Wando

I cut my Busan trip short by a day because I really wanted to ride my motorcycle to Wando for the Mokpo camping trip. Since I got back so late I didn't get a hold of the other riders so I rode to Wando solo. Took about two hours and I was able to enjoy some great view of Jeollanam-Do. Like most area in South Korea, Jeollanam-Do is dotted with lush green mountains. when the mountains give way, the dominate feature is rice fields. Summer is a great time to ride if you can avoid rainy weather since everything is green but you have to avoid the rain. Lucky for me the weather was great until I got to Wando. There the weather turned cooler and foggy but no rain thank god. I rode through Wando and crossed the bride to the Island where Myeongsasimri Beach was located. This is one of the great beaches of South Korea. It's 4k long and very wide so there is plenty of room to relax. The beach and the ocean meet smoothly so the water stays nice and shallow which helps keep the temperature warm. This beach is similar to Daegwang Beach which at 12k is the largest in South Korea. I can't decide which one I like better so I just need to visit both again to make an educated decision.
After I set up camp and said hi to everyone I headed to the beach for a swim. It was exactly what I needed after the ride down and the water felt great despite the dropping temperature and increasing cloud cover. That evening we built a campfire, ate some dinner and drank some booze (classic camping) It was Canada day so Canadian maple leaves could be found on everyone and everything throughout camp. Some people brought fireworks so we had a little show going by the beach despite the high winds and light sprinkles. Since everyone had been drinking since noon, we ran out of steam and called it an evening at around nidnight. This was when the fun really started. I have a cheap tent that has only netting on the sides and thus provides no protection against water so I was really worried about possible rain. For the first half of the night the main problem was the high wind. It created a nasty little sound in my tent and made sleeping impossible. At one point a gust uprooted one of my stakes and caused my tent to collapse. The rain starting coming at around 3am. I had not slept but my tent had done a good job of keeping out the light rain and I was cautiously optimistic a dry night could be attained. My optimism quickly shifted to an impending sense of doom when the rumble of thunder in the distance made itself known. Lightning followed it and before I knew it when had a torrential downpour in Camp Wando. The monsoon was coming down like a shower at home and the water quickly flowed into my tent, forcing me to abandon it for shelter in a tarp setup that was being used by some other campers. Much of the structure had collapsed from the wind but there was still enough room to put my soggy sleeping bag. At least I wasn't going to get any wetter. The rain bounced off the tarp like bullets and I knew this would be a sleepless night. Anyone that was actually asleep at camp was woken up but by one of the loudest thunder claps I have ever experience. The decibel level had to have reached 120-130 at camp.
The rain continued to pour until about 5am, at which point daylight began and everyone rose to assess the damage. Our camp resembled a flood zone more then anything. One girls motorcycle had fallen over due to the mushy ground and was damaged. Canadian beach balls and flags littered the landscapes. My tent had an inch of water in it but thank god my electronics stayed dry. One couple had even abandoned their sleeping spot for the safe refuge of the bathroom! That's how bad it was folks.
The busers packed up and left really early. We bikers got a later start because we had to deal with the broken motorcycle but we did get on our way at around 10am. The ride back was like the night camping. Very hard rain. We all got soaked head to toe in water while navigating the slippery roads back to Mokpo. Although soaked, none of us got cold. The weather was warm and the water felt like a shower even with the wind factor. My motorcycle Entourage did have one bad incident when a girl lost control of her bike on a 90 degree turn and flew off the side. I saw her accident in my rear view mirror and I knew she was probably injured as I pulled my bike over. Amazingly she escaped with a only a few cuts and bruises. She was wearing a leather jacket which prevented road burn and the helmet saved her head. She was even brave enough to get back on the bike and finish the trip. I dried off and collapsed into bed not wanting to think about going to school the next day.
This Wando trip was not what I hoped it would be but I can chalk it up as a life experience I can talk about. It's not very funny when you are experiencing a sleepless night in rain and witness a motorcycle accident but time makes these sort of things funny and in the end you are glad to have went through them.