Jeju!

The morning after the night before was a bit painful for Jaron. I'm so glad I don't get hangovers! We had to be up early to make our way to Gimpo airport to meet Cherry and Jaeduk at 12.30. We had to finish packing and do our washing first. We were finally ready and said bye bye to Catholic University. We got to the airport on time and had a bit of lunch before we got on the plane. This is when the surrealness started! Going through customs was weird considering it was a domestic flight. It's the first time I've been scanned with a hand held scanner. My bag was opened after it had been through x-ray and my purse was examined. I also had two lighters in my bag and your only allowed one. Cherry marched over and claimed one! Jaron's pot of change was taken away and looked at.
We got on the plane and settled in our seats and then I saw the flight attendent. OMG tall, dark and handsom! Jaeduk was clicking away and I asked him to get a pic of him. The next thing I knew the handsome attendent came up the aisle wearing a stupid hat and comedy glasses! I wondered what was going on and Cherrry explained that he was going to entertain the passengers. He gave a cake to a small girl who had a birthday and then he played games with the passengers. I couldn't understand a thing but cherry was good enough to translate for me. It all seemed like good fun although it was a bit strange. I can't imagine the snobby BA staff doing the same thing. We landed at Jeju and my first impressin was - Beautiful! Such a pretty place. We went to cross the road and there were stern looking ladies directing the trafic and the pedestrians. They were not that friendly and as Chery said "They should be working in North Korea".
We Picked up our hire car and made our way to the resort. On the way we decided to go to Love land. What a funny place (see the pictures on FB) Apparently it's a theme park to get the honey moon couples in the mood. It just had me in hysterics! Everything was sex themed from the toilet door handle to the drinking fountains. In the middle was a giant penis but it just looked like a whale to me! The palce was full of staues of people having sex! Most of the visitors seemed to be elderly tourists but there was a few young couples. We went in the small museum where there was an array of sex toys through the ages on display. We went into the gift shop where I bought a few bits. Cherry got hijacked by an ajumma who was showing her vibrating thingies and then the ajjushi came over and showed her the different speeds it had. The whole thing was funny and surreal! I think it's a strang place to have in a country like Korea. We then went to the mysterious road which looks like it's going uphill but cars can roll down it! I couldn't work it out because it definately looked like it was going uphill. We finally got to our resort after a couple of stops to look at the wonderful views.
Our apartment had a living area with a small kitchenette and two rooms. Us girls nabbed the one with the bed and the boys had the one with the bed rolls. The resort was 3 star but really nice. The view from our balcony was gorgeous. That night we went to the hotel bbq restaurant and ate black pig which Jeju is famous for. We had brekki in the hotel and that was strange. There was a selection of Korean foods and some western food. I helped myself to egg, bacon and sausages. I had a few cherry tomatoes and toast. I coudn't find a knife. There was a spoon and chopsticks on the table but no knives and forks. We had to ask the waitress for some cutlery and I think she had to go off and look for some. Koreans are so good with chopsticks that they can eat anything with them. Us poor westerners need our knives and forks!!! The next morning while I was downstairs waiting for the others a group of youngster who looked like they were on some sort of bonding programme came and asked me if they could have their picture taken with me as it was the last mission they had to complete! of course I obliged. A bit later another group asked so Jaeduk and I of course obliged again. Huh! We're famous with that company now!!
We then went to the Lotte hotel for coffee. What a beautiful hotel. If I win the lottery I'm staying there! The coffee was overpriced but it was worth it to be in beautiful surroundings. The coffee lounge was right next to the Duty free store which is promoted by 'the boys' and Rain so the view was doubly nice! Jaron was a bit sad to go back to our humble 3 star accomodation after that!
We went for lunch at a fish restaurant and the raw fish was lovely. It was the best I've ever had. I was dubious about eating it as I was still feeling a bit tender from the food poisoning I'm sure I got from the fast food restaurant near the uni.
After lunch we had a drive around to look at the sights....actually that's not true we got lost! The sat nav wasn't getting a signal so we spent a lot of time just driving. We found our way to the duty free store and had a good look around. Cherry did some shopping and we decided to go back to our room and then go to the beach. The beach was lovely but we didn't have long there because it was closing. A bunch of lifeguards walked by and Cherry nabbed them so I could have a pic with them :) Very nice! that night we had a late dinner at the bbq place again. the next day we had to say goodbye to Cherry and Jaeduk as they were flying back to Seoul and we were getting the ferry to Mokpo. We will see Cherry again before we leave but we won't see Jaeduk agian until next year so It was quite sad. We had lunch together before we saw them off and got our cab to the ferry port. That's another story!!!
My impressions of Jeju: OMg it's beautiful. It's hot (34 while we were there) and tropical. It has lovely sights and it's so great to be in a place with palm trees! I really want to go back there agian and stay for longer. There was so much we didn't ge to see in our limited time there.