This weekend was a holiday with monday off so we had a three day weekend. There was a big sand festival going on at Busan's Haeundae beach so I organized a group of about a dozen of us to head over for saturday, and island cruising the following sunday. However, big mistake to be learnt for a holiday weekend is book all your tickets ahead of time.

I planned on taking a slower train to Busan at 11am as the high speed KTX was $14 vs $7 on the slower train. When I was checking the schedule again friday nite the trains were sold out. So we had to scramble to let everyone know about alternate arrangement at the last minute. My added problem was that I only found out this week I can get a china visa from a busan travel agent so was trying to do that at the same time but had to get there before it closes.

Online it said there were 35 seats on the 11am bus from dongdaegu. But when I got there there were selling me the 11.40 and I didnt want to wait an hour. I went across the road to another terminal and they sold me the 11.10. Big mistake! This was the local commuter bus. First it went to Gyeongju, then Ulsan, finally Busan making all the little highway stops along the way. So it took me two hours same as if I had taken the 11.40 bus in the first place.

Since I was losing time decided to go first to the travel agent before it closes. Once that was done went back to my motel I had booked at Busan station other end of town, expecting to arrive by train. My reservation said noon arrival time and I didnt want them to think I was a no show and cancel. Didnt want to call them either as their english is very bad so wanted to go, dump my bag, and get my key.

After checking in the guy calls me back, starts jumping up and down playing charades, saying the odd english word. I had no idea what he wanted. Then he dialed his cell and put it by my ear. So I said hello and there was an older american lady on the other end. She was lost driving around in her car, trying to find the motel, telling me street names.

I dont live in busan so had no idea. I dont even know most street names in daegu for that matter. So somehow I had to navigate her, and ended up standing on the street so she could pick me up. Then we drove back together to the motel. Finally I made it to the beach at 5PM!!!

Luckily, this was just in time for the parade which was winding past as I walked to the beach. Aside from the usual traditional costumes they had a lot of movie characters like the wizard of oz, smurfs, superheroes, harry potter, shrek, alice in wonderland, etc.

Finally made it across to the beach and saw the sand sculptures. This was really good. Again, a lot of fairy tale characters. In one section they had coloured sand murals. One side was alice in wonderland, the other side was the wizard of oz. In another area were castle walls which you can walk inside. Another area had roped zones where people could make their own. Some were really impressive.

At one end of the beach was a stage where they were having the Busan International Dance Festival, if you can believe another festival on the same beach on the same day! They had different koreans doing different nationalities dances. They had a big arabian dance where they had large fabric banners they were swirling round. Because it was windy it was quite funny as it would wrap around their heads blinding them.

Also had korean guys doing a spanish matador dance with flamenco dancers which was good. I tried to film the arabian dance but my unreliable camera decided it didnt want to work.

They other end of the beach had another stage setup. Here they were doing a wedding show, and more belly dancing. It was slow walking in the sand and by the time I made it all the way to that end of the beach the show ended.

I had to look for people from my group since we had all arrived seperately. I bumped into some of them at different times of the day. I met my friend from busan and we wanted to get something to eat. We tried two indian restaurants but they had one hour wait times, as were most places. Even Burger King where we ended up had lines and no seating.

Later we went back to the international dance festival stage for some of the evening dancers. This time they had dancers from other countries. A lot of it was modern ballet and contemporary dance, not necessarily things I watch as I prefer cultural performances. They had some spanish ones doing a flamenco. The chinese ballet was quite good, a man wore a long fabric like giant sleeves and people held the long arm and performed.

They had a group from australia which was a contemporary dance performance. A korean group did what seemed like classical greece, all in white robes, holding clay pots, which they used in different ways. First they stood on the pots in different balancing acts, then different group movements with the pots. The last group from Hong Kong wasnt that great and was the last performance so we left around 10

We were expecting a firework show which they did last year but there wasnt one. We were chatting late with people and I wanted to head back. My friend was saying trains stop by 11.30. We got to the station at 11.30 and managed to get on a train. I needed to change to another line so was worried I'd have to take a cab part way. At 12 made it to the transfer station and got on the last train. As it was heading down all the stations on the other platform had their lights off so lucky I made it all the way back.