9th Boryeong Mud Festival!

July 14th: This weekend we went to celebrate the 9th Boryeong Mud Festival! It's an event that is centered around this mud that is collected from the clean beach. It is renowned for its superior quality and contains rich natural minerals. We (Kelly, Steph and Tara - Kelly's friend from home who is visiting us!) headed to Jinju Friday night to get a good start on the long trek to the east coast of Korea. We thought we were being very smart by bringing alcohol with us but unfortunately the bag in which it was being carried gave way and Kelly received a huge splash of red wine and vodka and a deep cut to the toe while exiting the subway. :( We recovered when we got to Jinju by buying some terribly cheap wine from the mart along with our Peach Champagne!

July 15th: We had to get up at 5am to catch the 6am bus which proved to be more difficult than planned since we got a little tipsy and stayed up into the wee-hours of the night. Either way, we found some of our buddies at the bus station and headed for a two hour bus ride up to Daejeon. We then had to catch another 2.5 hour bus ride to Daecheon Beach where the Mud Festival was being held. We slept most of the time which proved to be beneficial because upon arrival we gave'er!

We got to the beach and stood in awe as people started piling towards the huge mud slide and mud activities that were set up around the beach. There was a Mud Prison where you go if you aren't covered in mud, a Mud Wrestling pit, Mud Inflatable fun-ness, Mud Stations where you could paint yourself (and others) in mud, and a central stage where a concert was being held on the beach.

We dropped off our bags in a locker and headed to the store to grab some beers (note it is about 11am) and headed off to the beach. Everyone was covered in mud so we figured we should join in the festivities and drenched ourselves from head to toe in the cool, soft mud. We met up with the rest of the gang and spent the rest of the day letting the mud dry, playing in the ocean, and drinking copious amounts of Budweiser.

The most random part of the day was when we were walking around and Steph ran into Sarah Jane who was a high-school friend from Burlington! She was there with her hubby and friends and is teaching English in Seoul! I haven't talked to her in 5 years so was amazing to catch up briefly on our lives and to see a familiar face! Then not even 10 minutes later we ran into Josh Seager who we went to Dalhousie with! He's also teaching near Seoul. It was hilarious to meet up with another Halifornian!

Later that afternoon we headed back to our house where we were staying. It was on the out-skirts of the city but amongst the gorgeous rolling hills. There were 15 of us staying at the fully-furnished house and we all enjoyed much needed hot showers. After some lounging around we all examined our sunburns . We all realized it does not have to be sunny to get a sunburn and mud is not an effective UV protection agent.

We headed back to the beach to see the opening ceremonies. After losing everyone among the thousands of wandering mud-goers, we found our group and drank on the beach. We spent the rest of the night hanging out, watching the fireworks, and making fun of the Koreans who were enthralled with the silly dancers on the stage. We capped off the night with some pizza and chocolate before hitting the floor to sleep.Zzzzz.....

July 16th: The next morning came early and it looked like it was going to rain so we jumped back on the bus and headed back to Daejeon. From there we (Tara, Kelly, Steph and Erik) took the KTX back to Busan. That evening Tara fixed us up a wonderful imported dinner of whole wheat pasta, veggies, bread and wine. So delicious!

We had the next day off so obviously it rained. We went for some Vietnamese food and then to see Pirates of the Caribbean 2. Our day improved dramatically when we saw Jonny Depp in his eyeliner :)

Great weekend!