'Home'

8-9 May 06

...

3rd Night in Bangkok

...

Well, we caught our evening flight out of Siem Reap, Cambodia back to Bangkok. Once there, we had a 4+ hour layover waiting for our connection to Seoul, Korea. So, we wandered around the airport studying the insanely priced goods available at the so-called inexpensive 'duty-free' zone. Chocolates for $40??? Who on Earth buys that stuff anyway???

...

We eventually board our flight and then wait & wait for a long while before we can 'push back' and begin the flight. Turns our we're waiting for a connecting flight from Phuket. So we continue to sit and wait. Eventually the passengers board the plane & I watch a handful of them quickly settle into their seats. What's interesting, however, is that one of the ladies among these late boarders looks fairly familiar to me (something that happens to me all of the time--as I seem to remember faces fairly well). Unfortunately remembering names for me is a whole different story. So, I forget about it for awhile but for the next 5-1/2 hours of the flight I occasionally see the lady and am reminded of how familiar she seems to me. I keep racking my brain trying to figure out how I know her. Eventually, the flight lands in Seoul--we grab our luggage and I forget about it. Then, we have to transfer to a bus that will take us the 50km to downtown Seoul where we currently 'live'. So, imagine my surprise when this very lady who seemed so familiar to me climbs aboard our bus! She sits down near us and we strike up a conversation over the next 1-1/2 hour ride into the city. Turns out she's an American (what I guessed from a distance on the flight) who currently resides between New Mexico & Denver. She just spent 5 days on Phuket and is now heading to Seoul to spend 3 days with a girlfriend who just happens to be working near where Trekkie works. Her sister and brother-in-law graduated from our Alma Mater a few years before we did (small world!) AND that she's been in a similar line of work as are we. So, we start comparing 'career' notes and turns out we not only lived in El Paso, Texas, at the same time BUT we moved into the very house that they moved out of when they relocated a few blocks away to a larger home!!! They continued to visit our neighbors after they relocated--which is why she looked so familiar to me. Talk about a very small world, indeed!!! We all (she hailing from New Mexico & we hailing from the Seattle area) catch a randomly selected Thai Airways red-eye flight out of Bangkok--heading to Seoul--and somehow end up crossing paths. 'Tis a very small world indeed!!!

...

Once settled back in Seoul, I spent about a week stuck at home valiantly fighting the parasite (or whatever it was) that decided to hitch a ride in my body. Thank God for garlic!!! Mega-dosing raw garlic incessantly for 2 days straight finally did the trick & then I was back exploring the world.

...

Our next outing proved to be a hiking trip on another mountain range in Seoul. We hop on the subway to make our way to the 'green belt' area in which the cachebox is located. Along the way, I learn a quick lesson worthy of public service announcement on this board.

DON'T PRESS THAT RED BUTTON!!!

Ever intrigued by the bizarre things we experience in Korea on a daily basis, we stumbled on yet another 'device' in a public restroom. Usually we've seen these 'etiquette' buttons on machines in the stalls that when you press the button a sound of rushing water is emitted--not sure if this is to help 'conceal' sounds or to help 'start' the process--regardless it's not something we've ever seen in the US. This time, however, the red button doesn't produce a rushing water sound but rather it calls the authorities!

We pressed it just to hear the 'rushing water sound' but instead got a 'Yeobosayeo?' The way Koreans answer the telephone. Then, in very broken Korean I try to wiggle my way out of a very lopsided conversation trying to tell the 'authority' that it's not an emergency and that I'm just a stupid American. I guess he figured that out immediately because nobody ever followed up by visiting the restroom--at least, we didn't hang around long enough to find out. ;)

...

So, we safely make it out of the subway station and start winding our way through hi-rise apartment complexes in search of a trail that hopefully will lead us up one of Seoul's peaks. We eventually follow a path that leads us past this Buddhist temple--that is perched between apartments and the neighboring slope--hopefully, it's where we want to be. ;)

We succeed in finding a small trail near the temple and eventually wind our way up the mountain.

trkr enjoys a moment stretching out on the interesting sand-stone terrain on the mountain. I keep seeing these giant slabs of sandstone and I instantly think they're man-made as they strike me as something that would be made for movie-sets. But if you study the rock closely, you'll see that they're all natural! They just appear as if they're 'foam' rocks that have been sprayed onto the mountainside!

Trekkie finds another interesting workout station on the slope. This one is one of those 'anti-gravity' machines. Too bad it's built for folks who are about 5'3" tall--it was even way too small for me!!!

One of the interesting rock formations we had to hike around on the mountain. Don't they look man-made?

Enjoying the view of a suburb of Seoul from near the geocache site.

Watt on Earth is this??? ;)

Another unique DigitalFudge geocache classic from around Asia. This kid is ingenious with his hiding techniques. He's the one who created many of the other 'unique' geocaches I've described on this blog. Here he's built an electrical box looking contraption--that includes a wooden box that is banded around a tree in an 'off-trail' area of a very heavily travelled mountain trail. He added electrical 'ducting', wires & a funnel to the bottom to make it appear more 'natural'. Inside you can see the geocache--protected by the hinged lid. This kid has put a lot of energy into creating some very interesting geocaches all around Asia. What's even more bizarre is that he only hides GCs--I don't think he's ever found one (or at least recorded one that he's found). He seems to just enjoy planting them.

...

From this location, we decide to make it a 'two-fer' and hike along a ridgeline another couple miles in search of another cachebox (Bullion Jar) in the city that was planted by an airline pilot who frequently flies this route. We meander along numerous trails, city streets, past high rise buildings, under double-decked bridges, along city canals and eventually reach another mountain slope where the other cache is hidden. Somehow we decrypt the clues properly and succeed in finding that cache (not sure how, though?). Interesting though, Bullion Jar ended up being a brown plastic Cremora non-dairy creamer bottle instead of a bullion jar--just thought that the name was interesting. It certainly was an adventure in a new part of Seoul. A nice way to spend a few hours getting some exercise!