The next morning we woke up, and tried to plan our day. We headed to the subway to store our bags in a locker that would be on our way back to the Busan station. After that we decided to find lunch. As usual it is always hard to find a place to eat, but we came across this great little Chinese restaurant that had really reasonable prices. We were told that you can get Japchae at Chinese restaurants in Korea. When we asked if they had japchae, they said yes, and pointed to chop suey rice, we ordered that and some noodles, and dumplings. It was all very good, and we were very full. When we were done eating we made our way to Geumjeong Fortress. We took the subway(finally were able to figure out the international calling and talked to Adrianne, see picture) and then walked to the forest and cable car, which they call a ropeway. The ride up was amazing, we could see all of Busan, all the way to the ocean. Oh and by the way there were girls in cute high heels up there too! They just didn't hike around but there were actually cute, little Korean girls on the mountain in heels! (see picture)Once we got up to the top we hiked to the South Gate, on the way there I stopped at the bathroom (of course) and Kyle struck up a conversation with an American couple and their grandson who happened to be from MN! Small world. We had to cut the hike short in order to get to the train station and head to Gyeongju. Even though Busan had been my favorite place in Korea so far, nothing seemed to go right! When we finally took the subway back and picked up our bags, and went to Busan station we found out that the train to Gyeongju doesn't depart from that station. It leaves from a station that we passed on the way to Busan station, and we had just missed the train, so we had an hour to kill before the next train, and we wouldn't arrive in Gyeongju until after 9pm!
The train ride was excruciating! We stopped at every stop along the way, and it took 2 hours, which by car it only takes an hour! We had to maps to the guesthouse where we had reservations, but they were conflicting. This place was in the Lonely Plant guide and sounded, cheap and central, and we could do our laundry. Well after walking for over a half an hour, and making our way down several very dark and scary roads, past the Korean version of the Osaka prositute street (store fronts with pink lights, and nasty looking Korean woman, laying around smoking and watching tv) I got worried and said we should turn around and find a phone to call the guesthouse. Once we called, the owner actually came and got us! Were were less than a block away when I told Kyle we should turn back, of course he said he would have kept going but I was freaking out. It was very hot, dark and there were tons of misquitos out!
The guesthouse was not at all what we expected. The smallest place in Korea, and no AC. It was like a traditional house with a courtyard, and small ondol rooms surounding the courtyard. We had our own bathroom, which was very clean. And the Mama owner said she would do our laundry for us, for only 3000 Won per person. We debated staying there the two nights we had planned, but that would leave us without a way to get our laundry done.
We still had not had dinner so we went out to find something. I had seen a McDonalds sign that said they were open 24hrs so off we went. We had not had Korean McDonalds yet so we wanted to try it. Kyle had a Bulgogi burger, and I had just a cheeseburger, chicken strips and fries. It was good, and tasted the same as back home. Only the dipping sauce for the chicken was Korean, well and the Bulgogi burger, which Kyle said he could live with just having it one time.
After our delicious and nutritious dinner we went to bed in our hot little room.
