Dobongsan Mountain

 

Even as busy as we have been in Seoul, we both miss the summer things like hiking and swimming and camping. This Saturday was supposed to be rainy, but we decided to go for a hike up Dobongsan Mountain anyways. It was different than hiking in Utah or Colorado for the obvious reasons of humidity, different vegetation, and the size of mountains, but it was funny to see how the whole ideology of it is different too. 

We got off the metro that brought us about 10 minutes from the trails and found ourselves in the middle of a little hiking village. Every store was selling hiking gear, and every restaurant kimbab to pack along on the trail. It was this whole hiking community like you see with really important mountains (like Everest or Machu Picchu), where gearing up is actually a necessity.

The funny thing is everyone is geared up like they are doing Kilimanjaro, even though they are probably planning on hiking for a few miles (the highest peak on this mountain had a 3.4km trail). All the clothes that they wear is water proofed and light weight. Everyone carries walking sticks and gloves, and I saw a bunch of people with mini sleeping mats. It goes way beyond being prepared to this hugely trendy hobby that is pretty far from the laid back outdoors crowd in America. (We laughed because we were the only people wearing shorts and the "gear" in our backpack probably weighed less than the backpack.)

Koreans tend to be a bit superficial. That is not necessarily a negative commentary on them, but it really is true of a lot of aspects of their culture. The appearance of things is very important. So with hiking, it seems that unless you look intense about it, you must not really be into it.

The hiking village.

It was very green and nice to be up out of the city.

The mountain may not be that high, but we were warned that Asians do not use the concept of a switchback, and we found this to be true. I actually was very impressed with the old ladies who were agile enough to be going up steep and sometimes slippery rocks.

There were many Buddhist temples on this mountain. This one was particularly nice.

We bought some goofy looking Korean hiking socks to remember the day.