Mom & Dad's visit -- Part 4

So Friday morning we gathered all our things from the hotel and hopped in a cab to the bus terminal, where we caught an 8am bus to Gyeongju, which was about a 4 hour ride. Luckily there were no motion sickness problems as most of the way was interstate. Dad dictated to me some of his thoughts on the trip so far and I typed them up for him. That made the trip go pretty fast. I think they were both relieved to be getting out of the big city. We arrived in Gyeongju around noon, got settled into the Gyeongju Park Tourist Hotel, which was just about a block from the bus station (so convenient) and then Matt took us to a western restaurant for lunch. That afternoon Matt (a fellow ETA living in Gyeongju) took us all around his city. Gyeongju is probably the most important historical city in Korea. It was the capital of the Shilla Dynasty, which united the whole Korean peninsula back in I don't know what year. :-) (Ike's the history major, not me!) Anyway, I had been to Gyeongju in early October for our Fall Conference. We got to see the huge mound tombs of the kings, Anapji Pond, a really old-school refrigerator, and the oldest astrology observation tower in Asia (?). It was a nice walk, but then we headed back to the hotel to grab our jackets and freshen up a bit. Then we walked along a stream and ended up at a park that has a hill that we climbed, giving us a view of the entire city and it was right at sunset, so it was beautiful! Next we made our way to a samgyepsal (korean style bacon) restaurant. I had been wanting mom and dad to try this food, as it is one of my favorites. Unfortunately the restaurant we stumbled into wasn't the best quality. :-S There was actually still pig hair on the top of the meat. GROSS. That made my parents and I lose our appetite quite quickly, even though I cut the pig hair off once we noticed it. Anyway, after eating we went to an outdoor market and mom and dad got to see all kinds of raw fish and weird Korean food out on display, including HUGE octopi for sale. We asked how much the biggest one was (its head was the size of a basketball) but the lady wouldn't tell us. After getting ice cream, we said goodbye to Matt and headed back to the hotel. Mom and Dad passed out super early again.

The next morning I finally drug them out of bed and we got on a city bus to head out to Bulguksa Buddhist Temple, which was about a 30 minute bus ride. The morning air was crisp and we made it before all the tourists arrived. We didn't see anyone in the palace complex except the monks. I think they really enjoyed seeing it. Afterwards we caught the bus back to the hotel, and hurriedly gathered our belongings and headed to the bus station. We were finally heading to Suncheon, my hometown here! We had to transfer buses in Daegu, and I didn't want to miss our 11:30 bus there, otherwise we'd have to wait 4 hours for the next! Luckily we made it and even got to the hotel in Suncheon ok.
Mom and Dad in front of a huge tomb of a Shilla king.
Brrrrr! By a very old refrigerator from a palace. (It wasn't really cold, I was just pretending.)
Anapji Pond palace.
Mom holding the horse's jewels.
Bulguksa Buddhist Temple. Bulguksa Buddhist Temple.
Bulguksa Buddhist Temple. Prayer rocks.
Bulguksa Buddhist Temple. They have pigs in Korea too!