July 2014 - Japan with Hayden and Alice

Hayden's third visit to Korea was low key and relaxed.  We went across to Japan for a few days, and visited Hiroshima, Miyajima and Kyoto.

For me, Hiroshima was the highlight, particularly the Peace Park, with many memorials to the victims of the A bombing of the city in 1945.  The memorials and museum in the park have an emphasis on remembering the victims, and focusing on the human cost of the bombing.  It was an amazing experience!

Alice and Hayden pretending to work out where we're going
and what we're doing.......

Our first meal in Hiroshima

At the Hiroshima Peace Memorial (A Bomb dome).
The Memorial gardens and museum were a
highlight of our trip!

At Miyajima - a beautiful island just south of Hiroshima.

This just gave me a chuckle...

Kyoto - full of history and beautiful buildings.

We saw a number of carriages like this on trains.

This was an amazing introduction to Japan for me, and certainly has inspired me to visit again one day.

Nicola's visit May-June 2014 ~ trip to the east coast of Korea

Nicola made another trip to visit us in May/June, arriving just in time for Alice's graduation, and spending time exploring Seoul with Alice and her friends, and travelling with us to the east coast for a few days.

This is the second trip Nicola has made to South Korea, and it has been wonderful to welcome her each time!!

Our trip to Sokcho on the east coast included a visit to the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) on the border of South and North Korea, a wonderful art gallery, and a LONG drive home....... it was a long weekend, so EVERYONE was travelling back to Seoul at the same time.

Here's some photos of our time there:

Alice Graduates!!! May 30, 2014

At last..... and 8 months after her friends in Australia, Alice has graduated from High School!!!

Leeton High School was a wonderful start in high school, and Korea International School (KIS) was an amazing experience to finish her secondary schooling.  She now has great friends in Australia and around the world!

Graduation day at KIS was worlds away from Leeton High School (LHS), which was much smaller, much more familiar and absolutely lovely!  KIS was still fun, just very different from our previous experiences.

All the graduating students wore gowns and graduation hats, walked in to music by one of the school bands, and lined up at the front of the ceremony area.... just like a university graduation ceremony. It was special because it was Alice's graduation, and she has made some wonderful friends here in Korea while she has completed her high school education.  We are grateful to her teachers, both in Australia and in Korea, for their commitment and care in helping Alice grow and learn.

Sara, Alice and Shea!

Nicola came to visit for the graduation and a
couple of weeks of fun with the girls!

Alice and her lovely friend, Jasmine!

Alice's very special friend, Cecilia, with Cecilia's parents and us.

Sara, Shea and Kathryn helped us celebrate after the
ceremony at our favourite Italian restaurant
(the owner is between Russ and Alice)

May 2014 - Our 26th Wedding Anniversary Adventure!

Leading up to Prom night for Alice, she suggested (strongly) that Russ and I might like to go away for our Wedding Anniversary - how sweet of her to think of us like that...... and she thought it would be good to have her friends over to stay after the Prom (while we were away!!).  As it happened, we DID go away for a night, left her the apartment, and had an adventure!!!!

My research lead me to discover a pension (like a B&B, but this one didn't have any of the 2nd B) over on the east coast of Korea, only about 2 hours away, that looked very CUTE!!!!  Of course, MANY things look extra good when you see them online. The website was entirely in Korean, but that didn't dissuade me, neither did the fact that once I had worked out how to book a room, the website wouldn't accept any of my cards (Korean or Australian!).... so off we went, without a booking, and (at best) a vague idea of where we were going.

As it happened, the website was accurate in its directions, to within a km or two (surely that's close enough....).Even our car navigator was a little confused....at one stage, after we had caught sight of the pension, the navigator thought we were following a well-established road.....to us, it looked like we were driving along a sand track next to the beach..... slowly so as not to run over any tents or small children!! We made it back on to bitumen road down the track a little, and located the pension..... found the ajumma who ran the place, and negotiated a room (in Korean.....no English for miles around!!).  DONE!!!

The bed was hard (normal in Korea), the bathroom was minimal (that's being generous....but there was a handbasin, a toilet and a shower nozzle, so it was basically all there!!), the underfloor heating was on (in May....well into Spring, and certainly short sleeve weather), and there was no coffee (again, standard in Korea).  What could possibly go wrong with our Anniversary adventure??

We found dinner, bought coffee, walked along the beach next to fireworks, and campfires inside the tents.....and headed to our home for the night.  We couldn't work the TV, couldn't turn the underfloor heating off (centrally-controlled, so we opened the window), and the shower didn't have a hot water option.......hehe.

After a fitful sleep, Russ was ready for his first coffee...necessity is the mother of invention, so a cereal bowl was equally as good as a mug for the first coffee of the day! We did find a coffee shop on the way home that day, so all is well.

A fun adventure!

At least there were rice fields just next door, so Russ was happy...
sort of.

All in all, I think the adventure was worth it, just to say we've been there!!!  ....not sure Russ agrees....