Naksan-sa and Seoraksan

And so the blogging continues. It feels rather like I'm chasing my tail here as there is an ever growing folder of photos on my desktop waiting to be posted and written about. My new camera is proving to be somewhere between a blessing and a curse. I have some great photos to share with you, but I now have so many it's a marathon job just sorting and editing them.

This means that there will be fewer words in this post than normal. Pictures are far more use here anyway, as this is the document of a trip to Seoraksan National Park, widely considered to be the most beautiful national park in Korea. I hope the phtographs do it justtice, as it is truly spectacular. Huge sandstone rocks jut out against the sky, before sweeping down into slopes covered with many hundreds of greens. I'm really glad that summer is here, as all over the land is turning from an arid brown covered with slush to a lush green. It really is rather pretty over here.

The first few shots are of Naksan-sa temple, which is literally on the East coast, followed by some shots of the hike we took along the bottom of the valley. We were supposed to be climbing to the highest peak in the park, but we were not allowed to. More details on that post-pictures.

The insect museum close to Naksan-sa. Occasionally my old house in Guatemala looked a little like this.

This guy liked banana and almond bread.

My first Korean newt!

Amazing dual coloured cherry blossoms.

This is a spring where the water has a very high iron content, which is why it looks more like the site of a human sacrifice.

So just one short story to tell you before I go then. We arrived at the base of the trail up to the highest peak in the park at about 1pm. We were informed by a park ranger that we couldn't go up, because the trail closed at 3pm. Why did the trail close at 3, we enquired. "Because we don't want people on the mountain in the dark". "Fair enough, I suppose. So what time does it open again in the morning?" "3am." Grrrrrr.

I think that's enough about this little trip. I plan on taking a little break from doing stuff so hopefully I will get caught up on the blogging. It's already going much better than my Guatemala effort though. Coming soon: posts on my debut for the town football team, shark-diving, Buddha's day parade and some other gubbins.

Hasta entonces,

A

Are there cherry blossoms in Korea like there are in Japan?

Yes, yes there are. And there's a nice spot to see them in Gangneung, a city on the coast about 50 minutes bus ride away. With this in mind, Molly the Shitzu, Shannon and I set off to travel there to have a look.

Things got off to an average start when we got to the bus station and I remembered that the delicious packed lunch of roast dinner sandwiches and pineapple rings we had made was still sitting by the door in Shannon's flat. They then got worse when Molly started to retch about five minutes into the bus journey. She was sat on a towel while Shannon and I crossed everything in the hope that she wasn't sick. This obviously worked, as fifteen minutes later she went quiet and fell asleep.

Not sick as a dog, thank goodness.

Could this be the new Coke ad?

Also, check out the unusual (at least outside Korea) 250ml can.

On the way in to Gangneung we saw plenty of cherry blossoms out on trees dotted around the city. Spring was finally coming to Gangwon and it was nice to be out doing stuff. After a quick trip to MacDonalds-euh (to give it the Korean pronunciation) owing to forgotten lunches and making a new friend (Hi Kwang-ki!) who very kindly put us on the right bus, we headed off for Gyeongpo beach. Sadly, when we got there, not many of the cherry blossoms were actually out. Seemingly the pollution of downtown Gangneung is a more encouraging atmosphere for the flowers. Still, we got off at Gyeongpo-dae and went for a look around.

Gyeongpo-dae. My co-teacher says that this is a fort, not a temple. I'm not convinced. There's a bloody great statue of someone peaceful looking in the grounds, and it doesn't look too defensible. Mind you, the Koreans seem to have a bit of a history of being conquered. Maybe this is why.

Me, a shitzu and an idiotic grin.

Creepy Polaroid man, who offered to take a photo of my "wipe-euh" and I for 5 dollars. We politely declined / ran away.

Gyeongpo Lake through cherry blossoms.

The bloody great statue I was telling you about, and me, and Molly.

There were plenty of people out and about and most of them seemed to be full of the joys of spring. Out in this part of Korea foreigners are still a bit of a novelty (Gangwon-do is the most rural of all the Korean provinces) and to see two foreigners together, and with a dog, was absolutely mind blowing for a lot of them. As we walked around the lake to the beach, we said hi to numerous children, adults and other dogs; we were given a can of cider (the American non-acoholic kind) by some dancing old ladies and disconcertingly assumed to be married by pretty much everyone we met. The concept of people of the opposite sex being friends and doing stuff together seems to be a little strange here. This led to some rather awkward photos, as it seemed easier to let them continue to labour under a false assumption than try to explain that we were just friends in Konglish.

At least there were fake cherry blossoms.

And some real ones!

A Korean couple took this one. They told me I was handsome. This happens about once a fortnight too. I love Korea.

After that, we walked down the beach for a coffee and a game of Rummikub (I won for once), talked to more children and the waitress at the coffee shop, then took a promising looking bus that actually took us right back to the terminal, and headed home. We finished the day back at Shannon's flat eating the sandwiches I'd left there - so at least they didn't go to waste. All in all a pretty good day.

Lunch?

The Tera Rosa coffee shop. If you're in Gyeongpo, you should go here. The staff are nice, the coffee is good and the building itself is awesome. It's down the far end of the beach if you're interested.

More soon...

A