Here's another popular and very worthwhile day trip from Seoul, to Ganghwa-do (Island), at the mouth of the Han river (immediately south of the DMZ), listed as two hours away, but drivable in one. It's a decent-sized place, of which you can do a lap in one day, but to see the many attractions you need more time. It's great because it offers a "royal sampler" of Korean history and culture: pre-historic dolmens, working fishing villages, ancient Buddhist temples, and 19th-century fortifications. Although not that distant from the mainland, the island was used as a strategic retreat on a couple of occasions in the last 700 years at times of foreign invasion (a recurring theme in Korean history). Its cannon also saw action, believe it or not, against US and French vessels in the late nineteenth century. (Don't worry, I didn't know this either.) Finally, it also apparently has one of the largest tidal ranges in the world (after the Bay of Fundy), but we had to leave the Tidal Flat Centre to be explored for another time. To note, the temple shown above (Jeondeungsa), while not an enormous complex, has some fantastic decorative elements and interiors, quite the equal of what we saw in Japan. (NB. to readers that the "swastika" is very old Buddhist symbol, often used as a icon to indicate temples here.)
We had lunch in a harbourside place in one of the larger fishing villages, watching the small vehicle ferry to the outer islands load and unload. The setting was not completely unlike that on one of BC's Gulf islands (one of the regular ones, not super-fancy). The waitress promptly spirited Jamie away and sat him down by the pass-through where the kitchen staff could admire him. They plied him with a free lunch and a bottle of Coke. We repatriated him to our table before too long, but at the end of it, the staff somehow got him to bow. Did he learn this at school? We hadn't seen it before and were impressed.
