Busan

[Greg]:  Last Monday was a public holiday (Memorial Day) so we decided to take advantage and spend a long weekend in Busan, the second largest city in Korea.  We've been to Busan once before, during our Chuseok mega trip in September and we really liked it.  Unfortunately, it's not easy to get to Busan from Jeolla buk hole where we live.  There's no direct buses from Buan so we had to go via the worst city on Earth, Jeonju.  On the plus side, this did mean we could spend Friday night in the Carlton Motel, probably our favourite Korean love motel.  It's got massage chairs, a 2 person jacuzzi, an in-room sauna, an amazing shower and the comfiest bed in the world (or maybe we're just easily pleased since we normally sleep in a springy, broken oversized single bed in our mouldy apartment).

Amazing comfy bed

jacuzzi

sauna

Speaking of mould, when I packed my suitcase for Busan I discovered that a pair of my shoes have turned rusty and mouldy from the air in our disgusting apartment.  Nasty!

Mouldy and rusty shoes

Not impressed

We set off early on Saturday morning to ensure we'd arrive in Busan by lunchtime.  We'd booked bus tickets the night before because we expected the bus to be busy.  As usual, buying the tickets involved lots of pushing, shoving and queue jumping by rude Koreans.

We arrived in Busan at lunchtime and took the subway to Haeundae and checked into the Free Motel.  Whilst not as good as the Carlton in Jeonju (or our other favourites, the Beast Motel in Jeonju and the A Motel in Gwangjui), the Free Motel was still nice.  It had a decent shower and a jacuzzi bath which I flooded the bathroom with twice.  And the price was excellent compared to other motels in Haeundae.  And just in case we forgot that this was still a love motel, the computer desktop was suitably porny.

Free Motel jacuzzi

Oops!

Porny computer desktop

The bank holiday weekend co-incided with the Haeundae Sand Festival.  Woo!  Needless to say, as with most things in Korea, it was rubbish.  The sand sculptures were pretty good but the "parade" and "fireworks" were poor to non-existent and the other "entertainment" (eg the 'running with webbed feet race') were typically Korean and not very entertaining.  But the cocktails were cheap and the food was good so there wasn't too much to complain about.

on the beach

Korean dressed as a cigarette as part of an anti-smoking campaign

Crazy!

The beach was absolutely packed.  It was busy when we went in September but back then it was mainly westerners, presumably because Koreans were busy celebrating Chuseok with their families.  This time, however, Koreans were well represented on the sand, alongside what looked like most of the ESL teachers in Korea.

We (briefly) braved the freezing waters on Saturday before going for food and cocktails, followed by Katherine dancing on the beach.

Maybe paddling in the dark wasn't such a great idea

When we got back to the Free Motel on Saturday night, Kathy was desperate for the toilet.  We raced up to the 8th floor and put the key in the lock, only for the lock and the entire door handle to come off in my hand.  Unfortunately, the woman at reception didn't speak any English and we've been too lazy to learn any Korean (in any case, even if we had learnt the basics, I doubt it would have covered "the door handle has come off in my hand") so there was a lot of awkward giggling from the woman, gesturing from me and leg-crossing from Katherine.  Eventually, the woman invited us to sit in her private quarters whilst we waited for a joiner to come and change the locks.  This was the first, and I expect the only time that we'll step beyond the tiny glass reception hatch and into a Korean love motel living area.

awkward

On Sunday, we discovered a new tv show, optimistically titled 'Korea's Got Talent' (it doesn't).  It's exactly the same format as Britain's Got Talent and even has a Korean Ant and Dec presenting it.  Weird.

Korean Ant and Dec

No, it doesn't!

All in all we had a great time in Busan, despite the horrible journey there and back, the sunburn, the crappy Sand Festival and the broken love motel door handle.  Haeundae is a great place (for Korea) but it's not a patch on Blackpool.

I make friends with a bottle of soju

Katherine does likewise