Day 2 I took it quite slow. I enjoyed breakfast in my hostel with lovely pancakes, eggs, toast, homemade, jam, etc. It was more like a brunch, so I could skip on lunch, which doesn’t harm my budget of course! And it was very tasty haha.
I took the bus from Gyeongju to Bulguksa (or Bulguk temple), which is one of Korea’s most famous temples. It is indeed a very beautiful temple, and it’s one of those temples that just looks very old. Many of Korea’s temples get painted regularly, but Bulguksa has that kind of old feeling.
The temple grounds and architecture itself are very beautiful. Yet, this temple mainly differs from the other ones because it’s evident how time has changed the grounds.
On many places, the paint has worn off quite a lot, yet many details are still visible.
From Bulguksa I went to the Seokguram Grotto. A small shrine within a mountain, which is beautifully dug out. It’s hidden behind glass, and no photographs are allowed. It’s a tiny bit underwhelming, yet thinking about how it is/was constructed made the place a bit more special. The road to the Grotto was covered with lanters in addition to having many squirrels roaming the grounds.
Although the temple and so on was really nice, I have to admit I’m maybe a bit ‘temple-tired’. The majority of temples look very similar in color, construction, and so on. Although Bulguksa is probably one of the best temples I’ve seen, yet I wasn’t as amazed as I was at first.
It was already around 3 or so when I got back from the Grotto. The folk village I was thinking about going was at least a good hour away and closed at 6, meaning I wouldn’t have that long to explore it. Therefore I decided to head to Busan already, which is only an hour away from Gyeongju. Sadly, around the time I arrived, so did the typhoon that would come over that night (and was more or less gone the next morning). Still I took a peek at the famous ‘Gwangan Bridge’, also known as the diamond bridge. A cheesy lazer and light show takes place here too.
