Exploring Busan

For those who don’t know me (which would be most of you since I only started this blog like, a week or two ago), I’ve been hoping to encounter snowy weather for AGES.

The last time I touched snow was about four or five years ago in Jangyu after I arrived just a little bit too late during an unusually cold day in that part of Korea. There were only small piles of it left on a mountain.

Ever since then, I’ve been hoping to see snow again. Each year I always get so close. SO DAMN CLOSE. I mean goddammit there was even once where it snowed JUST AFTER I LEFT.

With these being my final three months in Busan, I’ve got a plan. Right after the coldest night, I will scale Jangsan Mountain. There’s got to be snow up there.

Every week once or twice I’ll practise going up Jangsan. Once the time comes, I intend to reach the summit hopefully in less than three hours. What? A guy can hope, can’t he??

Be scaling you real soon…

What we thought was going to be a relatively quick visit to the Jagalchi Fish Market ended up with our spending hours in Nampo instead.

Getting There:

Get off at the Nampo subway station and take exit 5. You’ll be at the mouth of winding pathways filled to the brim with shops and restaurants and cafés and bars. It’s a pretty hip place but also a bit of a tourist trap, you know what I mean? Definitely a must-visit if you’re in Busan!

This is what greeted us when we arrived:

Every year it seems Christmas gets bigger and bigger in Korea, if Nampo is anything to go by.

Follow the trail and venture deeper inside and you’ll be treated to a view that could only otherwise be achieved by consuming vast amounts of LSD. In other words, it’s AWESOME.

I mean, check out this huge Christmas tree!

Under the hood.

I made a new friend! Or are we more than friends? Hmm…

Check out the traditional street food.

Are you a fan of Running Man? They had some food at this stall. You know, if you’re into that sort of thing.

This one was significantly less shady than it looks like in my badly-taken picture.

We eventually settled on this seafood restaurant, after being approached by a strange portly gentleman who happened to be their promoter. This one’s in one of the slightly seedy alleys, but the food was pretty good, I must say.