Thursday
The weather took a huge turn for the better on Thursday, which was good as this was to be the day I abandoned over-eating and boozing early in the afternoon, and set off on a 120km bike ride. My friend Emily and I had been planning a multi-day bike ride since the beginning of summer, and had only just got around to doing it by the middle of autumn. We were also joined by Tom, a new addition to the Jinbu teachers union.
The day got off to an inauspicious start as I sheered off the valve on Tom's bike tyre trying to pump it up. I had a spare inner-tube, but then we couldn't undo the front wheel nut, and one of my cheap tools died in the attempt to undo it. This meant an emergency call to my friend Ui Chal and his heavy duty adjustable spanner (ooh-err). Finally we got the tube changed and disappeared upstairs to meet Emily and get ready to set off. Five minutes later my phone rings and it's Tom saying that the bike has been stolen. We spend a while trying to find the security guy to no avail, so sadly Emily and I set off without Tom. A mile up the road my phone rings. It's Tom, saying the thief was in fact Caitlyn, the other new teacher who knows the code for the bike lock. She'd borrowed it to go to the bank. We stopped to let Tom catch up, and finally set off on the first leg of our trip, which would take us out to the coastal town of Jumunjin and then down to Gangeung, over one of the higher passes in Korea. If you're interested in our route, look here:
Today we got all of the hard work done early. Almost immediately out of Jinbu the road sets out on a 5 mile long, 300m high climb to the top of the Sogeumgang valley. It's a pretty tough ask, especially when your bike's gears aren't too co-operative (Tom). Still, with some puffing and panting we all made it up to the top, where we stopped at a service area for (appropriately enough) mountain vegetable bibimbap.
Having done all of the up for the day, the next part of the ride promised to be a lot more fun. Plunging down almost 1000m to the coast on twisting roads is a much, much better idea than hauling yourself up the hill in hot sunshine. We launched ourselves down the hill, Emily and I in the lead, respectively singing and impersonating Valentino Rossi, and Tom of the one brake bicycle proceeding more steadily behind. The road was amazing - a series of tight U-bends on a steep slope. I'd love to show you photos but I was too busy going too fast and doing things I was taught never to do on my cycling proficiency test. At least I was confident of going faster than any car tackling the hill, so didn't have to look over my shoulder too often.
The only other incident of note was once the road had flattened out and we were cruising along towards Jumunjin. It being Chuseok, drink was still being taken at lunchtime, and we came upon this old fella on his motor scooter. Sadly, I missed the best bit when he was weaving all over the road and holding up a line of ten cars, but still, when you're wobbling home at 3pm on a 50cc scooter being overtaken by crazy foreigners on bikes, maybe it's time to ask yourself if you have a drinking problem.
We were going along too nicely to get my camera out again after that, until we hit the coast and turned south towards Gangneung. We stopped at Sacheonjin beach for a quick Powerade and a clamber on the rocks, before setting off down the network of excellent cyclepaths towards our final destination of Gyeongpo beach.
We got to Gyeongpo Beach as the shadows from the pines were beginning to stretch across the sand. Not an unpleasant sight to greet you at the end of a long day in the saddle. We dismounted, shackled the bikes to a tree and bought ourselves a bottle of Cass. This proved to be a mistake, as despite it being the very sound of vitality, it also becomes pretty much undrinkable halfway through a large bottle. We abandoned it and headed off for Nakji Bokkeum (hot stir-fried octopus tentacles) for dinner, and then for my first ever Jjimjilbang experience.
The Jjimjilbang is a pretty much essential Korean experience. Despite that I'd been avoiding it for a while. It's basically a public baths and sleeping room. They're frighteningly cheap, and, much like the Divine Comedy's National Express, all human life is here. 7,000won (about 4 quid, or $6) gets you a sauna and selection of pools to use for almost as long as you like. The pools range in temperature (though the one we went to only had three, I'm assured that most have more) so you can sweat everything out in the sauna, before jumping into the plunge pool for a few minutes, then climbing into the hot pool, which leaves a strange feeling of wearing your skin like a coat, or at least it did to me. Anyway, this part I really liked, and it soothed the pains built up from several hours on my bike. As long as you can put up with naked Korean men massaging each other you should be fine.The second part is the one I'm not quite so keen on. After putting on a pair of standard-issue grey pyjamas, which are actually really comfortable, you go into the sleeping room. There's a TV to watch here, but mostly you're just here to pull out a sleeping mat (two if it's quiet) and a horrible, horrible plastic pillow and bed down for the night wherever you can find a space. Now, my experience was actually not too bad. I crawled off into the men-only (ooh-err again) space, which was completely deserted, and managed to catch about 4 hours. I was still woken up by the ceaseless snoring, and interminable comings and goings from the main room, and this was on a quiet night. I also woke up with all of my former aches and pains fully restored from sleeping more or less on the floor. Still, these were eased somewhat by another dip in the hot and cold pools, and left me ready for another hard day on the roads of Korea. I'll tell you all about that next time.
A
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