Seoraksan National Park

I just spent the last two days at Seoraksan National Park with my aunt and uncle...and it was AWESOME. Everything about Seoraksan was AWESOME, from the scenery to the weather and even the SMELL.

Our first stop at Seoraksan was finding a mineral water spring! We went to Osaek mineral spring and borrowed some man's ladle to drink the water. The water tasted like metallic seltzer water...YUM. The water is naturally fizzy (How?!) and is supposedly rich in Sodium and Iron. My reaction after having a sip was: "Ugh! That's unexpected...and gross" and then I proceeded to drink 2 more ladles full, because the sign said the mineral water is great for indigestion, which I had that day...hmm.

Osaek mineral spring 

Mineral Spring: The water I drank!...It doesn't actually look like a rusted pipe in person.

Next stop: Pray to Buddha!

Then our first (and only, sadly) hike at Seoraksan! We were originally only going to walk up to a Buddhist temple built in a cave, but then when we got there, we saw this HUGE cliffside and my uncle said that I could hike up the rest of the way if I wanted...and I couldn't just not hike to the top, so naturally I dragged my 70 year old uncle up there with me. It's okay though, because he's much more fit than I am. So our original plan of hiking 2 hours turned into a 4-5 hour hike, thanks to me.

Hiking up to the top of a mountain always seems like a great idea when you're at the bottom, but when we got halfway to the top, we hit a set of infinite stairs! We were very high up on the cliff, walking on these steel steps that made creaky noises that made us think the stairs would collapse at any moment...and they WOULDN'T END. We thought we'd gotten to the top, only to find that there were...more stairs. Eventually, the signs stopped counting down in km and just started saying "10 more minutes"...10 more minutes at what speed?! But we finally made it!...and the view was amazing!!...and there was even a man at the top selling drinks out of a cooler. (That's something that's different between hiking in the US and hiking in Korea. In Korea, about every 1/2 mile or so up the mountain, there's a restaurant...and real bathrooms!) When we got to the top, clouds were swirling around the cliffside and you could see EVERYTHING. I loved it.

After hiking, I went to a public bath...but I've been to those before in the US, so that was fine. It was a nice way to end the day.

The never-ending rock stairs that we had to hike up...before we hit the never-ending steel stairs. 

Ulsan Trail

View from the top of Ulsan trail

Today, we visited another Buddhist Temple in another awesome location, and then went to the estate of the lady on the 50,000 W bill and her son, Yi Yulgok. I've visited so many Buddhist temples now, that I'm getting very good at formal bowing (called "jul" in Korean). Still not sure if I could handle bowing 180 times to the Buddha during a Temple Stay though...maybe next time.

Buddhist Temple. I thought the temple looked very surreal with all of the clouds swirling around it.

Statue from the previous photo of the Buddhist temple (up close)