Deathly ill with the travel bug

The plans are ever changing. This week, Denise convinced me to meet her and Dale in Nepal in September. Of course, I'm freakin going to! The issue for them was that none of the treks start until September-ish and they were going to do that while I finished my contract. So instead they will go to India, then we will all meet in Kathmandu. I need to start training for it now because with all the hiking and aclimatizing, it will take a lot of work. I want to go now!

After that we'll go to SE Asia and meet Leesa who will be done her contract by then. I have been looking at photos on the internet of all these places and they look amazing. I feel so lucky that I am able to do this trip. It makes the work worth it, but I don't want to talk about work. Its Sunday.

Yesterday, a new friend and I went to this small island resort thing about 60km outside of Seoul. Romi works with Dale, is from Toronto and we totally hit it off from the start. We're the same age and sort of had the same reasons to come to Korea (a nice change). We took the train out there, then a small ferry and then walked around this awesome island for a few hours. There are cabins people can rent so they can stay overnight. There are boat rides, bike rentals, tons of restaurants. We had chicken galbi (bbq style) for lunch and sat on the patio drinking soju and talking. We took lots of pictures and just had an awesome time exploring. I have a thing for ferries, not sure why. Maybe its being from BC. It was also great people watching. All the Korean women were dressed in their best, heels and all, for all the gravel paths. So many families were there playing games. We saw some Thai women, but then we looked closer and weren't sure if they were men or women. Regardless, they were stunning. We took the train back to Seoul at about 8.30 last night. We both kept saying how awesome traveling within Korea is because it is so cheap. The train was $4 each way, the ferry was $8 round trip per person, we spent $23 on lunch in total and had tons of food. The same kind of day trip in Vancouver or Toronto would have been around $100 or something. The day also inspired me to suck it up and buy a new camera. I ponder it everyday, and I need to just get it over with.

I scored a sweet couch from the trash/"good furniture that no one wants" pile. I was riding home from work the other night. Denise helped me carry it home. Here's some advice: if you want the craziest looks form locals, carry a couch home. Its beige leather with wood ends. There are some jiffy marker marks on it, but its comfy, clean and does not smell weird. Its nice to have another place to hang other that my bed, or the floor.

The cherry blossoms and magnolias are in bloom in the city and everything looks so pretty. Its nice that Spring is finally here. There is a big cherry blossom festival this month too in Seoul. Its getting really warm and humid too, a nice reminder of the sweating that my body does to keep cool.

Namaste