I came, I saw, I conquered.
Trip Start
Jul 10, 2010
1
10
Trip End
Ongoing
Inje, Gangwon, Korea Rep.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
This past weekend I went on an AMAZING trip to Seoraksan National Park. This trip is something that my boss plans at least once a year, and now I can see why. The park was one of the most incredible/beautiful/surreal things I have ever seen in my life. And not only was the park great, but just everything about the trip in general was a blast.
We started with waking up at 8 on Saturday to all meet outside and pack into our rental van over to Yeoungton to meet Jay (our boss) and a few other co-workers. From there we headed out. The drive was about 4 hours or so, and I slept pretty much for the entire drive. When we got there it was as if everyone chugged a bunch of energy drinks because we were all bouncing around ready for the hike. As soon as we walked into the park we were greeted by the most gigantic Buddha I will probably ever see in my life. Before we set out, we stopped for a quick bite to eat at a little "restaurant" outside on one of the trails. While we were there we also got some Makkoli (Korean rice wine) and some really sweet regular wine. After that, we all had a nice little buzz going and were ready to take on the mountain.
The hike itself wasn't too bad. Most of the time I was hating life, but then I would stop, look around and realize how lucky I was to be in such a breath taking place. My co-workers are all really great people too, which made the hike that much more enjoyable. The hike took around 2 hours one way, maybe more, I'm not sure though because I didn't have a watch. Around the halfway point we stopped by this huge, round, rock that is famous because people can make it wiggle if they try really hard to move it. When we were there I looked up and saw these crazy rocky peaks with stairs going up them and jokingly said, "Hey guys, lets go up there!" then my friends replied, "We are". At first, I was really excited, but then about halfway up those stairs I remembered that I'm terrified of heights and I didn't know how I was going to make it up, and if I got up, I didn't know how I was going to get down. Somehow, amazingly, I talked myself through it and made it to the top. When we got up there it made every part of the day worth it. It was absolutely incredible. I wonder if I'll ever see something that beautiful again, and if not, I'm okay with it.
At the top, there was this awesome Korean dude selling gold medals with the mountain on them. If you bought one, he would engrave your name on it and announce it to everyone who was up there and they would all clap for you, it was pretty neat. We took a lot of pictures and took some time to just take everything in, then headed back down. A crazy thought we got on the way down, was that the man selling the medals makes that hike everyday for work, but with his personality, I wouldn't doubt if he sang and danced the entire way up.
After the hike we went to this spa/water park called Waterpia. At first, I wasn't too excited, but then I saw they had a gigantic raft water-slide inside and I changed my mind. The ride was pretty awesome and we rode it at least 5 or 6 times haha. When we were done acting like children, we went outside (which was freezing) to explore all the different hot tubs. That was also really cool, because there were literally dozens of different hot tubs with different themes, and they were all surrounded by rock, so you would have to walk on little paths to find them. Some had waterfalls, some were supposed to be focused on healing or energy or other things, some were huge, some were small, but they were all really beautiful.
When we were done with the spa, we went back to our condos for some R&R accompanied by fried chicken (there went our work out) and good old fashioned drinking. The night itself was really fun, but being that we all climbed a mountain that day we went to bed pretty early. In the morning, I went out on to the balcony and was completely shocked by our view. At night you couldn't see anything, but in the day you could see all of the park and the mountain we climbed. I actually, unknowingly, took a picture of our condo when I was at the top of the mountain. I would give anything to wake up to that everyday. After taking everything in, we had to start the clean up.
When all was cleaned and everyone was ready, we headed to the beach to get some food. I was not feeling seafood that day, which was too bad because its incredible there, but oh well. Then we all walked on the beach for a bit, took some pictures (sadly my camera was dead), then loaded back up and headed home. The trip went by quickly, but it will undoubtedly be one of my most memorable trips here.
