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Only two more days before I head back to the good old USA. Today we bundled up and walked down towards Leigh’s school. I wanted to photograph the crop of persimmons I’d seen air drying by the 1,000’s but they had been all covered up so that was disappointing. We turned and walked back uptown to one of our favorite coffee places – Coffee Holic and had a couple lattes. Leigh and Gideon took a cab back home and I took the long way, down some side streets. Leigh and Josh have a date night tonight, so I’m in charge. I’d forgotten what it was like to be up every couple of hours and how much I celebrated a burp!Leigh got her hair cut this afternoon and Josh shaved off his beard. Here they are heading out for their date.

Sometimes things just catch your eye, like a bunch of garlic for sale, or a dirty old junkyard. It’s fun to play with them and see where it will take you. The cable was down yesterday so we couldn’t update, but trying to catch up and will do another entry later. We’re going for a walk, so who knows what we will find …

So today’s blog features our trip this morning to the hospital for Gideon’s Hep.B vaccination and general check-up. The boy is growing like a weed – now weighs 5kg – and doing fine. He was outraged when they stuck the needle in his little thigh, but came away with a handsome bandaid and apparently no memory of his traumatic experience. Here are some pics of what will probably be our only outing today, since it’s turned cold and windy outside.

Tonight we were invited to dinner at the home of Mr & Mrs Kim, friends of Leigh & Josh. They were so hospitable and gracious and the food was delicious. We took a group photo before we left (see below).Garlic is in season at the moment, and it is sold in bulk in the local grocery stores. I took a photo because I’d never seen it displayed quite like this before.

It’s late so I don’t have any torrent of poetic prose today – sorry to disappoint my throngs of regular readers .. We decided to hire a car and drive to Seoul. The train ride (with one connection) takes 4 hours, and Leigh can’t ride a bus (2 hour trip) because of motion sickness, so we left early this morning and hit the road. One little problem was that our GPS only spoke Korean which sent us in a few circles. Another little problem was dense fog so needless to say our trip to Seoul ended up taking 4 hours and was stressful. We met up with the Han family, friends we hadn’t seen for years, and they took us for a traditional Korean lunch – an education in plant and animal life never before seen by me on a dinner plate. After that we wandered around Itaewon, a trendy area of Seoul frequented by a melting pot of international residents and visitors. Fortunately the Korean GPS guided us home via a more direct route and only took about 2 hours.

This morning we packed up Gideon and all of his attendant paraphenalia (which took awhile) and caught the 11:48am train to Gumi. It was a 45 minute trip through mostly agricultural countryside; rice fields, apple and persimmon orchards, dairy farms and towns of varying sizes.Mount Geumosan is a provincial park with hiking trails, temples, a fortress, and great fall color on the mountain.It was a long day, especially for Gideon and we arrived back in Sangju on the 4:50 train. Here are some pics taken along the way.

It’s so funny when you’re away and completely out of your routine. I don’t even know what day it is most of the time – because it doesn’t really matter. Anyway here are a couple of photos taken today – nothing exciting, just spending family time.

Images: Harvested rice fields, shopping at the e-Mart, and taking a napThe pace is definitely slower – for me at least. Our days are dictated by Gideon’s schedule which is predictable for the most part. He is a very good baby, and only fusses when hungry, windy, or dirty. So we shop at the local grocery stores, go for walks, or stay at home cooking, doing laundry, and for the last 24 hours watching the election news on the web.We have plans to get out and about a little more over the next few days and will spend a day in Seoul over the weekend – second largest city in the world.

Leigh and GideonWalking in the neighborhood
I have my days a little muddled right now, but after leaving Detroit at 12.30 on Saturday afternoon, I arrived at Incheon airport, Seoul less than 3 hours later, at 3.15 on Saturday afternoon. Two buses and 3-1/2 hours later I pulled up at the Sangju-si bus station where Leigh was waiting. This is going to be a fun trip. Such an obviously different culture so lots of photo opps to look forward to, plus Gideon John Jourdain – the main photo opp event!

Back home after a whistle stop tour. I will post some images on my website once I have had a chance to sort through them, but here are a couple more quick pics. Above is a view from the top of Max Patch Bald near Hot Springs and below is of the Davidson River that runs alongside the NC-276 past the Cradle of Forestry near BrevardI added a daytime photo of the balloon festival in Statesville.The last one caught my attention while traveling home through rural South Carolina’s 321 South – only in SC!