Yesterday (November 8), Patrick and I walked another Olle Trail, as we often do on weekends. This time, however, we walked with several hundred other walkers as part of the Jeju Olle Trail Walking Festival.
For those who haven’t kept up with our Olle adventures, the Olle (Korean for “way”) trails circle Jeju Island and a few of the major outlying islands. 26 paths in totals, most ranging from 12-20km and taking 4-7 hours each. We’re trying to collect them all during our time here!
The Olle Mascot – a horse – cheering us on at the opening ceremony.
We arrived to register around 8:30am under gloomy skies. Several sponsors had booths where you could play a game to win lotions, Olle flags, keychains and usual festival knick-knacks.
Jeju volunteers leading the dancing to the Olle theme song!
The opening ceremony included short performances from a children’s choir, women’s choir, and a couple very talented solo kid acts – a fan dance, and a cello player. Then we were off!
Walking the gauntlet of Jeju Olle Youth Volunteers to start hiking the trail.
About 2 minutes after we started walking, it started raining, and kept up all day. So we didn’t take too many pictures, but here are a few highlights:
The trail of ponchos ahead…
Me with my beautiful purple umbrella (thanks Allison!)
One of the “cultural displays” – a set-up for a traditional Jeju wedding.
Some interesting, unintentional, trail “decor”.
Some statues along the trail.
Hamdeok beach. Pretty, even in the chilly rain.
A beautiful section of trail with typically Jeju stone walls and blooming silver grass.
Lunch was the best part. We ate yummy home-made octopus-rice porridge (better than it sounds! and super filling) and a green onion pancake, and our table neighbors insisted on sharing their rice wine and “root soju” – the usual vodka-like drink, except fermented 100 days with the root of a special tree to make it extra “clean” and smooth. It really was! In return, we searched our bag for something to offer them.
We were carrying a bag of Halloween-shaped gummy candies (thanks Anita!) and gave a few to the guys across the table. They proceeded to help themselves to the bag, handing out gummies to their friends and any random passer-by, picking them up using chopsticks, and feeding them to the people around. They were having so much fun with them that we didn’t even mind when he felt the bag, said, “oh, one!” and handed it back. Bonding over candy and alcohol, even without much common language.
A children’s dance show at the lunch spot.
A fun day out, even in the rain and chill.
Sorry for the long delay between posts. I’ve been having some technical difficulty with the blog, matched with the fact that this year I am actually working full time (I was only part time for much of last year), so it’s just been harder to find time to share our stories! I promise we’ll get some photos and stories from our fall break to Bali very soon.
Love to you all from Korea!