Between preparing for our Nov 2006 wedding and also looking for/buying/renovating/getting ready/moving into our first home @ The Rivervale, I think the both of us were pretty much not planning where we’d go for our honeymoon during the last quarter of that year. I’d also just started working at Temasek Polytechnic in Oct that year, and even specifically explained that my wedding was just a month from the start date of employment and that I hope to take a week of leave over Christmas that year. Thank God for very supportive organizations. So, as soon as the dates firmed up, we went with the easiest method to get going on a vacation without needing planning: a packaged tour.
This was to be our first and only packaged tour since that point. Not that there’s anything wrong with the itineraries or the general experience. My takeaways from the trip were that while time was pretty optimized and there was minimal waiting around for things to happen, and it didn’t feel too rushed. We were also very lucky to have a very well behaved group that was largely female-dominated (there was also one other just married couple besides us) and a pretty good tour guide, and an almost totally mishap-free trip – until the flight home when I suffered from another bad bout of nausea. But there were places on the itinerary we had no interest or engagement in – more on that in the comments below – and there was also no escaping the couple of tourist traps too, though thankfully there was no hard-selling. The tour buses brought us to the shops, and we were free to just check-out and go find coffee joints instead haha.
And so, recollecting our 8 day honeymoon in South Korea in Dec 2016:
The 8 day package wasn’t really eight days of sight-seeing – one of those inevitable marketing tricks in packaged tours. The flight out of Singapore was in the early evening, and we arrived in Jeju Island only around noon time of Day 2. Jeju Island is a popular day(s)-trip destination for holiday seekers, and several places of interest are standard inclusions in packaged tours. The place here is a curious area known as Mysterious Road, which purportedly has cars set on neutral gear moving on their own uphill. The science of it is explained here.We spent Days 2 and 3 on the island. The weather was fairly cool though still tolerable, and we did fine with just our normal clothes with some minimal winter support, and jackets.A popular spot on the island is Sunrise Peak, or Seongsan Ilchulbong, formed from volcanic activity thousands of years ago. Our guide explained that it’s possible to do the climb up in an hour. This was when we were younger, so the attempt was fairly easy for us, and upon reaching the peak we had views like these:… and these:From Google Maps, the road grids look pretty much the same today as they did 12 years ago.At Mt. Seopjikoji and national park. The place is also the site for a Korean TV series. But since we weren’t followers of the genre, we couldn’t really see the significance of the area – aside it presenting beautiful views of the East China Sea.Visiting Cheonjiyeon Falls in Jeju Island. Now that I write about it, Jeju sure is pretty dense with really pretty natural sights. This picture took me a few attempts – my photography technique was still pretty raw back then – and some careful cropping as the place was actually pretty crowded that mid-afternoon. Come to think of it, I’m pretty happy with this composition as I was 12 years ago!Still at Cheonjiyeon Falls. I imagine that this place must really explode in color during autumn.Our last visitation spot on the island was the Teddy Bear Museum. Hannah and Peter would love a place like this!Leaving Jeju Island, we headed back to the mainland, with the rest of the trip operating around Seoul. Day 4 was at Everland, South Korea’s largest theme park. The place was… OK, but really better suited to kids and not honeymooning couples. Ling though was obviously enjoying the snowboarding rides!Day 5 centered on a trip to Namiseom Island, or Nami Island. This tiny spot sits within the Han River, reached by a short 5 minute ferry ride, and has a Metasequoia footpath that is surrounded by stunningly tall trees. The spot was made famous by by the drama series Winter Sonata. Nope, didn’t watch that either haha. Had to take a bit of time again to set-up a shot like this, sans people.The ice stalactites are all you need to see to tell how cold the place was!Day 6 and we went up Seoraksan National Park in the morning. Incredible views. This was before the days where I shot in RAW exclusively, and have only JPGs now to work with. Sad.We might see snow when we go up Hehuanshan later this year. Must remember to take more pictures of snowscapes!The Konica Minolta Maxxum 5D I had for two years before going full-board then on Nikon DSLRs. Besides this DSLR, we also had a Casio Exilim Zoom EX-Z700 that we bought specifically for the trip. The compact camera worked for all of the trip, then promptly broke down shortly after we returned home.The afternoon half of Day 6 at Dragon Valley Hotel, a popular ski resort. Both of us were complete noobs at this, and all we got was a quick 10 minute explanation on how to handle equipment before being thrown into the deep-end. Both of us fared badly at it!We checked out of the ski resort on Day 7 morning to spend the last two days in Seoul itself. This spot is the Cheong Wa Dae (Blue House), the official residence of the South Korean Head of State. No, we didn’t go in – the tour just brought us to explore the outside a bit.The same day afternoon was spent at a local cooking class, with this one specifically centered on the preparation of Kimchi, though to be honest, we’re not fans of this salted/fermented veggie dish. The rest of the day was spent at Lotte World where we stayed a night at the resort too.The last day of our 8 day trip. I don’t remember what island this was, but it’s the place where the South Korea drama TV series titled Full House was filmed.
Looking back at these photos, I’m pretty sure we’ll visit South Korea again soon to check-out some of these places again!
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