Damyang Bamboo Forest

This weekend we had two extra days off for Children's Day and Buddha's birthday. We took advantage of the extra time by getting out of Busan for two days with our good friends Erik and Breckan. We booked bus tickets to Gwangju, a city 4 hours west of us, and from there took another intercity bus to a small town where there is a bamboo forest. We walked around the forest and surrounding area for a bit and even tried bamboo ice cream!

 

 

 

 

 

Playing traditional Korean games

 

Our "hotel" was an adventure all on its own. Since it was a holiday and we were planning this all last minute, it was difficult to find a place to stay. I eventually found this hotel that I thought was right in the same town as the bamboo forest. Nope. It was yet another 40 minute taxi ride away. Thankfully we got there without any problems.

This "hotel" quickly became our favorite part of the weekend. We each had our own little cabin/hotel room with a beautiful view of the mountains.

Our little cabin in the woods

 

Space TV

 

The view from our room

 

Food options were limited, and of course we were there in time for dinner. After Erik spent several minutes speaking "hanglish" (Hanguel + English) on the phone with a lady who spoke broken English and was translating for the Korean man at the hotel, we discovered that we couldn't walk anywhere (too far!) and no one would deliver. Therefore our options were "mud chicken soup" or a whole chicken. We opted for the whole chicken, but we were definitely not anticipating the pterodactyl-looking pot of "food" we were served. We hardly got any meat off the thing, so thankfully we had brought plenty of snacks! It definitely made a great story that we laughed about a lot the next day (once we had eaten a real meal!).

We're pretty sure our whole chicken was broken into a bunch of pieces and thrown into the pot to be cooked.

Disgusting. Breckan deemed these pterodactyl feet rather than chicken feet.

We spent hours playing Ticket-to-ride, and Breckan and I graciously let the boys win a few games so they could book their self-esteem. HA.

The next morning we got ourselves back to Gwangju and took a bus back to Busan and then made tacos together for Cinco de Mayo.

Erik and Breckan :)

 

A very successful, fun weekend indeed! We are cherishing our last few weeks with these friends and are so grateful for them and are blessed by their friendship!