A Little Moore Perspective AFTER Korea

The city of Chuncheon is in a basin, with mountains literally all the way around it. Inside the basin are some pretty steep hills (as you can see from Sarah’s walk to school). But there are only a couple real mountain peaks inside the basin. Our apartment is situated right next to one of these mountains, called Bong Ui (bong-ee).

Many people, including some of the teachers Sarah works with, have frequently asked us “Have you climbed the mountain yet?” or said “What are you doing this weekend? You should climb the mountain!” We got to wondering, what exactly is on this mountain? Being from Indiana, land of flat plains, just climbing a mountain seems like a pretty tall order, but around here they treat it like it’s their Saturday morning work out!

So we get up and going one Saturday with a plan to climb this mountain. We strap the kids onto our backs and head out. I’d scoped out the area using Google Earth before we left, and found that there is a paved road leading part way up the mountain that is behind our apartment complex. We followed the road up, passing a field with pipes sticking out of the ground (water processing plant?) as well as what appeared to be a cemetery. We were following behind an elderly man on his way up as well. We came to point where the pavement ended and a man was operating a large back-hoe, apparently carving out the area for the road to go further. We were not sure what to do at this point, but before we could decide our next move, he stopped the machine and waved for us to go past him.

We continued on the dirt road until reaching a large cleared out area, like a dirt and gravel parking lot. There was an enormous set of stairs carved out of solid rock climbing up to a couple large, wooden doors under an ancient Korean gate, with warriors painted on the doors. There was also what looked like an old mine cart attached to a cable and mounted on a rail beside the stairs. We can only assume it was for pulling people up who couldn’t climb the stairs. It looked pretty rickety and thrilling.

Another young couple was just coming down the stairs, so we assumed it was OK for us to head up. We got to the top and grabbed one of the large iron rings on the doors. They creaked and groaned as they slowly opened to reveal another short set of stairs climbing to a courtyard. We walked up to the courtyard and found that we were inside a temple, with long Asian buildings surrounding the courtyard. I heard a steady grinding sound like that of a broom sweeping or perhaps a sword being sharpened…! Turning around I realized that before we had entered, the door had been partially locked with its large wooden bolt running through the handles. Apparently it wasn’t pushed through quite enough to lock, which is why we were able to get in. Above the gate was an enormous bell. This must be the source of the chimes I hear off in the distance at random times of the day. A large wooden mallet lay next to the bell. I was sure tempted by that mallet, but decided it might not be the best idea since we might already be in trouble for breaking into the place. We decided it best to not press our luck further and got out of there.

Our trip up this side of the mountain might have ended there, with the parking area appearing to be the end of the road with the temple on one side, rock faces on the other two, and a steep cliff-like ravine on the last side. But the elderly man we had been behind earlier walked over to the rocks and climbed right up a trail and into the woods. We walked over to inspect and found that it was a switch back trail along to top of the rocks that you couldn’t see if looking at the wall from any distance. We followed the trail up into the woods.

The forest is beautiful, with twisted pine trees covering the mountainside, the occasional grassy clearing with light shining through the trees, and views of the river far below the mountain. The trail wound all through the rocks and trees, all the while at a fairly steep climb. There were many places where the trail split off and appeared to go down the other side. Occasionally someone would meet us at a trail intersect and speed past us as we figured out which way to go. While at one of these passes, we began to hear some kind of chanting off in the woods. It was loud, but we could not see its source. It gave us a kind of eerie feeling. What were we going to find on top of this mountain anyway??

We continued to choose trails that led us further up, and thankfully not towards the chanting. We climbed and climbed our way to the top. Cresting a final hill, we as last seem to be approaching the goal. A board plank way begins and lead us right in to… a bunch of workout equipment?? What? This looks like some kind of outdoor gym. There are a bunch of people working out on exercise equipment everywhere! This is certainly not what we expected to find! We wander through the “camp”, probably looking a little awkward as we walk through, hoping we look a little like we know what we are doing and not walking to a dead end. How crazy! So people really do climb this mountain for their morning workout! There is a large clock mounted on a pole on one end of the gym showing the time. Wow. Don’t be late for work I guess.

The plankway ended and we were at a peak where we could see down both sides of this finger of the mountain. We found ourselves a nice big rock and sat down for a while, just soaking in the fresh air and looking down over the city through the trees. From here we can see Yubong, Sarah’s school, and I snap a few photos. After a while we walked back through the gym, still cracking up about the whole thing, and back on the trail. There is a radio tower that you can see from anywhere in the city, and we just had a little bit higher to go to reach it, which was the very peak of the mountain. We saw the man we had originally been following and asked him which trail to take to keep going up. He pointed us in the right direction (literally, because he could only understand our jesturing) and we followed it up a bit further to the top.

There were 2 towers at the top: a much smaller and older one that barely topped the trees with some abandoned buildings around it and a very tall newer one with new fencing surrounding it. While it would have been a spectacular view from the larger tower, I opted to climb the smaller, obviously abandoned one. Besides, I didn’t figure I needed to overdo it with unnecessary radiation exposure. The trail led right up to the gate of the abandoned tower with a large hole in it, the trail continuing beyond the hole. I walked through and climbed my way up the tower. It was a delightful sight! I snapped many photographs, the main one of which you can see in the panoramic album.

There was still quite a bit of trail to hike from here, but we’ll speed through it a bit. It turns out there are stairs and trails all over this mountain and we could spend a year just following them all figuring out where they connect to. Many of them just take you down into different parts of the city. At a couple places there are natural springs with rocks built up around them to make a pool and some cups where you can drink fresh water from. By the end we had hiked up and completely around the entire mountain.

We worked our way in the direction of our apartment. Many of the trails were very steep and someone had put up a rope tied to several trees to use as a rail while walking down. When we were walking or sliding down one such portion of the trail, my feet slipped out from under me and I fell on my back – right on top of Ezekiel! Though not injured, he was pretty scared by the fall, so I took him out of the backpack and comforted him for a bit. He exclaimed for weeks, especially to people we’d talk to on Skype “No da-ee, no fau down da mountain!” Thanks, son.

It turns out we made the right choices of trails as they led down to a set of stairs that dropped us directly into a parking lot of our apartment complex. We had no idea these stairs were even here! But we were quite worn out and glad to call it a day.

Take a look at the new photo album to see all the pictures from this hike!