Daecheon Beach (대천 해수욕장)

With the summer season drawing to a close, we wanted to try and do as much as we could with our daughter Elizabeth. On this outing, we took a day trip with our friend, Jennifer, to Daecheon to check out the beach. Elizabeth has been to three beaches since we've been in Korea: Koji(꼿지) Beach in Anmyeondo, Haeundae(해운대) Beach in Busan, and Kata Beach in Phuket. This would mark the fourth on the list.

The drive was about 1.5 hrs from our apartment. When we got there, there were quite a few people at the beach, most of whom appeared to be college students on break. Plus, there was a college right across the street from the beach. The beach was pretty nice, but we got there right around high tide, so the beach was kind of narrow. We rented one of the raised wood platforms that Koreans like to sit on and had snacks and soaked in the sea air.

We tried to get Elizabeth to literally get her feet wet, but she was obviously scared of the surf. It wasn't really that bad, but to a 3 ft tall 2 year old, those could be terrifying. Instead, we encouraged her to play in the sand. She liked filling her bucket and dumping it to make her "sand castle". At sunset, the lifeguards (actually Korean Coast Guard assigned to watching the beaches) made an announcement that everyone needed to get out of the water for safety reasons. This wasn't a problem for us, since we never really made it into the water. What was kind of surprising was that the announcement was repeated in English, which is how we actually understood what they were saying.

After sitting around a bit longer, we decided it was time to go. This is when Elizabeth finally got her feet (and hands) wet. We rinsed her toys and she followed to rinse her hands, which meant she'd have to walk into the water a little. It was a small step, but at least she was getting a feel for the water. We packed up and headed back home. We may be back sometime in the future. We'll just have to see. -T