Juwangsan National Park & Andong

This weekend, I went with the Seoul Hiking Group on a 24 hour trip. I was a bit hesitant about going at first, as the sleeping situation was less than ideal, but I decided the experience may be worth the lack of sleep. About 40 of us met at 11:30PM on Friday night to head to Gyeongsang Province. We drove through the night and arrived at the Juwangsan National Park around 4am.

We sleepily piled out of the bus, and the trip coordinator, Warren, handed out bagels, bananas, kimbap, juice, and water. We walked about 20 minutes or so to a lake area and ate breakfast and waited for the sun to come up. When the sun came up, the lake was beautiful; very foggy and a bit surreal. I brought along my new camera and struggled with messing with the settings and trying to find a way to take good photos with the lighting. Luckily, some other DSLR owners were on the trip and were able to help me.

After breakfast, we got back on the bus and were brought to the main part of the national park, where we were to start our hike. We split into two groups, the group that wanted a leisurely stroll around the park, and the group that wanted to ascend to the peak. I was warned that the hike to the peak would be intense, but I wasn't about to miss the opportunity, so I joined on to go to the top.

They were not kidding about the hike being intense. It was a steep climb and we moved quickly. I struggled through it, but even by the time we were halfway up, I knew it would be worth it. We stopped for pictures at the halfway point and I was mesmerized by how gorgeous it was.

After we reached the peak, we climbed along the ridges and then descended. When we got to the bottom, we walked through a river bed and past a few waterfalls. Altogether, the hike took about five hours. I am seldom that productive before 11am on a Saturday.

After the hike, we got back into the bus and traveled about an hour to the city of Andong. Warren had coordinated a lunch for us, where we got to try the food Andong is famous for, Andong jjimdak meaning steamed chicken of Andong. I thought it was quite good, though didn't much enjoy eating on the floor after hiking all morning.

We finished lunch and headed to the Hahoe Folk Village. Visiting the village felt like stepping back in time.  When we first arrived, we went directly to a traditional mask dance. The masks were quite cool, but the plot and storyline were very different from what I expected and not exactly appropriate for the many children in the audience.

When the dance finished, we got to walk around the village. This was one of my favorite parts of the day. While at first it seemed like the village was centered on tourism,  this was a chance to see that it is really a living and breathing village. While many of the townspeople make their living from tourism (people sold snacks and crafts outside of their houses), you could see the more traditional way of life.

We met up to take a boat across a river and climb up to see a view of the village. I took the following picture from a girl on the trip with us.. it was just too good not to include. This was the guy bringing us across the river.. and he didn't seem too happy about it.

 

All in all, it was a wonderful (though exhausting day). I arrived back in Seoul around 10pm, was asleep by midnight, and somehow managed to sleep through my alarms and text messages until 3pm on Sunday. I took TONS of pictures (which I am sure you can tell by the blog post..) but if you want to see more, check out my Picasa site!