Daepyeong

Daepyeong is a seaside village on the southern coast of Jeju Island, and is about as far as a person can get from the 38th Parallel, and still be in Korea, without further island hopping.  Although only a fifty minute flight, it is a world apart from Seoul both in climate and lifestyle.  It is a land of palm trees and citrus fruits where winter temperatures seldom dip below the freezing mark, and its inhabitants I mingled with pride themselves on a slower paced, pastoral way of life.

We flew into Jeju City on the north side of the island, and caught a bus down to Jungmun on the south side where our guesthouse hostess picked us up in her car.  During the ride to the guesthouse, she told us Jeju is famous for wind, stone, and women (Jeju's women divers get worldwide attention from the likes of National Geographic). 

Sure enough, the next day, we had to lean into the wind as we walked, walls constructed of volcanic stone stretched everywhere, and we were fortunate to find seating in a small restaurant as a group of twenty-eight women, who arrived just after us, had reserved nearly the entire joint.  I think these women were tourists like us, and, given to verbosity, quite windy in their own right.  Unable to hear myself think, I sat and ate a huge bowl of juk (Korean rice porridge) in stony silence.

Daepyeong harbor.

This photo is representative of the narrow streets
and wind resistant, walled in, low profile houses of Daepyeong.
Standing a towering 6'3" tall, there were times
I felt like Gandalf in the Shire.

No mortar is used in constructing Jeju's stone walls
which are known as doldam.
The stones are simply (or not so simply for the
laborer) fitted and stacked.

Mosaic exterior walls, like this floral pattern,
are common on Jeju houses.

More mosaics.

From Daepyeong, looking out across garlic fields,
toward Gunsan Oreum.
Tangerines are grown in the distant greenhouses.

Jeju farm implement.

Jeju palm tree.

Dinner time at a Daepyeong restaurant.