We rode the Korean KTX “bullet train” south to the coastal city of Busan, traveling at speeds as fast as 185 mph. Busan is the 2nd largest city in South Korea, and there was a lot we wanted to see and do. Busan was celebrating its 50th anniversary and there was a special exhibit at the Busan Museum of Art: a whole floor was dedicated to photos of the residents and local artists' works going back 50 years. This is a photo of a painting of a Busan Lotte baseball player entitled "The Portrait of Our Age" by Lee Taeho. Just like San Francisco, the team is called the Giants, although these giants wear pinstripes. Go Giants!
The temple shown here is Haedong Yonggungsa. We climbed down 108 steps to get to the temple. We went on the weekend and it was a very busy temple with a lot of Korean visitors.
These stupas show the beautiful seaside location of the temple.
We had fun climbing around the rocks at the shore, but it was too cold to even dip our toes in the water. It reminded us of being home in Northern California. We took the bus back downtown and it was so packed that the driver refused to pick up passengers until he made the 40-minute drive to the subway station. We wished we understood Korean because a number of the local passengers were quite disgruntled, although we think their protests were humorous because they evoked laughter.
The architecture here is utilitarian and sometimes covered in advertisements.
But at night, the beauty of the buildings shines through. This is Gwangalli Beach area where we enjoyed strolling and stopping for a drink at several different bars.
LED lights that change color are often used, including here on the Diamond Bridge.
This is smoked duck with a kimchee roll. We devoured the duck by wrapping it in a lettuce leaf with chili paste, kimchee and scallions. This was breakfast, by the way. It was so good, we had to have it twice!
We think this is a "community garden" where people can get their own plot of land for growing vegetables like lettuce, onions and garlic. As you can see, it's right in the city.
We have been touched many times by the kindness of the Korean people. We know only a few Korean words, so often in a restaurant we will point to a picture or at what other people are eating to order. Here we are at the Bada Sory restaurant, which means "Sound of the Sea." Mi-Hee (the woman) brought us the menu which was all in Korean. Then she explained that it was the Korean equivalent of a pre-fixe menu - what a relief, we didn't have to make any choices!
We chose the restaurant because it had tanks of fish out front, was filled with local customers (always a good sign), and we wanted to try Korean sashimi, called hoe. We were not disappointed; it was so fresh and delicious. Mi-Hee brought photos to the table to show the types of fish that we were eating. She also cautioned us that the wasabi was fresh so it would be extra hot.
Here's a picture of some hoe that we downloaded from Wikipedia. It is almost exactly what we were served. By the time we remembered to take a picture of ours, it was all gone. Whoops!
This is sea pineapple, a type of sea squirt called meongge in Korean. We thought it tasted like oysters but even more briny. Mi-Hee showed us which sauce to dip the meongge into before eating.
The next day we saw the meongge for sale on the street.
We enjoyed our dinner so much that we went back for our final meal in Busan. This time we were given some "extras" like this fried fish, complements of the chef pictured above. It was so perfectly fried that we ate the entire thing, bones and all. We were a bit sad to leave Busan because we had made friends and enjoyed our time there so much.
The temple shown here is Haedong Yonggungsa. We climbed down 108 steps to get to the temple. We went on the weekend and it was a very busy temple with a lot of Korean visitors.
These stupas show the beautiful seaside location of the temple.
We had fun climbing around the rocks at the shore, but it was too cold to even dip our toes in the water. It reminded us of being home in Northern California. We took the bus back downtown and it was so packed that the driver refused to pick up passengers until he made the 40-minute drive to the subway station. We wished we understood Korean because a number of the local passengers were quite disgruntled, although we think their protests were humorous because they evoked laughter.
The architecture here is utilitarian and sometimes covered in advertisements.
But at night, the beauty of the buildings shines through. This is Gwangalli Beach area where we enjoyed strolling and stopping for a drink at several different bars.
LED lights that change color are often used, including here on the Diamond Bridge.
This is smoked duck with a kimchee roll. We devoured the duck by wrapping it in a lettuce leaf with chili paste, kimchee and scallions. This was breakfast, by the way. It was so good, we had to have it twice!
We think this is a "community garden" where people can get their own plot of land for growing vegetables like lettuce, onions and garlic. As you can see, it's right in the city.
We have been touched many times by the kindness of the Korean people. We know only a few Korean words, so often in a restaurant we will point to a picture or at what other people are eating to order. Here we are at the Bada Sory restaurant, which means "Sound of the Sea." Mi-Hee (the woman) brought us the menu which was all in Korean. Then she explained that it was the Korean equivalent of a pre-fixe menu - what a relief, we didn't have to make any choices!
We chose the restaurant because it had tanks of fish out front, was filled with local customers (always a good sign), and we wanted to try Korean sashimi, called hoe. We were not disappointed; it was so fresh and delicious. Mi-Hee brought photos to the table to show the types of fish that we were eating. She also cautioned us that the wasabi was fresh so it would be extra hot.
Here's a picture of some hoe that we downloaded from Wikipedia. It is almost exactly what we were served. By the time we remembered to take a picture of ours, it was all gone. Whoops!
This is sea pineapple, a type of sea squirt called meongge in Korean. We thought it tasted like oysters but even more briny. Mi-Hee showed us which sauce to dip the meongge into before eating.
The next day we saw the meongge for sale on the street.
We enjoyed our dinner so much that we went back for our final meal in Busan. This time we were given some "extras" like this fried fish, complements of the chef pictured above. It was so perfectly fried that we ate the entire thing, bones and all. We were a bit sad to leave Busan because we had made friends and enjoyed our time there so much.
