Happy Chaos At Stony Brook Pastures: Labor Day Weekend/Mt. Soyosan

I'm going to warn you up front this is a long post with many pictures....

On Friday, Brendan was supporting his high school and dressed out with his JV team at the Varsity football game. He was leading by example since he is the Captain of the JV team! Yep, I'm a proud Mama. (The Varsity won by the way and the JV has their first game next weekend)

Saturday, we headed up to Camp Casey to Shane's Hooch. He usually comes to Yongsan to see us, but we switched it up a bit this week :) Camp Casey was holding a Labor Day Festival so we got in on a bit of the fun. The kids did some rides and games.

Dillan got to see Ironman

Shane ran an obstacle course. I have no pictures though....some boy of 15 who shall remain nameless forgot to take any. I was working a Family Readiness Group booth for the Battalion (see doing my part :) )

Then we went out for a Beef and Leaf dinner....We all LOVE Beef and Leaf!!! We went to this restaurant--Piggy Cow.

Here is a bit of what the dinner was like--all you can eat buffet. You pick our your own cuts of meat and then cook them on the little grills on the table. I need to get one of these for our house...Love them!!!

This is a picture of the bowl of veggies I got to go with my meat...there is kimchi and sprouts, and I don't even know what all else, but it's yummy.

I'm sure Shane would love to know I put a picture of him with his mouth full, but I really wanted to show the "wrap" in his hand. This is how you eat these....you wrap your meat into the leaf pick up to eat. (thus beef and leaf)

I put some veggies on mine too--here is a picture before I wrapped it.

Shane and I chose to have a beverage as well :)

On the way home we enjoyed this sign on the post bus :)

On to Sunday, we headed north to Mt. Soyosan for a hike. We had a fantastic time! It took us a total of about 4 hours and the kids did great (most of the time) Very little whining :)

These pictures were all at the beginning before we started.

I guess the Koreans think you need a warm up first.

Dillan said that piggy back rides were a good idea...I'm not sure this is what he meant.

Here is the map of where we were going...nope couldn't read it.

But this said it should take about 4 hours. So off we went.

Here are a couple of pictures I took on the way up, but it was tough so most of the time my phone (camera) was tucked away in Shane's camelback.

We made it to the top and the views made it all worth it--even Meghan the one who whined the most said it was. This looks out over Camp Casey which was really pretty cool to look at from way up there.

I promise Dillan made it to the top too, but he was too busy running around (where did that energy come from???)

We rested and had a much deserved snack.

See I told you Mr.Silly made it :) Oh and please take notice of Dillan's new blue graphite hiking stick--and Katie's red one--and Brendan's new Korean hiking pants. (Don't worry we didn't leave Meghan out--she had an extra night with Shane and got dinner, bowling, breakfast, and a new movie)

And then it was time to head back down. You would think that part would be easy, but ummmm....

This is looking back up and what we hiked down...it was all piled rock...tough. This is also when Dillan decided the terrain and the view reminded him of Lord of the Rings and started pretending to shoot arrows like Legolas...we thought he was more like Gimli--little, falling behind, and complaining about everything so we said --no arrows, only an ax!! LOL!!! (This was also the part of the hike where a group of Koreans, who were taking a picnic break, called Dillan over and gave him a peach and a humongous apple. They sure do love my blonde cutie)

When we got to the bottom there was a temple. This is the first one of these we have seen. Unfortunately, most of it was under construction so we might have to go back and check it out another time...don't worry we won't hike this mountain again. There are too many others to tackle.

People had piled the rocks up into little towers all over the place.

This was a really creepy bug we saw--the antenna were so big!!

And this is where all the Koreans went after the hike--they were picnicking and having a great time by the water.

And that was the hike...on to a much needed lunch...we went and found a place that had pictures on their menu and we were all set.

We LOVE these "pancakes". They have green onions and squid and are fried. They are delicious!!!

And this was a cold soup--it had cucumbers, seaweed, kimchi, and tofu in it. Shane and I were not fans of the tofu, but the rest was really good. We also had a spicy lettuce salad that had some tofu on it...again not a fan. Surprisingly, my kids like it though.--Dillan and Katie like it and the other 2 don't mind it.

And I have this picture because the Koreans mostly drink water with meals so we don't order drinks. But, when we had finished our meal the server brought us 2 bottles of coke "for free" My kids are always getting free stuff here.