The Search for Cherry Blossoms in Korea - Hadong (하동/河東) & Jinhae (진해/鎭海) (7 April 2013)

My friends and I booked tickets from hanatour for 49,000KRW, which includes the bus rides to Hadong & Jinhae, breakfast at Hadong and basic insurance. And so my search for cherry blossoms started in Hadong and Jinhae, at the Southern part of South Korea. 

Hadong County is a county in South Gyeongsang Province. It takes approximately 3 hours by bus from Seoul. Hadong is famous for its scenery as well as green tea. 

We started the bus journey at about 11pm the day before, and reached Hadong at 3am. We slept on the bus until sunrise and we were supposed to walk 7km to our breakfast destination. Of course, those who choose not to walk can take the bus straight to the destination. It was too cold for my friend and I as we were too under-dressed for the cold weather, so we took the bus while the rest of our friends walked!

It was quite unfortunate that there was very heavy rain the day before our arrival, so many of the petals dropped! We managed to see some cherry trees that were not so bare though.

It is definitely a good place to go if you wish to escape from the bustling cities. I remember the peacefulness I felt when I took a short walk along the rows of cherry blossom trees. 

How to get there: Visit the Hadong County official website for details!

Jinhae Cherry Blossom Festival 2013 / Jinhae Gunhangje Festival (진해군항제축제)

Next up, 2 hours bus ride to Jinhae. Upon arrival at Jinhae, we were directed to the free shuttle bus that will bring us near to the places we want to visit. You may still need to take a short walk from the bus stop though! However, as we only had a few hours to visit a few places, we took cab instead.

Since it's an annual festival with many international visitors as well as locals, the roads were quite congested, and there were many taxi drivers who wanted only fixed fare trips! It was still cheap for us though since there were 5 of us.

Recommended places to go around Jinhae downtown

Naval Training Command Centre

Yeojwacheon

Gyeonghwa Station

Jinhae Station

Naval Training Command Centre

This was the most beautiful place I saw that day. Many of the trees were still in full bloom, and because of the sun's glow on the petals, it really looked like a picture! Alas, too many visitors!

Three rows of cherry trees along the main road from the entrance

~.~.~

While we were heading towards our next location, we watched the parade from the taxi! There were military bands, people in Joseon  Dynasty costumes, including the above! This is for the transport of criminals!

 Gyeonghwa Station

Directions - From Jinhae Station, take Bus 307, 315 to Gyeonghwa Station.

Another famous location in Jinhae. Unfortunately, most of the petals have dropped, and what we saw was a sea of pinkish trees. Still pretty nevertheless!

 Yeojwacheon Stream (Cherry Blossom Road)

This is the place that made me interested to go to Jinhae. I first saw the picture from the KTO facebook page, and told myself I must go there! This is also known as the "romance bridge", after being popularised due to the MBC TV series "Romance" (: 

The timing when we reached was quite bad, with harsh sunlight glaring at us. 

There were stalls along the stream selling both local delights and international food, such as kebab and turkish ice-cream. We didn't have time for proper lunch so we ate as we walked around!

Fishcake with crabstick

We were lucky enough to catch the performance by Korean soldiers! All of them are so tall!! The performance lasted at least 5 minutes where they flipped and threw the rifles into the air, and performed synchronised actions in waves! Very charming!

 And that ends our adventure in Jinhae!