two months! It is September 8th and David and I are celebrating our anniversary with a trip to On the Border for dinner accompanied by a potential American movie. I am one lucky girl to be married to such an amazing man and living in a foreign country to top it off. These last two weeks have been a bit of a struggle for me in the food department. I have been having a hard time eating vegetarian in a place where soybean products and beans are hard to come by. My day has become significantly brighter however now that I have received my very first package while here in Seoul. My mother in law sent me some much appreciated herbal tea, candy, Indian style chickpeas and soup mix among other items. We have yet to receive our sea shipment which contains all of the food we purchased prior to coming to Seoul. Lets just say I will be one happy girl once that package arrives! Well anyhow on with the good...

Just last weekend David and I had the privilege of completing yet another hike, but this time we were accompanied by our new friends from New Zealand. We started our hike up at Yongmasan Mountain and continued all the way down to Achasan Mountain where it spit us back out to a second subway. We had the most perfect weather and felt absolutely blessed to have seen all the wonderful greenery, waterfalls and mountain tops. It took us approximately 3 hours to complete the hike and we hope to one day work our way up to Buchasan Mountain, which is a much higher and longer trek. Compared to my last hike of Achasan Mountain, I will say the Yongmasan portion of it was much more rocky and much more of a challenge. We really deserved the ice cream we purchased at the mountain peak!!! When I say we purchased ice cream, that does not mean there was a pre-existing ice cream shack at the top. Nope, a very courageous Korean man hike all the way to the top with a giant cooler on his back....now that's hard work!

Since our hike took place on a Saturday, after a well deserved nap David and I headed out for a little Mexican food and some walking around the Insadong market place. They had some great music playing outdoors and everyone was enjoying a good stroll next to the stream running through town. The next day was Sunday so of course we went to church! This time we decided to try out another church just south of the river called Jubilee. While the church was much younger than our previous one, we really enjoyed hearing from the Korean-American preacher and meeting all the expats there. It was a great church and it will be hard to make our final decision as to which one we will end up at for the next five months.

It is now Thursday afternoon here in Seoul and we are coming up to the biggest holiday of the year for Koreans, Chuesok (spelling unsure)! Basically this is the Korean's version of Thanksgiving. Everyone is expected to return to their hometowns and pay homage to their ancestors. Many people will go to their beloved ones grave sites and place flowers or clean  up the area. There is always a major celebration with of course, a lot of food. We actually just found out that we were invited to a traditional Chuesok celebration at the home of Mr. Harris. Mr. Harris is the VP of the company David is working with and the same man that took us on our first hike here in Korea. I am a little nervous about the food but David's boss Ron and his wife Joy will be joining us for the celebration as well so I am greatly looking forward to it. We have also made plans to meet with a wonderful family here in Seoul that is friends of David's aunt Bonnie. We will be meeting with them on Tuesday for lunch so I am looking forward to meeting with another native Korean.

Finally I want to talk about my trip to the salon today to get my hair cut. I was a little nervous at first wondering weather or not they would understand me and have the same level of care that American salons do. However, I was worried for nothing because I had a wonderful time. The store manager spoke fluent English and I they were very big on head and shoulder massages. The lady that cut my hair did a great job and she even dried and curled it for me afterward. Well that concludes my week, missing everyone back home but enjoying my husband and Korea all the same...

Peace Out

The Sunnyside of Seoul

The day has finally arrived when the rain has departed and the sun has moved in, praise the lord! It has been over a week since my last blog and I am happy to report it has only rained once, and only for a brief amount of time. Now for those of you following my blogs this is HUGE! The temperatures have begun to fall slightly and we are finally without all the humidity. It is currently a comfortable 85 with most mornings averaging the upper 70's. 

Since David has been working away I decided last week that I would do a little exploring and take Bear on a hike. I found Mount Achasan online, did some research on how to get there and decided to leave on Thursday morning. Now Bear had never been on a hike before so this was all very exciting for him. It was about a 20 minute subway ride and another 25 minute walk to the trail but it was well worth it. The trail took us up above the city where you could see the most incredible view of the river. It was mainly dirt paths with a bit of rock mixed in. Surprisingly Bear did amazing and walked the majority of the time. We even managed to find a little stream where he was able to drink some water. At the top of mt. Achasan we located yet another temple and a really nice lounging gazebo that puts you up above the tree line. The weather was a bit hot that day so by the end of our hike Bear and I were quite tired. I will mention though that we found the Koreans extremely helpful along our journey. When we first started out a very nice Korean man lead bear and I up the mountain and showed us where all the good trails were. He even gave Bear some water and offered to carry his Carrier. Two other Korean men also came up to us later on and tried to strike up a conversation and play with Bear. Had we been back in the states I would have been a lot more alarmed however Korea is much different. People here will bend over backwards to help you and ensure that you are enjoying their country.

On Sunday morning David and I tried our second church out and had a really great experience there. We went to Seoul Union Church which is designed specifically for expats and foreigners. It also just happens to be the oldest Protestant church in all of Seoul, founded in 1886. The church is now a non-denominational, English service lead by a rev. Prince from Africa. While the preacher wasn't the most charismatic teacher he certainly had some wonderful insight about the scriptures and used at least ten different scripture verses during his sermon. The best part about our experience there had to do with the people. The moment we stepped into the chapel we were greeted by four or five different people. Most of them were teachers or missionaries from the states and were very quick to offer their emails and any support we needed. After the service lunch was provided downstairs (lunch takes place once a month) and we were able to meet with some more members and mingle. We were very fortunate to have hit it off with a new couple from New Zealand. They arrived in Seoul only days before and were in much the same position as David and myself. They are a younger couple so we are excited for the opportunity to go out with some people our own age. We also met a really interesting Korean native. At the age of eighty he looks and sounds as if he is only 65. He was extremely friendly and was super excited to tell us about how he once lived in Houston and still remembered all of the sites. We too had traveled to his hometown of Jeonju so he was even more excited. We sat and talked to this man for at least a half an hour and he made us promise to return next Sunday.

Well that is about all of the exciting new stories in our lives except for the fact that we have resumed our Korean language training. We are taking two hour sessions twice a week with a Korean woman names Isabel-that would be her English name that is. We had our first session last night and all I will say is that the woman is a tornado of energy but we hope to learn a lot from her!

Enjoy and God Bless

Bears, Bugs and Urine Jugs

The day has finally arrived that I get to write about my most favorite place...the ZOO of course! The long awaited day finally took place on August 20th when David and I went to the Seoul Grand Park Zoo. I had been wanting to go for weeks but the weather has been more than unruly until just recently. So when we finally saw that it wasn't going to rain, we packed up the camera and head for the subway. It was only about a fifteen minute ride and once we got there we were completely breath taken. The view coming out of the subway was gorgeous to say the least. There were lush green mountains surrounding us in every direction and a walkway lined with vendors and lights that lead up to the Grand Park.

Now we new that it was going to be a big zoo after researching it online, but we had no idea just how big it really was! The park was miles and miles of wooded trails and picnic areas that surrounded the hundreds of different exotic animal exhibits. They had Giraffes, Hippos, Carnivores, Hoof-stock, Dolphins and Sea lions, regular Lions and Tigers, Elephants...I could go on and on forever! There were your standard cafeterias and side food vendors but they also had a huge botanical garden, rose garden, camping area, and two separate aviaries. David and I spent hours walking around the Zoo and still managed to miss about 30 percent of the animals. By the end of the day we were exhausted from all the walking. Thankfully they not only offer a tram to take you in and out of the park, they have a skyline (just like a ski-lift) that takes you from the top of the park down to the bottom with the most amazing view, so of course we rode that down at the end of the night.

David and I both agreed that not only was this the largest Zoo we had ever been to but it was also the most beautiful and creative. The Zoo is centered within the mountains and everything is built into the natural setting so there are trees and greenery everywhere. The three exhibits that we enjoyed the most had to have been the Ape Forest, the lions and the Rainforest. The Ape Forest included all your major primates such as chimps, orangutans and baboons. The thing that made it so cool is the structures and the animal interaction. The Chimp exhibit in particular had a two-fold scaffold that allowed them to climb as high as they desired with lots of ropes and toys included. The Orangutans were equally as cool because one of the females would climb up to eye level and reach out her hand as far as it would go. She was prompting her watchers to feed her, and many people obliged despite the no feeding sign. Now the loins also caught our attention because of how wild and natural their housing was. We could pretty much walk to any destination around their enclosure and have a perfect vantage point. We could even view them, and hear them I might add, from the skyline which was an added bonus. Finally we found the Rainforest to be a lot of fun because of the layout. The two-story  building allowed us to be right where the animals were, whether that was at ground  floor or up in the tree tops. They also had David's most beloved species, the Macaw, so that just made it even better.

We ended up leaving the zoo around 8pm but will most likely return for more at a later date. Now upon leaving the zoo and heading back to the subway we wanted to stop for a potato twist on a stick, which we did. However, the most memorable thing we saw and smelled upon our departure was a particular food item we had encountered a few times before...BUGS! Now these aren't your standard chocolate covered grasshoppers. When you pass by them they look just like brown and white colored larva. David didn't believe that they were really bugs but I was most positive. He wanted to get just a bit closer to examine them so as we did I got a nice whiff of their delicious scent, in all honesty the smell was so bad I nearly lost my dinner. The next day David and I were at the grocery store and sure enough what do I find just sitting there on the shelf with other supposedly normal food, right next to the tea...Silkworm pupae. That's right you can buy it in the grocery store as well as served hot from the skillet right there on the street.

My final little tidbit of information for people traveling to Seoul, don't get too close to any homeless looking person carrying a white bucket. Unfortunately there is no shortage of homeless people in the streets of Seoul. However, there is also no shortage of public restrooms yet they persist to use the restroom in these white buckets. Buckets that they then pour down the drains in the middle of public walkway. Needless to say that smells no better than the cooking baby silkworms!

23 Side Dishes and a Main Course

Annyong! It is Monday morning here in Korea and We have been recuperating from our full day of activities yesterday. It is considered a Korean holiday today so my husband gets to stay home with Bear and I for a change. I would like to begin by talking about all the amazing things we got to see and do complements of David’s work colleague, Mr. Harris and his wife. We feel greatly blessed to have been so well taken care of.

The day began for us at 5:30 in the morning. We met David’s boss Mr. Turnblad in the lobby to head on over to Seoul Station. From there we took the subway over to Yongsan station where we were greeted by Mr. Harris and his lovely smiling wife. So in true Korean fashion, Mr. Harris paid for all of our days expenses and even provided our first class KTX tickets to Jeonju Province, which by the way is a very nice bullet train. Cruising at around 180 mph, we arrived at our destination some 2 hours later.

The weather was very nice when we stepped out of the train station and we actually had about three hours of clear sky until it began to rain again. The first of our many activities was a nice, steep, uphill hike to a temple located halfway up the mountain. The hike itself was a challenge  merely due to the constant and relentless uphill walk but the view was worth it all! When we had finally reached the temple we got to see the whole magnificent view of God’s amazing creation. It actually reminded us of back home in the Appalachian mountains.

After taking some nice pictures and enjoying the fresh air we explored the newly renovated temple grounds. At that time a Buddhist funeral was taking place so we could hear a lot of praying and chanting. The interesting part of the temple was actually the housing. On the outside it appeared to be your typical simplistic temple homes but upon second look you could see a very nice modernized kitchen, full access to electricity and satellite TV dishes located outside. We had a little bit of a laugh at those, I guess even the monks like to watch TV. Anyhow, by that time we were pretty sweaty and hungry so our generous hosts sat us down for a nice snack. They had prepared a delicious apple, peach, grape, tomato and rice cake  snack. Even I enjoyed that!

After a bit of a rest we headed back down the mountain a second trail in the woods. This trail led us to a very unique tree called the lovers tree. It was an old tree that had a branch that was fused to the tree next to it. We of coursed loved the sign that accompanied the location.

Finally we went to explore a second temple site and partake in a short break at the local stream. The second temple we visited however was a lot larger than the first. The shrines to Buddha were on a much larger scale and people from all over would come to bow down and pray before the idols. From a Christians point of view it was cool to see the craftsmanship but a little uncomfortable to watch so many people laid out before a gold statue three stories high.

The second half of our day was filled with a lot of eating and a lot more walking. Before heading to our second location we stopped at a local Korean restaurant to enjoy some local Korean food. While David and everyone else partook of baked anchovies, kimchi, scaled and NOT de-boned fish, as well as several side dishes of various odd looking vegetables with chili paste, I enjoyed my nice bowl of white rice. Yes I know that I probably should have tried to eat at least some of the food, but that poor fish was just staring me in the face so I stared at my rice bowl instead! At this point in time it had begun a torrential down pour with copious amounts of lightening and thunder. So after taking out our rain gear and umbrellas we got in a taxis and left for a traditional folk town called the slow city…or Hanok village.

Here we walked around taking in all of the traditional Korean style housing and small shops and restaurants. We learned about the amazing things that the Koreans had accomplished with paper….Korean paper that is, and visited a historical palace in the area. After all that walking the rain had subsided and we stopped at this nice café to enjoy afternoon tea and refreshments. If you look at our pictures you will see David eating a giant bowl of ice cream. Well apparently Koreans have their own way for preparing ice cream here. It is a giant bowl of shaved ice, lots of different fruits, red beans…yes I said beans, and some cherry ice cream with a cherry on top. I had a few bites while everyone else downed two separate orders of it, so I suppose it is quite good.

Next we resumed our walking, found some more historical building and 10 minutes later it was time another meal! This time dinner took place at a family restaurant. Now you know what that means; Korean style food. This time they presented us with 23 side dishes, rice water to drink and of course the main dish which consisted of rice, chili paste, sprouts, vegetable and an uncooked egg yoke  in the middle. Thankfully some of the dishes weren’t as intimidating as before so I ventured out and had a bit of the sweet potato in a sweet syrup, dried radish in chili paste, egg puff soufflé and bean sprout soup. By this time it was past seven and time to debark for our journey home.

We had a wonderful time with Mr. and Mrs. Harris and met some very nice people along the way. Upon arriving the Jeonju a very enthusiastic man at the train station welcomed us to his city and ran to retrieve tourist maps for us in English. Another Korean local sitting next to David on the train ride home gave him his business card and invited him to call him for lunch sometime.  So that was the completion of our big day out and to say the least we were exhausted upon our return home. This morning I can easily say that my legs are still worn out! We definitely enjoyed ourselves though and hope you also enjoy the many picture we took.  Have a very blessed Sunday and remember to meditate upon God’s glorious creation as much as you can, we most certainly have been!