Kosu Cave, Chungju Lake, and Dodamsambong

This Sunday I went on a trip to Kosu Cave in the Chungcheongbuk Province, which is south of me.Picture courtesy of Adventure Korea.

I had to be out of my house by 5:30am to get to the bus on time, and I was actually running late, so I wasn't able to ride the subway with Stephanie, who came as well. The bus took about two hours to get to Chungju Lake, which was created by the Chungju Dam.

We boarded the ferry on the right that's partially cut off.

The ferry ride was about two hours, and was clipping along at about 22 knots. We changed ferries about halfway through.



I was fascinated by the scenery, as a lot of it was striated rock. I was trying to have an intelligent conversation with Steph about igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rock, but I could barely remember the difference. We had the same type of discussion when we went to the art gallery - "I know I learned this in school, my mother would be very dissapointed that I can't remember it."


The second ferry that we boarded was bigger, and you could go outside to take pictures - the other one was pretty much completely enclosed.

A sign on the second ferry. Gotta love the English translations...

We got off at a rest-stop type area, and took a few pictures before heading back to the bus to be moved to the cave.

Stephanie and I in front of the scenery

Kosu cave is semi-famous, not for anything in particular, but I guess there aren't many caves like it in Korea. It reminded me a lot of Carlsbad Caverns, though not quite so... cavernous. It was actually very close quarters at times, and you were often holding onto the cave walls so you wouldn't fall off the steps.

The entrance to the cave. It can be pronounced Kosu or Gosu.

I won't put the massive amount of pictures that I took inside the cave on here; a lot of them were very similar. It was really interesting though, and about 11 degrees C (59F) inside the cave.

Most of the cave looked like this, and it was such close quarters that you could touch the walls.

I saw a bat! It was really dark, so it's rather impressive that I saw it at all. It was so close I could have touched it! Everyone else started taking pictures of it, too. But I saw it first...

This is my favorite picture from inside the cave. There was lots of water.

The "path" split at one point, and you could take the upper one (which Stephanie did) or the lower one (which I did).

Me and the cave.

Stephanie playing with the pool of water.

A rather strange flea-market type set-up outside the cave selling souvenirs. Why a toy gun would be an appropriate souvenir for a cave, I'll never know.

After the cave we went to Dodamsambong, which means "three weird rocks on the river". Which is exactly what it is. I don't think they'd be as impressive except there's a gazebo on one of them. How they built it there, and how you're supposed to get to it, I have no idea.

Dodamsambong

A better shot of the gazebo. So cool looking!

Some people went climbing up a nearby hill/mountain (depending on where you're from. For me, it was mountain) to see the Stone Gate.

An appropriate name. It's a stone bridge, which looks like it could be an entrance to something.

A view of Dodamsambong from the top of the Stone Gate

Stephanie's on top of the world! Or just the top of the Stone Gate.

We climbed over the "do not enter" sign (it was in Korean - I plead ignorance!) and walked to the top of the Stone Gate. What an awesome view! Though it was a bit scary since you could barely fit two people side by side, and there was no railings, so it was very easy to imagine yourself falling off (though of course no one did).

On our way back down - the steps were pretty fun!

And that was it, we headed back home afterward. All in all a restful and interesting end to the weekend.