Further Wanderings

The ferry trip from Incheon, Korea to Tianjin China was kind of like a trip back in time.
The ship seemed like it must have been one of the ones plying the Japan-Korea routes sometime back in the 1980s. It was clear that at one point it had been a handsome vessel, but by the time of our journey it was a bit rough around the edges. While it was in no way uncomfortable, the frayed carpets, antiquated artwork on the walls and a much louder, disorganised complement of passengers made this journey feel a little less classy than our previous ones (this impression was probably added t by the two small bottles of soju and one of Makgeoli that we drank the evening of the trip. In fact it was more the way my head felt when waking up on the ferry that added to the impression.)

One way or another the ferry got us where we were going. A little late, perhaps, but better late than never. When we got on land we took a 200m (literally! 200m!) bus ride to Chinese customs and immigration. We were the only obviously non Chinese/Korean passengers on board, which appeared to mean that we ended up at the front of the queue somehow, so in the end we were just under an hour late for meeting our couchsurfing host, Christine, who’d kindly offered to pick us up at the terminal. There had been no public phone on the boat, so we were very happy when a kindly policeman allowed us to use his to give her a call.

Our ferry pulls alongside in Tanggu harbour. Tanggu, the port of Tianjin appeared busier and bigger than Busan, Incheon, Fukuoka or Osaka. Not entirely surprising as it’s the nearest seaport to Beijing
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Our second spell in Seoul wasn’t nearly as action packed as the first time around, but it still had plenty of action.

And in fact the busiest, most action packed day was the one immediately after our arrival. During our first visit to Seoul we’d tried to organize a tour to the DMZ but discovered that we’d left it too late to get one that was both good (included most of the sights) and inexpensive (under about US$100.)

The DMZ is a legacy of the Korean War. The war in fact never really ended. South Korea wasn’t a party to the armistice agreement that ended the fighting, so the north and south have technically been at war with one another ever since. And the “border” isn’t actually a border at all. It’s just a line that everyone agreed to pull back to (and 2km behind) when they stopped fighting. This left a 4km wide swathe of land along the “border” that neither side was permitted to enter, except under specially controlled circumstances, lest misunderstandings ensue and the war start back up again.

The status of the DMZ means that the area on either side of it is one of the most militarized on earth (the South Korean “civilian control line” past which civilians are not generally permitted extends about 20km further south beyond the DMZ, and is filled with soldiers, mine fields, electrified fences and fortified guard posts. (This level of inhospitablity has also meant that the DMZ has remained free of poaching, logging and pretty much all other human interference for almost 60 years so that it has effectively turned into an unintentional nature preserve.)

About the only place it’s possible to get inside the DMZ and right up to the border is just north of Seoul at Panmunjeom, the area where the armistice talks, and all North-South negotiations since, have taken place. This is where we were headed.

Three ROK (Republic of Korea, i.e. South Korean) soldiers right near the North-South border at Panmunjeom
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The trip back to Korea from Japan was also by ferry, and was at least as comfy and pleasant as the trip there (and shorter too... Fukuoka-Busan took only 6 hours as compared to the 19 for Busan to Osaka.) ... [Continue reading this entry]

We'd debated whether to take a bus or a train from Kobe to Hiroshima. No matter how one goes, domestic travel in Japan is spectacularly pricey, with the bus for the ~300km journey costing 5000 yen (about NZ$75), the ... [Continue reading this entry]

Departing Korea was kind of sad. As though we were leaving too soon. So it was fortunate that we knew we'd be returning. We'd gone to check out the ferry terminal the day before, and discovered we didn't need ... [Continue reading this entry]

In Seoul, Suwon, Donghae and Samcheok, we'd experienced a fair cross section of Korea's cities from large to small.  We were keen to see a bit of rural Korea too.  This was especially true given the sense of sameness that ... [Continue reading this entry]