3rd Sep: Namison - (Nami Island)

We haven't been to many places outside of Seoul so on Wednesday we got the train out to visit Namison (Nami island). Namison is a small island in the pukhankang river which was named after a famous Korean army general (General Nami) who died aged 26, and was the filming location for a TV drama which became massively popular in Japan 10 years or so ago. Since so many Japanese came here to see the island it's been turned into a bit of a tourist attraction. You take a 5 minute boat ride out to the island which is tiny but beautiful, it is basically one big garden. There are quite a few wild animals to be found running around including ostrich's. You can hire bikes and tandems and all sorts of other vehicles to travel around on or just walk around and admire the place. We were really lucky to find the ostrichs as they roam free on the island and currently have a baby to look after so they normally stay hidden. They also had a Bonsai garden which had some pretty cool Bonsai trees that looked very old.

We also tried an old style korean food which is basically a rice dish served in a hot metal box which needs to be shook up to mix everything, so to do this you get a pair of gardening gloves to hold it with (it's red hot!). 30 or 40 years ago this was a normal school packed lunch. All the kids would put there box's together in a heated area and use gloves to get it out and mix it up at lunch time.