Chiaksan National Park

Monday, August 11, 2008

So, a while ago we went hiking in Chiaksan National Park. I know that I was supposed to write about this quite a while ago, but I just never got around to it. So, here I am now. It was a couple weekends ago and we made our way out there on a city bus. This city bus decided to go like 200km/hr down the road and then slam on the breaks and almost hit a fence when he needed to stop and pick up more passengers. It was kinda scary. When we finally got out there, it was beautiful. There is an amazing river coming down the mountain that twists and turns along the main trail. There were so many beautiful places to stop and take pictures or just to stop and rest (unaware of the feats lying ahead of us). We got to see some amazing temples, but too bad parts of it were closed off this time for, I think anyways, the temple stay. (That is when tourists and really anybody can go and stay at the temple and take part in all of what they do there for a couple days. They call it a spiritual retreat).

This is a video of Kyle and Matt getting into the river (actually the video was not working right now, so I will load it in a bit). There was one spot, the nicest spot, where we were not allowed to get in because that is where many of the Koreans were praying. I will add pictures in another post. So, afer we messed around so much on the first two KM of the hike, we decided it was time to try and reach the top of the mountain. Not being able to read Korean, and the Korean with us not being much help, we made our way up the "hard" trail because we didn't know what the sign said. We thought, "hmm... stairs, this might get us up there before dark because the other trail keeps looping around".

Well... the first flight of stairs definitely has well over 250 stairs going straight up. We thought from the bottom that we would have those stairs and then an easy walk, then more stairs, etc. Nope. We got around the corner on the stairs and it turned into the most difficult climbing/hiking I (and all those with me) have ever done. It was so hard. We were stopping all the time to make sure everyone was okay and looking at the trail that lay ahead because there were points when this trail was very very dangerous. When I thought we had definitely gone at least a KM out of the last two, we saw a sign. I thought the sign was going to be a relief and reward us for all the hard work we had done, but I guess 0.2km straight up just feels like 1km. We stopped for a bite to eat. While we were there, Matt ran ahead because he wanted to make it to the top to take pictures and be finished by the time the rest of us got there. Well, the rest of us were greeted by a park ranger who told us we couldn't complete the hike because it was getting too late. So, we had no Matt and no way to get to the top to get him and no phone to call him.

We decided at this point it would be best to send Andrew and his girlfriend up to get him (since Andrew's girlfriend is Korean and she could explain why they were still going up) and Kyle and I made our way back down. We caught the first bus back home and got home around 5:00pm. Matt called about 20 minutes after we got on the bus and said he was coming home and we were going to have spaghetti. Matt didn't show up till 8:00pm because he went back to the top with Andrew and then ran down. Andrew didn't make it back till midnight. That is pretty brutal for both of them because the buses stop at 7pm. So, each of them had to pay for a $30 cab ride back to town (this doesn't sound like much to those of you at home, but here, a 15 minute cab ride only costs $2.80-$3.00, so imagine how long they were in the cab).

So, we didn't make it to the top this time, but we will be going back and we will make it up there. We are going back when fall comes because the changing leaves are going to be so beautiful. We are trying to go to Seorksan National Park on the September long weekend, which is another National Park not far from here, and from pictures our friends have taken, it looks amazing. So, here's to hoping we get up to the top!

Sorry, my blog was kinda anticlimactic and that I didn't give much detail. I literally just got out of bed and haven't even turned the lights on yet. I might still be half asleep.