Discovering a new hobby: Hiking in Korea and the Jinhae Cherry (un)blossom Festival

After the questionably organized ski trip, we were a little weary to book plan another excursion with WINK.  But we really wanted to go to the Jinhae Cherry Blossom Festival and they were the only group organizing one for the opening weekend (March 31 - April 1st), so we decided to give them a second chance... and we are sure glad we did!

Wearing Green and Pretending to be Irish... It must be St. Patty's in Korea!

St. Patrick's Day is a big deal back home... and, as I found out, also in Korea.  For twelve years, the Irish Association of Korea has been organizing and hosting the free St. Patrick's Day Festival in Seoul to celebrate Ireland's patron saint... and to give everyone an opportunity to wear green and get uncontrollably intoxicated.  So we decided to partake in this year's festivities with a beer in one hand and soju in the other!

I'm actually just posing with Chris' beer to "look" cool.. I started drinking much later!

"Can you make me one with everything": Our Temple Stay story

Just before retiring back to our sleeping quarters after a full day temple stay program, we sat down for a chat with the Buddhist monk who was in charge of our Adventure Korea group.  He wanted to know if we had any questions about the Buddhist religion and his own path to enlightenment or if we wanted to share some "funny stories" since he loved to laugh.  As I sat there, listening to the thoughtful and meaningful questions of my peers and the sage answers of our leader, I couldn't help remembering a funny story I had once come across while surfing YouTube for no particular reason.  (Actually, you can find here).  After running it through my friend Chris, I decided to go ahead and share this "witty" joke with our humble monk.  It goes something like this:  

Adventures in an Adventure Park

I have to be honest. I've somewhat lost interest in blogging. I'm not a natural writer, nor do I enjoy it particularly. Besides, lately I've been more than filling my quota of it, helping Jason with his scholarship and bursary application letters for Law School. Still, I know that, if for no other purpose than to document our travel memories for years to come, to come back and read about our adventures in fifty years when we're old and have nothing better to do, then I should do it. With my first Master's and AQ courses starting up in a few weeks, I know I'll have my hands full. So it's now or never. Here's my first attempt at attacking the backlog of posts Jason and I are faced with due to our excessive procrastination. Let me take you back to a warmer than average mid-February Saturday...

Just keep skiing!

I'm slightly excited to be blogging about our February 25-26th weekend ski trip to Korea's Yong Pyong Resort, for two reasons: