My parents visited me and Romana in Korea for three weeks. Here are a some of our days and evenings out and about.

DAYs 13 OF my parents’ 3-week TRIP to Korea

We drove down to Gangneung for a daytrip and explored a couple of old, historical houses and grounds (and got to hear an organ concert!), and then we went to a nice sandy beach.

The drive to Gangneung was going to take about 40 or 50 minutes, so we had breaky at A Little Bit (어리틀빗), a coffee shop very close to our accommodation. We had chocolate covered croissants. It was a lovely day but too sunny to sit in the sun without shade (get some more shade, A Little Bit!).

Ojukheon

I think I took the quickest way in, using the toll roads. I always make the mistake of thinking Gangneung and Sokcho are a lot closer than they really are! I did something along the lines of, “let’s just cycle down to Gangneun for a few hours” a few years ago; took me all day and I was knackered! We arrived around lunch time and while my parents grabbed a coffee, Romana and I went to get some beef soup. We then walked to Ojukheon (오죽헌), a large museum complx featuring the family of the artist who is the face of the Korean 50,000 one note. It featured art of this woman and her family.

Seongyojang

Next, we drove a short distance to Gangneung Seongyojang (강릉선교장), a set of old houses with ties to a Korean family of old. The place has a lovely garden, pond, places for performances, and a tea house. It was a relaxing place to walk around with lots of flowers and a cool house built half over a lily pond. We could hear loud organ music playing and eventually found our way to a woman playing old waltzes and the like; very unexpected! We watched for a while before heading to the tea house, another relaxing place.

Gyeongpo Park, Beach

We went to Gyeongpo Park (경포도립공원), a stretch of sandy beach with pine trees and a small restaurant-lined road along the rear. It’s right next to Gyeongpo lake. I paddled in the sea for a bit. We found a restaurant nearby called Tom’s Bistro (톰스비스트로) and had pizza.

Then back to Sokcho for beers and Yahtzee!