Gyeongju, Part Last

Day 2 of Gyeongju was less eventful, as we were just going to see the typical touristy stuff, and not attempt to find some random obscure tomb.

We started off by going to a marketplace and having traditional Korean food.

Yum...so delicious...5000 won (about $4.50) for rice, soup, 

and ALL the side dishes you can eat!

ALL THE SIDE DISHES.

Next we went to Bulguksa Temple...and sorry...this is not going to be exciting for you.

See, it's the oldest temple (apparently) ever, so it's quite popular...meaning there's many people...meaning they won't let you take pictures...

This is the closest I felt comfortable taking pictures. Seriously. Can you see the Buddha?

Bulguksa temple is basically full of small shrines like that, and quite a few big ones, too.

And there were a LOT of people worshiping that day!!

The monks were all out, singing and ringing their monk-bells (I know nothing about Buddhism, sorry)

Anyway, the point is, it was really uncomfortable to be holding a camera. 

So I didn't. 

:D

I did take a picture of this pig, however.

Next, we went to the second most popular touristy-place, which was this grotto with a HUGE AMAZING BUDDHA INSIDE!!!

Of course, pictures weren't allowed.

Here's the outside of the grotto, though!!

Really, there's an amazing Buddha right inside that door...

When the sun rises the light apparently hits the jewel on his forehead!!

...Or rather, it did that before they built a shrine around him to protect him. o.O

Here's a view from the grotto on the mountain:

NATURE........

Then we walked down the mountain, I bought postcards, Korean Boy's own people mistook him for a Japanese, and we went home.

~~~~END OF TAREN'S VACATION~~~~~

If any of you want actual GOOD pictures from these places, I can send you a postcard...

...sorry.

^^

Gyeongju, part III

So, after being pleasantly distracted by the cave temple, we continued on our way to:

KING MUNMU'S MARINE TOMB!!!

It was starting to get dark, so we had to drive quickly...the road just kept going and going.

Obviously, it was going all the way to the ocean.

We still consistently saw the inconsistent signs ever few km.

Munmu's Undersea Tomb!

King Munmu's Marine Tomb

Underwater Grave of Great King!

We still didn't really know what it was, but we were getting excited.

The final sign pointed us toward a 'beach.' 

....where is it?

We walked along for a while and finally noticed a tiny sign explaining how King Munmu was cremated and his ashes sprinkled at sea.

....

So...no tomb?

Nope!

Just some AMAZING rocks that you can barely see, where they apparently sprinkled his ashes.

Woot!

As disappointed as we were, it was still kinda funny.

The sun was setting, so it was time to go back.

On the way we saw another field where something interesting USED to be but now all that remained were some pagodas.

By the time we got back to Gyeongju it was dark.

The only thing to do at night was visit Anapji Pond, which is an old garden/pond of the royal family.

It is all electrically lit up now, and it was very nice (although crowded) to walk around at night.

Um...obviously it was dark, so you can't really see anything in the pictures.

 Trust me, it was nice...

Trust in me...

Just in me....