I've discussed before about attempting to know the right place and time to take photographs, but I would definitely say that a lot of the things I do with myself on a daily basis allow me to take pictures, and therefore attempt to create something interesting for other people to look at.
I'm sure that most of my pictures don't mean anything to anybody but me, but the 10% that represent the perfect moments captured in a still image give me something to be proud of, and hopefully either make people interested in the story behind the picture or make them feel like it is a place they would like to go, or something they would like to see or experience.
The addition of a new camera in Malaysia was an inspired move as it has allowed me to increase the quality of the pictures I have been able to take, and I think it has also made me more selective as I now spend more time considering whether or not each situation is worthy of getting my camera out for.
Admittedly a lot of the time I walk around like a massive tourist with it swinging around my neck as once the camera is out, the moment I put it away I feel like I will come across something I want to photograph so it's just easier to have it that way.
On my travels I have seen lots of people with cameras, some with DSLRs like mine (I'm often made to feel inadequate by the fact that 'hardcore' people have brought their tripods with them) or smaller compact cameras, but often I see photographs being taken on phones. As is the trend these days there are plenty of people with 'selfie sticks' and they are sold at pretty much every shop (particularly in Korea), and although I haven't seen many people here with them, there were quite a few in other locations with GoPros.
Personally, I think the situation where a picture really doesn't tell a thousand words is when it comes to photographing landscapes - something I have found myself doing regularly.
I don't feel my pictures really do justice to some of the beautiful vistas that I have been seeing, and often they come across as being rather bland and boring. When you take a picture of a building or the sunset for example, your eyes have something to focus on or be drawn towards, but taking a panoramic picture of everything you can see in front of you can often be difficult. Sometimes it's just hard to sit everything in or for example in this picture, what I was trying to take a picture of only takes up a very small part of the photo:
If it's not people that get in your way then it's buildings!
Frustrations like this certainly won't stop me from taking pictures, but they do make it a lot more difficult for me to convey through images the beautiful and fascinating sights that I am often seeing.
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7am dead on - I had no idea why I woke up at that time this morning but I did.
Usually my body is smart and it realises that after a day like yesterday when I walked the soles off my new trainers that I need the rest - needing the toilet is often the only reason that it disturbs me. But this morning my eyes opened with a flash at seven with no necessity to go to the toilet and thankfully no drilling. I laid awake for a few minutes before eventually going back to sleep, and then having to prise my eyes open when it did come time for a my alarm to go off.
Despite scouring through the TV channels this morning I could find no sign of NHL or NBA playoff action so I was stuck with MLB - thinking about it I probably should have put that on when I woke up at 7am and I would have been back to sleep in no time.
I'm not sure if this is the case in every country, but I know from my experiences of being in Korea before, but when it comes to international sports like basketball or baseball, the cable TV channels like to show athletes of Korean decent so pretty much each morning they have live coverage of the Pittsburgh Pirates on who feature short stop Jung-Ho Kang on their team.
Whilst living over here they used to show every Premier League game featuring either Manchester United or Bolton, and I remember one particular Sunday afternoon instead of showing the Merseyside derby one of the networks decided to replay a game between Bolton and Wigan (which had just been shown live) as it featured a goal from Chong-Yong Lee.
Sports really are a big deal in Korea and although their number one 'sport' is video gaming (100% not made up) the natives are passionate about both basketball, baseball and football. Since getting to know more and more about Asia I can see why so many teams take advantage of marketing opportunities with their stars who are native to this continent as they really do become national heroes.
I always thought Manchester United were dominant in this part of the world, but overall I've seen far more things associated with Liverpool. This included a giant poster in a Dunkin' Doughnuts in Vietnam which featured a picture of Sterling, Sturridge and Suarez (awkward!) saying that they were an official training parter of the club. Pictures with the club crest on also frequently feature in Standard Chartered banks who are the Liverpool's main shirt sponsors.
Goes to show that football truly is a global game.
Once I'd roused myself and started to feel a bit more awake I prepared myself for the first part of my day which would involve revisiting a couple of sights from yesterday before moving on to something new.
Although I managed to get a picture of both Jeongbang and Cheonjiyeon waterfalls yesterday (both in different forms) I didn't really get to see them close up, and I though that would be something that I could look into doing. Considering how close both of the waterfalls are to me it wasn't too much of a problem, and I think if they were a little further away then maybe I'd have thought about settling for what I had seen.
Grabbing some breakfast on the way I first decided to head to Jeongbang which I was hoping had re-opened after a day of warmer weather yesterday and a start to today which had seen bright blue skies and a re-appearance of my shorts.
After making the fifteen minute walk to the entrance to the waterfall I was delighted to discover today that it was actually open so I paid the 2,000 won it cost to get in (I feel like this is a standard ticket price for everything as pretty much every sight I have looked into going to costs the same price) and then ventured down some stairs in the direction of where I could hear the water gushing from.
You could start to see the waterfall as you went lower and lower and even from far away it looked like a pretty impressive sight:
Considering that my last efforts to see a waterfall ended up in me getting drenched it was a beautiful sight to see the sun shining out on the waterfall and everything around me, there actually weren't any clouds at all:
Jeongbang is significant in Jeju as it is one of the island's three major waterfalls, and is the only one in Korea where water is directly falling into the ocean. There were quite a lot of people around and attempting to navigate my way over the rocks I could see why some bad weather might have closed the place in previous days:
The waterfall itself was an incredible sight and I think it was great to view in very different ways to the one I had seen in Laos which looked spectacular even in shocking weather:
Thoroughly satisfied that I'd seen more than just this:
...which was my view yesterday I decided to go and try my luck with Cheonjiyeon which had so far eluded me in my three days in Jeju.
Yesterday I saw it from a distance, but despite following the signs couldn't get into the entrance, but walking there today I followed a different route and discovered that it has been a level below where I had spent my time walking.
It was busy there, just like it has been at Jeongbang and this time there were no steps to walk down as I followed a path which began to gradually get you closer to the sound that you could hear from a distance.
The waterfall is on three levels, one high up (that the ticket was to see) and then a second level and third level very close together:
Getting to the waterfall it wasn't quite as impressive as Jeongbang but still very majectic to look at:
The one on the left in the first picture wasn't coming down as strongly as the ones on the right which create the main falls. Dense forest covers up most of the origins of the waterfall, and from here it trickles down through the other two falls shown in the original picture before going into the harbour area which is back by the entrance gate.
Again, I was much more satisfied after getting close up to this waterfall, and felt like it was a good decision to go back and look properly rather than settle for what I saw yesterday.
With two things successfully completed it was time to carry out my third activity of the day which required me to take a bus across the island and head to eastern Jeju.
In the wonderful magazine that I have one of the things it highlights is a place called Seongsan Ilchulbong Turf Cone which is also known as 'Sunrise Hill'.
Seongsan was formed by a volcanic erruption in the middle of the ocean and is 182 metres above sea level. The pictures I'd seen showed that the top of the hill itself was flatter than a regular crater you'd expect to see, and although you can't walk around it, I imagined that being up so high would no doubt provide me with some fantastic views.
In order to get to Seongsan I needed to take one of the buses which essentially does an anti-clockwise circle around the island in order to get to Jeju City.
Thankfully the map the hotel had given me displayed where the bus stop was and I managed to navigate there without too many problems. The signs were all in Korean which weren't too much use to me as none of them seemed to have Seongsan written on them so when the bus I thought I was supposed to get on turned up I asked the driver in my best Korean accent and he nodded his head and let me on board.
I wasn't sure how long it was going to take, but figured it might be quite a while as I was pretty much having to go from six to three on the clock with plenty of stops along the way. The bus itself was pretty empty, but after a couple of stops it started to fill up a little more. We drove down the coastal road which gave great views of the rocks and the sea. It's really strange because normally when you go close to the edge of an island you might expect to see sand, but as Jeju is a volcanic island you usually have rock formations and a good view of the ocean which actually seems relatively calm.
It took about an hour and a half to get to the stop called Seongsan Ilchulbong and here it was much breezier than it had been in Seogwipo, but after looking at what I was going to have to climb I was still pretty glad I'd worn shorts:
As I got closer all you could see was a zig-zagged path with people looking like the size of ants walking up and down:
I was just grateful that there was a path as I can imagine that if this was in Laos or the Philippines then it probably would have just been a dirt track!
There was quite a lot of people headed to the top, and on the way I looked back occasionally to see what I was leaving behind:
When I eventually got to the top there was some spectacular views, very similar to what I'd witnessed coming up. There were sets of stairs in place to allow you to get better views of the crater in the middle:
It was really amazing to be at such a great height and not only be able to see downwards for a fantastic view, but to consider that the reason I was able to stand where I was, was due to the eruption of a volcano which created the rock I had just climbed up.
I stayed for a little while taking in the view, but it wasn't exactly what you'd call relaxing with all those people around.
I decided to head downwards:
I wasn't sure about how regular the buses were, but as I walked towards the stop I saw a bus just pulling off so I figured I had a little bit of time before the next one would be coming. I continued to walk down the coast and managed to get a good view from the distance of Seongsan Ilchulbong before I managed to flag down the next bus and make my way back to Seogwipo:
By the time I arrived back at the bus station it was almost dark and having not eaten since just before climbing up Sunrise Hill I was pretty hungry so I got some food on my way back to the room.
Tomorrow will be my last full day in Jeju before it's time to say goodbye to Korea once again.
Higher
Kylie Minogue & Taio Cruz (2009)
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