Great Ocean Road - #VanLife

So, one of my pipe dreams is to get a van and do it up. Something like this

Then I can become a hippy and my family can properly denounce me. Though I know they won't because they love me too much.

Anyhow, I thought before I commit to a $40k van + do up cost, I should try to live in a van for at least couple of days to see whether I'm actually cut out for it. So, I went to https://www.shareacamper.com -  it's like an AirBnB for campervans. And we decided to hire this van to explore the Great Ocean Road over Australia Day weekend.

The van comes with a portable gas stove, but being me I was worried that we wouldn't be able to eat 'proper' food. So I prep'd as many sauces as I could - since we would be on the road for FOUR DAYS! I know right.

Here are all the foods that I prep'd for my brief #vanlife

• spicy peanut soba noodle salad - just the sauce, so we would only need to boil the soba and mix in the salad
• Fabs' famous bolognese sauce
• Breakfast burritos 
• Boiled eggs for eggs sandwich 

I also packed tuna cans, sandwich materials (cucumber, mayo, bread etc), crisps and chocolates. Fabs tried to convince me over and over that we were going to a 'touristy drive' and not a remote mountain so there was NO NEED to pack SO MUCH food. You know nothing Fabs Snow. I might turn into a hangry monster when hunger strikes! Better be prepared than sorry.

Day 1 - Torquay

The start of our #vanlife 

We got to Torquay around 9.00 p.m. On the way we passed a lot of surfing shops. Famished, we went to Señor and had a good feed and a few drinks. Full and tired, we headed to Point Danger car park and went to bed.

Day 2 - Park Rangers, Waterfall, the Apostles and Port Campbell

At 6.30 a.m. we heard a knock on the door with the greetings "Park rangers, wake up!". Barely awake, we were just staring at the ceiling of our van, palpitating, eyes wide open with our brains trying to send a "ping!" for our limbs to react. And then we heard the knock again.. So I pushed Fabs out of the bed to speak with the so called rangers. They slapped us with a $125 fine for sleeping in the car! So, state wide it is NOT illegal to sleep in your car. It is encouraged even, in case of fatigue/tiredness. Which we were. So, we are going to appeal it!

Anyhow, we left Torquay shortly after,  and my head was still pounding due to lack of sleep. We went for breakfast at 4 Kings Coffee & Food at Anglesea. Completely forgot that today was a public holiday, so 20% surcharge applied when we ordered our breakfast. It was delicious, albeit expensive!! I was still jaded, so I had another coffee when we got to Point Roadknight Beach and went back to bed whilst Fabs went for a surf. He was glad that he went, and I was glad that I had a kip. Everyone was happy.

Afterwards, we checked out the Erskine Falls - a quick walk up and down the ramp.

Quite pretty

Then we continued on along the Great Ocean Road - and it was indeed GREAT. We stopped at one of the lookouts (after we tried to go to Wye River Road Camping Area, but it was closed) and had bolognese pasta overlooking the ocean.

Our lunch spot

We passed through a sign saying 'Cape Otway Lighthouse', after (not so) much of a discussion, we decided to check it out. After driving inland for about 10 km, we found that one has to pay $19.50 to check out the self proclaimed 'Australia's most significant lighthouse'. The pain of the fine and 20% surcharge still lingered, so in unison we said "no thanks", and drove 10 km back to the main road.

Continued on to the main gig, the 12 Apostles.

And Loch Ard Gorge.

They are beautiful and magnificent. Nature is amazing.

Traumatised by the park rangers, I was determined to find a camping site. And also I wanted to be able to freely cooked my stuff. We went to Port Campbell Holiday Park but there was no vacancy. The lady recommended us to check out the Rec Park up the road. For $10 pp, we got a spot. And for $10 pp we got what we paid for. There's kitchen facilities, laundry, toilet (ran out of tissues in the morning) and bathroom.

We had a very healthy nutritious dinner (cheese and crackers with a side of wine)

It was noisy all around, all day and all night. Though, since we were so tired, we fell asleep anyway.

Day 3 Beach & Port Fairy

After breakfast (the burritos, they were the BOMB 💣!) we broke camp and drove to the Port Campbell beach. It was gorgeous.

I want this life 24/7 please

We went for the Port Campbell Discovery Walk and discovered that youths nowadays smoke weed at 10 a.m! We couldn't even ask for some since it was a bit too early, no?! All hot and sweaty, we jumped into the water and it was the best feeling.

On a high (from life, not weed) and feeling ravenous, we went to Warrnambool and had the Kermond's Hamburgers. Nothing much to see here, so we went to Port Fairy. Hailed as the 'most livable community' in the WORLD 🌏 in 2012, it was a beautiful spot with massive beach and very friendly locals.

We stayed at the Gardens By East Beach Caravan Park - I was shocked that we had to pay $46, but then I realised why. It was walking distance from the beach, full of families and older people. Facilities are clean, spacious and it was nice and quiet!

So relaxing

Day 4 Beach and Home

Forecasted to be 42℃, Victoria's summer delivered. By 9.00 a.m. it was 30++℃, hot and oppressive. We had a quick dip on the beach where the water was still quite cool & very refreshing. Port Fairy beach is really gorgeous.

Blue see-through water, soft fine sands, gentle waves, it is the perfect family beach.

Unfortunately the surf was dead that day

After breakfast, we tidied up the van, packed everything up and all ready to drive back to Melbourne. I thoroughly enjoyed staying in the van. I will definitely do it again in the future, hopefully with our own van!!

South Korea road trip

We continued on our South Korean adventure. So far we went to Seoul and Jeju; now that we got used to driving on the right hand side, we were ready for the road trip.

We left Jeju by ferry to Mokpo. It is a 4.5 hours ride and cost ￦68,000 for both of us. We went to the international pier which is about 1 km up the road from the local ferry terminal. Lucky we had enough time to catch another taxi to the right terminal.

To say that it was a ferry is actually selling the experience short. It was more like a cruise ship. It was fully equipped with a supermarket, massive restaurant & bar, game rooms, massage room, karaoke rooms, business class rooms and economy rooms. I booked us an economy room. It was pretty much an empty room, and there were five other people in the room with us - all laying around on the floor.

Very interesting and different experience

Mokpo

We arrived at Mokpo around 6.00 pm and caught a taxi to Lotte car rental located in front of Mokpo train station. Taxis are quite reasonable and cheap in South Korea; the journey from the ferry terminal to the train station only cost us around AU$3.00. We hired the car for 5 days, dropping it off in Busan - where we will leave South Korea and head to Osaka, Japan.

We booked Yujeong Hanok Guesthouse, a traditional Korean accommodation; i.e. we slept/ate on the ondol floor - with Western style bathroom. This was the beginning of our struggle to communicate, as barely any English was spoken outside the big cities - my sign language proficiency was 120% challenged on this leg of the trip.  

In saying that the locals tried hard to communicate with us. When all else failed, they would indicate us to follow them and walked us to our destination. The landlady in Mokpo walked us to the restaurant when I asked for dinner recommendation. She also kept telling us to check out Yudal mountain, which we did in the morning. There was no one else in the guesthouse, so we had the place all to ourselves. 

Dinner spread with Korean rice

View from the top of Yudalsan

Boseong Green Tea Plantation (보성녹차밭 대한다원)

Entrance fee ￦4,000 per adult

After Yudalsan we drove for 1.5 hours to the green tea plantation. It was really quiet for such a beautiful place! 

The flowers were just starting to bloom

Rolling hills of green tea

Even though it was cold, we had an ice cream anyway

Naganeupseong Folk Village (낙안읍성)

Entrance fee ￦4,000 per adult

We continued on our drive to Naganeupseong Folk Village. According to the internet, we could stay inside the fortress village, but we had no idea how. So, we decided to just rock up, go to the i-centre and see how we go. After various body movements, maximum use of google translate and numerous phone calls - an elderly man popped in to the i-centre. He then gestured us to follow him to (I assumed) his house, opened the bedroom door, continued to speak Korean to us and left. Accommodation sorted! 

The guesthouse that we stayed

It was a hanok style guesthouse, so again we slept on the floor. Funnily enough, I slept really well!

In one of the alleyway

Drone footage of the folk village

Suncheonman Bay Wetland Reserve (순천만습지)

Entrance fee ￦8,000 per adult

Suncheonman Bay has the biggest colony of reeds in Korea that attracts large number of rare birds. The many trails around the wetland are gorgeous; though we didn`t see many birds. I believed they were still hibernating.

So brown and so fine

Daraengi Village (가천 다랭이마을)

We stayed a night here. The drive from Suncheonman Bay to Daraengi was very picturesque with mountains all around us at all time and flowers lining the streets. The village is famous for terraced rice paddies - we booked a studio nearby called Montmartre (with spring bed this time, Fabs had enough sleeping on the floor) that overlooking the sea and mountains.

Terrace fields by the sea

Stunning!

Spot us

German Village (독일마을)

Yup – there’s a German village in a countryside of Korea. It felt like a theme park with overpriced bratwurst with tasty beers.

There were German flags EVERYWHERE

Tasted OK... beer was yum though

Yeojwacheon Stream (여좌천-벚꽃명소)

We came here a week too early - there's a yearly sakura festival for 2 weeks from 1st of April. The cherry blossoms has just started budding; they already looked beautiful, but in full blooms I think it would be magnificent. Especially since the entire city of Jinhae is filled with cherry blossoms; not only the stream area. 

Sakura everywhere! 

We continued to Gimhae and stayed in the Terrace Hotel - I have a feeling that it is a 'love hotel', but since everything in Koreans I can't be sure. It has themed rooms, there was (pretty much) no lobby or receptionist, you can get a room with some sort of vending machine and the biggest giveaway is, it provides condoms. It even has the 'premium' rooms with its own garage, vending machine in front of the room and private staircase to ensure complete anonymity!

The room itself was spacious, clean (I hope so) with a massive bath, and nicely decorated - so I had no complains.

Busan

After breakfast we continued on to Busan and checked into Queens Hotel - the room somehow looked similar with Terrace Hotel though slightly dated. I don't know whether it is a love hotel as well, since I couldn't find any condoms. 

The hotel located in the shopping strip - so we just went for a walk in the rain, shopped for some more clothes and skincare. 

ANOTHER shopping street in South Korea

Spa Land Centum City (스파랜드 센텀시티)

Weekdays ￦15,000/ Weekends & National Holidays ￦18,000. After 8.00 pm ￦13,000

Spa Land is located in 'Shinsegae Centum City', the largest department store in the 🌏 Here's the proof.

The scale of the mall is ridiculous. And the Spa Land itself is humongous. As mentioned, we went to a Korean spa in Seoul; but it was a local one near our accommodation. After a quick browse on the internet, I thought this spa looked good after all that driving and walking. It wasn't good. It was brilliant. 

The first floor housed 22 spas (!!!), 13 distinctively themed Jjimjil-bangs and saunas, and an open-air foot spa; while the 2nd floor has 'entertainment zone', with a range of beautification programs, a theater, and a conference room. There are restaurants on both level, resting areas, massage chairs and many more. 

The pictures don't do it justice since I can't show the spas - some outdoor spas with their own waterfall!!

We could've spent a whole day there. But we got there after dinner and the place closed at 12.00 am. We contemplated to miss our flight the next day so we can go back to this heavenly place. 

This place was THE perfect place to close off our South Korean chapter!

Road trip finds

I highly recommended a road trip in South Korean countryside. It is way less touristy, the landscape is breathtaking, and much 'entertainment' along the road. Like this fake traffic controller.

Fake - the arm just went up and down

Some only had one arm. We also passed a speed bump that sprayed water onto our car! Driving in South Korea required international driving license from your home country which is really simple to get.

Once more, this country doesn't disappoint! To anyone that hasn't been to Korea, I highly recommend it. It's very modern whilst still keeping its very own traditions and quirks, clean, mecca for anything related with beauty and shopping, gorgeous sceneries with many trekking trails, yummy food, and it's still somehow affordable.

It had been an amazing 2 weeks and a wonderful start for our trip.  There were times I almost pushed Fabs off the cliff for being a nuisance we're all capable of, however love prevailed. Kamsahamnida South Korea for the memories - Konnichiwa Nihon! We are off for our week long pilgrimage trek at Honshū: the Kumano Kodo. Hopefully I survive to write about it!