Time is flying by! I don’t know if I have ever felt life whizzing by me as quickly as I do now. Each week is packed with work and coaching tennis and swimming and Korean lessons and volleyball and yoga and Bible study and one moment it’s Monday and the next it’s already Friday. And the weekend arrives and the world slows down again and it’s time to take a deep refreshing breath of relaxation and adventure.
Not much has changed since my last blog, which is why I haven’t added any new posts. I realized the other day though that we don’t have to do anything extraordinary to share our lives with the people we love…we just need to share! And, I actually DO think that our little relaxing adventures are pretty extraordinary :) So to honor our remarkable and now-normal-for-us life, I am going to start writing mini-blogs about our mini-adventures on Jeju.
To start chronologically, and because Steve and I refer to this day as “the wonderful day,” our first mini-blog is devoted to the first Saturday on Jeju that we experienced perfect sunshine and blue sky!
The Wonderful Day
Back in the days we did not own a car, Steve and I woke up the Saturday before school started with the noble intentions of working on lesson plans. We took one look outside at the clear blue sky and sunshine pouring down and decided that there were in fact far nobler plans in store for us that day!
We hopped on our bikes and rode down past the giant buddha at Sanbangsan, past the wide-brim-hatted farmers bending over their plots, past the fishing shops and our favorite yet-to-be-discovered cafe Studio 38, and along the coast until we reached our destination at Songaksan.
We locked up our bikes and began the hike on our first oreum! We wound around the wooden pathways of the oreum, enchanted by the breathtaking views, the geological surprises, and the idyllic horses.
We examined the small hobbit-like caves that the Japanese soldiers had forced the islanders to make for them to hide out in during their attack on Korea, and we were stunned by the reality of history.
After encircling the oreum, we headed straight up to the top to check out one of the craters!
The wonderful day continued when we stopped at Pizza Ten on our bike back along the coast. Their strawberry smoothie was a phenomenal find on a hot day, and was the perfect pre-swimming treat! That’s right. Biking, hiking, and then SWIMMING! Now you may be starting to see why this is the wonderful day :)
Our friends just happened to be at the beach as well, so we borrowed some boogie boards and played in the waves :)
We biked back past the castle lookout, past the road side orange stands, past the painted water towers, and past the giant onion welcome sign to arrive home exhausted and elated. And then we watched Doctor Who. The End :)