Fall Foliage

This Saturday was my friend Jess' birthday. She's a very adventurous and active person, so for her birthday she wanted to go down to Naejangsan to go hiking in the mountains and look at the fall leaves. This weekend was the peak weekend in Naejangsan, so it was rather busy and we were only able to get the slow train there and back because the fast train was booked. Half of the group went down there Friday night, and the rest of us followed on the first train out on Saturday morning. We made it to the train station around noon, and after a little debate on whether or not we should ask for directions, found the bus to the mountain and hopped on.

The bus was overly crowded with ajumas in hiking gear, younger couples in matching winter outfits, and Korean tourists, as well as our group of foreigners. We got to what seemed like the area we were supposed to get off at, and everyone got off the bus. The traffic was frustratingly slow, but it was still moving faster than you can walk. But because my Korean was the best out of the people there (and mine is severely limited at best), we got off as well when we should have just stayed on. So we ended up walking several kilometers to get to the area that we were supposed to stay.

We made it to a rather busy intersection full of hikers, tour buses, traffic cops, and some of the fittest people over 60 I've ever seen. After trying to have a phone conversation with the Korean man who owned the minbak we were staying in, we were picked up in a car and driven about two blocks to the place we had booked the week before.


Generally, minbak means a home stay. So you are essentially staying in someone's spare room in their home, and meals are often included. However in the case of Minbak Row in Naejangsan, the street of minbaks was simply a collection of supposedly low-cost, low luxury places to sleep at night. Our particular two rooms were supposed to sleep 15 people, but the 12 of us were in rather close quarters. When we first arrived, there was some confusion as to whether we were even in the right place, as there were no bags in the room and half our group had come in the night before. It turned out that they had stayed in town on Friday night and left their bags at the police station so they could go hiking in the morning. So we dropped our bags in the minbak and went off in search of lunch.

We got about 200 feet from the minbak before we ran into a restaurant. This turned out to be the closest place to get food, and probably one of the more expensive Korean restaurants I've been to. We did, however, get to see a whole pig on a spit right by our table.


After getting lunch, we decided to try and find the rest of our friends. They said they were heading back from one of the temples on the mountain, and we should just walk towards the main entrance of the park and hopefully we'd catch them in passing.


The walk was long and crowded, but we did manage to see lots of fall colors along the way, and beautiful scenery was captured by careful camera framing. :)


We didn't see the other members of our group so much as hear them. Jess is loud at the best of times, and we could hear her talking long before we saw the rest of our group. They had been waiting by a rather beautiful tree so we could get the whole group photographed together. Of course we couldn't get a Korean to take a picture for us, so Sean volunteered to take a group picture with everyone's camera.


After wishing Jess a happy birthday, the five of us that had come that afternoon headed up the mountain to see what we could find.


One person dropped out after we made it to a temple, so there were four of us that made it to the hermitage that was up some rather daunting stone stairs.


At the top at the hermitage was probably the ugliest Buddha statue I've ever seen. It's a shame, too, because it would have made a great picture. As it is, this picture just seems comical to me.


It was starting to get on towards early evening, so the two other girls decided to head back towards the minbak. James wanted to make it to the top before sundown, and I wanted to keep climbing, since we had long left the crowds behind us at the temple. So James, being the mountain goat that he is, loped off towards the summit, and I had a pleasant hour's walk by myself in the woods at dusk.



It started to get dark around 5:30, and the mosquitoes were starting to come out, so I turned around and headed back down the mountain. James eventually caught up with me, and by the time we had gotten back to the minbak 2 hours and about 5 kilometers later, it was pitch black. We met up with the rest of the group and sat around outside the 7/11 talking, drinking, and playing card games. I headed back to the room around 10:30 because we had decided that some of us were going to take the cable car at 6am the next morning to watch the sunrise. I was exhausted from climbing the mountain that evening, and I knew if I didn't go to bed at a reasonable hour I wasn't going to get up in time for the cable car, which was a good half hour walk from our rooms.

We had asked the owner of the minbak earlier that evening to turn the ondol (under-floor heating system) off, since the room was stifling hot, and with 12 people sleeping in the room it wasn't cold enough outside to warrant any heating at all. Unfortunately, the ondol was turned back on around 3am. So with sleeping on a burning hot floor, getting bit by mosquitoes and ants during the night, and being awakened several times by others drunkenly returning to the room at all hours, needless to say I didn't sleep very well.

I woke up at 5am the next morning, and guiltily roused the few people that wanted to catch the cable car at 5:15. I didn't mind as much as I would have if people hadn't confirmed the night before that they wanted to be woken up. I'm not a fast walker, even when I have gotten a good night's sleep, so I headed towards the cable car a little earlier than the other five people who had decided to get up. We made it to the cable car at around 6:15am, and even though we were late, we were the first ones to use the cable car that morning. It was still dark when we got to the top, and we found the observation deck to watch the sunrise.


It wasn't the most amazing sunrise I've ever seen, especially since the actual sun was blocked by one of the mountains, but it was a pleasant morning nonetheless.



After getting a minuscule cup of coffee from a restaurant located on the edge of the mountain and having a rather amusing chat with a group of Korean hikers who were still drunk from soju, we headed back down from the top. The trees below us reminded me of some sort of weird cauliflower garden.


By the time we got back down to the base of the mountain an hour or so later, the line to get on the cable car had about 200 people in it, and probably would have taken at least 45 minutes to get through. We looked around the bottom, and I was fascinated by the persimmon trees, which were prolific and looked like something out of a Dr. Seuss book or a Tim Burton movie.

By the way, if you've never eaten a frozen persimmon, I highly recommend it. It's like a fruit slushy in a peel.


Then the six of us headed back to the minbak, because our train left around noon and we needed to pack up and catch the bus back to the train station. We took the scenic walk on the way back instead of the more crowded and open trail.


We did notice on the way back quite a few Koreans who all seemed to have the same super-expensive camera with giant zoom-lens and tripod who were all taking pictures of the same thing.


But the walk was nice, the colors were more vibrant that morning even though it was overcast, and we just barely made it onto the bus back to the station as it started to rain.

Aigo....

I'm headed off to Naejangsan tomorrow to go hiking with some friends and look at the fall leaves. Can't wait to take pictures!

Spent about three hours today going back and forth to the immigration office to replace my lost alien card. It's a pain to get down there, stand in line, and come back, but it might be worth another trip if it means I get to keep my alien card the next time I leave the country (they confiscated mine when I left last year. It's been annoying trying to slowly replace everything in my wallet. I had my Florida driver's license, social security card, my American bank card, not to mention about 6 different cafe point cards. My Bank of America card is on its' way - free of charge- to Korea, I've gotten a new card for my account here, and I got a new subway card this afternoon. I keep calling the club, but my expectations and hopes are low that my wallet will ever be found again.

Manic Monday

On Monday we woke up early and went in search of coffee after deciding to stay in Mokpo for another night and head for Boseong the next day. We had past a few coffee places that were open the night before, but weren't able to find one open at 9am. Most of the places we saw were open at 10am, some were noon. It still amazes me that you can own a coffee place anywhere in the world that isn't open by 7am - at the latest. Regardless, we decided to head over to Yudalsan Park, which was listed in our guidebook and we both had wanted to see. It was between us and the shore, where we wanted to take a boat out to some of the further reaching islands, so it seemed like a good idea to walk through it.

Now, when I think of a park, I think trees, grass, maybe some landscaping and places to sit and have a picnic. This is probably because that describes most of the parks I saw growing up in the flatlands of Florida. When Korea says 'park', you can almost bet that it's actually a mountain. This one happened to be about 600 meters high. This is the walkway up to the park through the city:

We missed the glass botanical gardens, mostly because when we got there it was blazing hot, and we were really just concentrating on getting up the mountain, and not what the guidebook said to look for.

We saw Madangbawi (great views and two rock carvings) and Ildeung, another peak on our way up.

We must have taken the long way around, because it took us about 3-4 hours to get to the other side to the beach. We wanted to take a boat ride out to some of the further flung islands, but the ferries only run twice a day, and we were a good 20 minute walk from the ferry terminal and only had about 3 minutes before it left. So we took a small boat tour in the bay around Yuldusan.

Then we took a bus to the Mokpo Natural History Museum. Aside from a horribly stuffed taxidermy tiger that looked like a third grade sewing project, it was actually a nice museum.

It took us forever to find a place to eat. Most places won't serve just one person -there has to be at least two people - and the first several that we tried were either too expensive, or wouldn't allow us to share a single serving of any dish (even though some of the dishes started at W30,000 each). We decided to head to bed early since we wanted to be in Boseong first thing the next day. We debated about trying to head out anyway and cancel our reservation, but having a place to keep our bags and a shower, as well as not knowing if we'd be able to find a place in Boseong, was worth staying in Mokpo another night.

Always...no....Never...climb a mountain in flip-flops.

I've been eyeing this mountain for a month. I can see it from my desk at work, and in between the sky-scraper apartments while walking around town. I finally decided today as we were getting ready to leave that today was the day. I was told there were several paths you can take, and Cherita took me to the base of the mountain, which is very near her apartment. Mind you, I'm still dressed in my jeans, t-shirt, and flip-flops, along with my bag from work. But I figure, I'll try it. If I can't get that far, I'll just turn back and tackle it another day, with the proper clothing. But at least I know where the path is now. So I started to walk.

It was very scenic at first, and reminded me a bit of my parent's place up in Georgia. As I continued to walk, it started to get a bit steeper. 

And I got winded rather quickly. My calves started to hurt, in some places I would guess the angle was 50 degrees or more. Now I know why so many Korean women wear heels. They're nothing compared to walking up the side of a mountain (which is a national past-time. they sell hiking gear in HP like Walmart sells bikes and soccer balls). There were a few plateaus, one of which had an interesting mound, but I couldn't read the sign.

So I kept climbing. Mostly because I wanted to see how far I could go in flip-flops. And because I wanted to see if I could see my house from the top. I didn't make it to the top, partly because it was starting to get late and I didn't want to get caught on a mountain path at night with no flashlight. But I did get to see a great view:

My apartment is behind that little red building near the middle of the picture, which is a school. So after getting my fill of the view, and catching my breath, I started back down. That's when it got a bit tricky. Walking up dirt, gravel, and stone is one thing. Walking down is much harder. There are a few sections that have rope tied to the trees, but they're few and far between.

I almost slipped twice, so when I got to some of the bigger slopes with loose gravel, I decided it'd be easier to sit and scoot than to try and walk down. It worked, to an extent. I didn't fall, but I didn't realize how sharp the rocks were and how old my pants were, so one of my two pairs of jeans that I brought with me is no longer useable as they have a giant hole in them. Thankfully no one was behind me, and my shirt was long enough to cover me until I got to Cherita's house, where I borrowed a skirt for the 15 minute walk back home. So now I know (and knowing is half the battle) that I should come prepared next time with proper shoes and better pants. I can't wait to go back in the winter when it's snowing.