I woke up early, said goodbye to Mokpo, and boarded the 9:00am ferry for my four hour sail to a giant volcano. Awesome! 1.8 million years ago lava began spewing from under the East China Sea creating Mt Hallasan and it’s surrounding 368 oreum, or parallel volcanoes, known today as Jeju Island. It’s always been a part of Korea, but the culture here did develope a bit uniquely. Historically, everything from houses to graves to tools and statues of the 18,000 deities that dwell here were all carved from lava rocks.

My first stop was all the way on the eastern end of Jeju to a great big oreum called Ilchulbong (see the pic at the top of the post). It stretches out into the sea from the little fishing town of Seongsan-ri. It’s quite something to see from ground level, but climbing up to the rim is even better. The crater is so incredibly green. It’s like a great big salad bowl out there by itself. I’ve had horrible luck with weather on this trip, but thankfully it was nice and sunny that day.

Next, a trip underground into the Manjanggul Lava Tube. There are many lava tubes running through the island, but this is the only one you can walk through. You can see where the lava flowed and cooled in different spots by looking at the crazy formations on the walls and ceiling. This was my first experience in a lava tube and it was pretty awesome!

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The Jeju Stone Park sounded boring at first, but turned out to be pretty fascinating. There were lots of examples of traditional homes, dolmen, various tools and artifacts, and many guardian statues known as dolharubang. Copies of the statues can be seen everywhere around the island like mascots, on street corners, in front of buildings, sometimes in the street like traffic cops, as well as little ones for sale in every store, everywhere!

Also at the Stone Park was a fantastic museum all about volcanoes with explanations about the how’s and why’s of all the crazy shapes lava can take as it cools along with examples from around the island. It was like a science museum and an art museum all rolled into one.

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For the first few days I based myself in Jeju City on the north shore, for the last bit I moved myself to the south shore in Seogwipo to make it easier to access the trails on Mt Hallasan, the highest peak in South Korea. My first day I did a big 8 mile loop hike on the western side that took me up about three quarters of the way to the summit. Unfortunately, the fog and rain struck again so I missed out on the incredible views as well as got soaked to the bone. Another hike derailed by weather (I told you I was having horrible luck). My last day, I was supposed to hike the eastern trails that go all the way to the summit, but I woke up to more fog and light rain. I decided that I had had enough and decided not to go. By about 5:00pm the fog and clouds had cleared and I could see the whole of Mt Hallasan mocking me from the streets of Seogwipo. I can’t help wondering if I should have just gone. This will remain a MASSIVE disappointment to me for years to come.

To end on a more positive note, Seogwipo has some really beautiful coastline, cliffs made of lava (see the pic above) and several amazing waterfalls. I’ll leave you with pics of the waterfalls until the next post. Tomorrow, I’m taking the easy way off this island, a domestic flight to my next stop.

All my pics from beautiful Jeju Island are here