many the miles: summertime, and the livin's easy (photos from july)

this is an approximate reposting of my fourth facebook album of korea for those not on that site. there are several extra photos from jeju included here per request from my mother :)

ellie and i feeling summery in (where else?) olympic park

just watching the world go by

rearranging the apartment yet again:

we had a minor accident

and immediately got out our cameras to photograph the damage

then we cleaned up. thankfully ellie was able to put the fan back together

hiking in bukhansan:

this is where we were headed

hiking in korea is completely different than hiking in the states...nature and quiet are invaded by people and restaurants

the lonely planet guide was not lying when it said "use metal cables to haul yourself up baekundae peak"

there are supposed to be amazing views from here, but feeling like i was in the clouds (literally) was a cool substitute

sweaty and gross but we made it! the poor flag's not in such great shape though

kimbap on a mountaintop

this guy rocks.

looking back at all the mist on the way down

"umm...where are we?"

(we had accidentally hiked entirely over the mountain and down the other side)

blue sky at the bottom

t-shirt found at coex mall...this one's for my perkasie princesses. love and miss you girls :)

summer vacationing on jeju-do:

in the airport before boarding

waiting to take off

hello, four-star hotel.

this is the view from our balcony...a path of pain, a pool with waterslides, and the sea :)

ahh yes big comfy beds

so i was wrong--this is the closest thing south korea has to blue hole. unfortunately, there's no swimming allowed...lena translated the sign for us, and it warned that the water was very deep (21m), very cold, and contained some sort of dangerous whirlpool thing

rainbow above the waterfall

cheonjeyeonpokpo (cheonjeyeon waterfall)

yay for traveling with your best friend :)

as usual, there were lots of koreans with lots of cameras

a typical moment during our trip...ellie photographing something cool around us and lena photographing herself

a beautiful butterfly that rested long enough for a photo

mmm fresh pineapple

lena on a huge bridge that spans the gorge below the waterfall

it's a long way down

a cool fountain with five different heads for spouts. someone was feeling either creative or indecisive

ah, korea. you would put a family mart inside a pagoda

palm trees and parking lots

jungmun beach

korea does a day at the beach like they do everything else--crowded into a small space, and pretty much on top of the people next to you

the view from under our umbrella

at least the sky was blue and the water was nice :)

view from our balcony at dusk

first haircuts in korea! the hairdresser was slightly amused and slightly unsure of what she was doing

much better for the hot and humid weather :)

doesn't get any better than this

yeomiji botanical garden, which has the largest greenhouse in the world

see? it's huge. and this is just the main room--there were eight smaller rooms off of this, as well as three floors of observation decks above this room

look i'm in the jungle!

having a staring contest with triceratops

croc!

desert garden. the flowers behind us spell out "yeomiji" in korean

they had those funky distortion mirrors; we of course had to take photos

ah, couples outfits...this is one of the tamer sets we've seen

reflection of the roof in the lily pond

water garden

flowers floating by

part of the lotte hotel. slightly out of our price range

hallasan (halla mountain). this is the most we saw of it all week, as the peak was covered in clouds each day

hello down there

the uppermost level of the observation deck

view of the bridge and temple near cheonjeyeonpokpo that we had seen the day before

this took quite a few attempts to get right with the sea in the background

YUM.

we tried to go to udo (a small island off the coast of jeju) but failed, so we wandered around seogwipo city and found this random market. it used to be streets but has been covered and turned into an indoor market