Mud Festival- Let's Get Dirty!

It's summertime - lets head for the mud? Well, that's exactly what we did during this hot summer weekend in Daecheon Beach. Pack your bags it's time to get dirty!

Koreans most popular festival consists of free mud. The region is famous for its mud because it rejuvenates the skin and leaves it feeling silky smooth. This rich mud is abundant along the coast of Boryeong, so they bottle it up and sell it in cosmetic products. More important to us, the mud brings tourists for a week during the 9th annual mud festival.

Moon Kkang organised a large group of nutty teachers to head down to Daecheon for some fun in the sun. About 50 of us teachers, left on a charted bus from Daegu at 6am and arrived around 10am on Saturday morning, just in time to stake out our piece of sand before the crowds showed up.

Lucky for us, we arrived to see no rain clouds and bright blue skies. This was a huge surprise to us because we left Daegu with rain falling on our heads due to the typhoon off the coast of Japan. We said "farewell" to the Daegu rain and headed to west coast of Korea - escaping all the bad weather.

The day was full of sunshine, so we laid out in the hot sun, drank, drank some more, played volleyball, swam, and of course covered ourselves in mud. The day ended with a western custom, that I took for granted while living stateside - hot dogs and hamburgers. We had a big BBQ on the street with the teachers staff. It was a great way to end the day, but we all felt the pain of our sunburns. With 8 months of no sun, we felt like we were the dogs cooking on the grill.

However, the party didn't end with hot dogs and hamburgers. The festivities continued throughout the night. Koreans and foreigners headed back to the beach to light off fireworks, drink soju, and eat grilled shellfish. It was a late night for everyone, exempt for Lauren, who was suffering from third degree burns in one of the hotel rooms. She passed out early because she was so excited to bunk with the other 14 girls in her room. She turned in just before everyone headed to the singing room. I was on my way with the gang, but somehow, I got side-tracked by a street vendor selling fried Everything! My night ended with a bellyache!