Elusive Campgrounds and Turquoise Waters

We realize it has been a little too long since our last blog and therefore there are too many stories to tell about our adventures, but we'll try to do the best we can.  The last two weeks the clan has been out and about exploring Korea.  We started with a trip to the Gangwon-do Province to the east of where we live.  We piled camping gear and the three of us into a school vehicle to go searching for locations for our outdoor education programs.

The trip started with the normal Korean challenges, why would anything be easy?  After a small debacle to get a much needed cell phone we headed for the mountains, leaving Incheon at 1:30 instead of the projected 10:00 in the morning.  Driving was the second hurdle to overcome, with the navigation system, which is difficult to understand at times (luckily its in English), the multiple tourism maps, following the somewhat cryptic road signs and watching out for millions of other Korean drivers, Koreans are not necessarily known for their good driving habits, there was quite a bit to juggle.  Jess kept it together for the most part, only yelled maybe once or twice.  Thank goodness Koreans drive on the right side of the road, most of the time.

After a few stops along the way to pantomime to tourism officials we encountered the third obstacle.  Locating the campground.  Arriving in Seoraksan national park after 9:00 pm the campground was nowhere to be found, so we purused the other options of small minbaks and pensions advertised as honeymoon retreats. We opted for a small "honeymoon" hotel, which John checked into and unfortunately after paying for and seeing the room, noticed that it had a few to many remnants of past honeymoons to be inhabited by our family. We took our bags back to the car and in frustration pantomimed with the unhappy owner and her inebriated husband for a refund.  With the late hour of night in mind and not knowing our surroundings, we headed up the hill to the Seorak Grand Park Hotel, the big national park hotel with a decor straight out of the 70's but plenty clean for Finn to crawl around in. Anything for a good night's sleep at this point.

All the hard work and trials and tribulations payed off though when we awoke to the mountain air and stunning views of jagged mountain peaks in the morning.  We spent the day talking with National Park rangers (they spoke english! yeah!) and then took the cable car up to some beautiful granite peaks overlooking the eastern shore of Korea and the Sea of Japan. A short hike from the top of the cable car was an ancient fortress hidden within the granite crags and a small Buddhist temple with throaty chants echoing through the mountains.

View from the top of the cable car looking out over the Sea of Japan

 

On the way back down the cable car we noticed a very large Buddha statue just up the valley from the base area. Once back on the ground we headed in that direction and found a four story tall statue with another temple dug into the hillside behind it. Slightly farther up the valley was yet another temple compound last rebuilt in the 1700's, but over a 1000 years old and still in use today. Its amazing how dates blend together when buildings are noted not by the year, but the dynasties they were constructed in and how commonplace historical places become in a society that claims a four or five thousand year old lineage. 

 In the remaining daylight we exited the park and finally found the elusive campground. We set up camp and spent the evening playing with Finn in the grass.

The next two days we found ourselves driving through back roads and countryside of eastern South Korea, looking for campgrounds and recreation sites that didn't exist or were being renovated.  Nearly every place we went people crossed their arms in an "X" saying no, no, no.  We did find some trails that we need to follow up on and a few campgrounds that we haven't found on the map.  John regularly reminded Jess that finding what won't work is a part of the process of finding what will work.

On the way home we spent the night on the Eastern seashore in a small minbak and spent the morning playing with Finn on the beach and in the turquoise water of the Sea of Japan. On the way back home we happened upon the ski resorts that will be in the 2018 winter Olympics and toured their base facilities.  John says their seems to be some steep terrain but their are twenty foot tall nets that line each run top to bottom, guess he won't be skiing off trail at those resorts.

This past week has been the equivalent of Korean Thanksgiving.  We spent the first four days recovering from our scouting mission and attempting to find things for the house.  Then we headed back to the islands off the coast of Incheon where we spent two wonderful days hiking on the island and playing in the ocean. We have never seen Finn so happy as he is at the beach, digging in the sand and splashing in the water and the waves.  He is totally fearless!  Now that he can walk we're attempting to help him realize that when he walks into the water and falls over it might be too deep to keep his head above water.  He seems unphased!

Jess and Finn looking out over the Yellow Sea from Deokjeok Island

Hiking towards the pagoda in the upper right of the photo

The town of Sepori where we stayed

Free from the backpack

Evening beach session, Finn couldn't get enough

Mom breaking the news to Finn that it really is time to leave

Watson is a retired police dog from Oregon and he's been doing a great job babysitting Finn

Overall things are good.  We are all adjusting.  John has been happy to get to dog-sit a very large black German Shepherd named Watson. He might be trying to get Jess used to the idea of having a dog (not so sure about that!).  Especially not without a yard.  Jess' job is challenging but it keeps her mind busy.  Its difficult to  find what we're looking for in a culture where it doesn't really seem to exist, but we'll keep looking.  We have numerous ideas, just need to do some more exploring.  Finn is getting big, has a molar starting to pop through, but still only two sets of four teeth in the front (top and bottom).  He learned to walk about two weeks ago and already he seems to be running circles around both of us.