[Part 1] 196. 51회 진해군항제 The 51st Jinhae Gunhangje

I finally went to Jinhae today!!!!!

My loyal blog readers would already have known by now but… this is my first time spending spring in Korea and right on top of my TO DO/VISIT DURING SPRING list is to check out the cherry blossom festival in Jinhae. It’s actually more like a festival held in commemoration of Admiral Yi Sun Shin but for many, the main attraction is the cherry blossoms. 군항 means naval port and Jinhae is the naval base for the Korean Navy.

Thankfully, I am based in Busan now and I live in Sasang which means that it’s really convenient to visit Jinhae! There is a bus to Jinhae from Seobu Bus Terminal in Sasang which comes every 15 to 20 minutes.

Prior to our day trip to Jinhae, I had researched quite a bit about getting there and after reading several blog entries about visiting Jinhae on a weekend, I was adamant about going on a weekday to avoid the long queues, long waiting time and heavy traffic. My initial plan was to take the 1.20pm bus from the Bus Terminal but I only reached Sasang with my friends at 1.40pm, which meant that we could only take the next bus at 2pm. Our mistake was not going to the departure gate area immediately after purchasing our bus tickets. We were fooled by the relatively empty waiting area in the terminal, thinking that we needn’t worry about any crowd, but the moment we entered the departure gate area at slightly before 2pm, we were greeted by the looooong queue for the bus, which was already full too :( Thankfully, the next bus (supposedly the 2.20pm bus? or maybe more buses were catered for the festival) came within a few minutes and left within the next few minutes too. Thank goodness!

The journey from Sasang to Jinhae took about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Upon alighting, we quickly purchased our return bus tickets at the bus terminal first, in a typical kiasu Singaporean-style, led by yours truly. We had no maps and no idea where to go so we just followed the crowd blindly until we reached the rotary where the main event venue was at. There’s a tourist info booth there and you can get maps :)

The Bus Terminal or the 시외 Bus Stop

Cherry blossoms everywhere!

Walking towards the Jungwon rotary 

Some performance for the Jinhae Cherry Blossom Art Festival

Food everywhere too!  

Jaehwangsan Park 재황산공원 which we wanted to go to but didn’t have the time :( 

Tourist info booth

Finally armed with maps, we found our way to Yeojwacheon 여좌천 where the famous Romance Bridge is. The stream is near Jinhae Station.
Beautiful but really crowded!

The start of the stream

Nice out-of-focus pic of us

Falling petals. Spring’s version of falling snowflakes. 

Taken with my S3

We were happily taking photos when this reporter from KNN approached us (guess he spotted the only foreign-looking lady amidst the crowd- Valentina) and filmed us taking photos of each other before interviewing Valentina :) 

I was her translator though she didn’t really need me :P 

Everyone was selca-ing and I just had to do so too

Trying to catch the petals

We didn’t quite have a proper lunch and ate on the bus so we all got quite hungry after awhile and I found my favourite 계란빵 egg bread! 

Gyeonghwa Station is not within walking distance from Yeojwacheon so we took a cab from Jinhae Station to get there. Our cab fare was 4,300원. Basically, if you’re in Jinhae for the festival, you should check out the stream, the Jaehwangsan Park and Gyeonghwa Station. At Gyeonghwa Station, the Mugunghwa train becomes the star attraction and as the train passes, it causes the flower petals to fall because of the gushing wind and it’s really a beautiful sight to behold. Passengers on board the train become celebrities of the moment too because everyone starts taking photos of the train lol. 

Enjoying time on the railway tracks before the next Mugunghwa came by 

Got separated from my friends :’(

It was a horror trying to get back to Yeojwacheon from Gyeonghwa Station at 6pm because it was peak hour, all the buses were full and there were no available taxis :( I met a group of Singaporeans (very distinct Singlish accent) and talked to them for awhile as we were all waiting for a taxi/bus (whichever came first). In the end, my friends and I gave up and we decided to walk till we could get a cab somewhere. But then, when the cab came, there were 5 of us and only 4 of us could get in. Since Jenna had work to do and wanted to come back first, she took the cab back while the rest of us ended up walking all the way back to the stream! Thank goodness for Google Map and our vague memory of how the taxi drove us to the Station that we managed to find our way back to the stream :) 

Picked up the flowers from the ground since I didn’t dare to pluck any

Valentina trying to sprinkle petals on me

Modelling the latest spring bag from Myeongdong with flowers from Jinhae lol 

Well, we were told that Gyeonghwa Station and the stream weren’t within walkable distance but we managed to walk back :) The stream’s beautiful at night too! 

Fake flowers

My dinner of very salty potato twisters 3,000원 and sausage 2,000원

From Jinhae Station, we took a cab back to the bus terminal and just as we were getting into the taxi, a random guy came up to us and told us that the bus terminal was very close-by and that we needn’t take a taxi but we ignored him and took it anyway. We think that he was just trying to get our cab instead because…the bus terminal wasn’t that near and after walking for almost an hour (I think!) from the station to the stream, we were beyond exhausted. 

At the bus terminal, we were greeted by a really long queue for the bus, twice the length of the queue in Sasang earlier this afternoon. According to my estimate, we would have to wait for the 3rd bus BUT we were in luck :) The bus driver suddenly called for people headed towards Sasang and so we were allowed to board the bus BUT we had no seats :( Still, we weren’t going to wait for the 3rd bus for seats. The journey back was a bit longer than 1 hour 15 minutes and we reached Sasang slightly after 9pm. 

I’m so glad we made it to Jinhae after school today :) It’s a pity though that we didn’t get to explore more of Jinhae but there’s always another time :)