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Published: August 7th 2013
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After spending the last couple of weekends in cities, eating and drinking, I was desperate to escape on an activity day to the countryside. Luckily I found a facebook group for hiking and cycling in Busan, and I travelled out one Sunday morning to the peripheral city of Yangsan to meet some of the members. I was able to borrow a bike and we started off on our trip to Tongdosa (temple). We headed up north by the riverbank, which was decorated with many flowering poppies, and escaped the industrial landscape shortly afterwards. So nice to feel in the countryside again! We passed so many rice paddies with people out working their land - thoroughly peaceful and the roads were quiet too.
It wasn't a demanding cycle by any means and we arrived at Tongdosa in under three hours - just in time for lunch! We abandoned out bikes to their fate outside the main gate and walked up. The temple area is set in beautiful mature woodlands, a real getaway. To my delight we learned that the temple serves lunch to visitors for free between certain hours. We were able to help ourselves in their canteen, the only stipulation
was that we had to finish whatever we put in our bowls, no food waste. It was delicious too, a mixture of rice, fresh and fermented vegetables with some mushroom soup. When we had finished and washed up, we went outside to explore a bit. Tongdosa is the head temple of one of the Korean orders of Buddhism, and is famous as it doesn't have any statues of the Buddha outside the main hall, as the relics of the Buddha are preserved inside several pagodas around the temple. Most of the temple buildings are faded and were not re-painted, again standing out from the crowd, and lending an authentic feeling of old world Korea. After a quick tour and a refreshing ice-cream, we went for a walk upstream, passing the One-Mind-Bridge and stopping for photos on the One-Arch-Bridge. Then we were in the countryside again! I knew this as soon as the pollen hit my sinuses - a rare feeling when living in Busan! We walked for a good long bit and stopped to cool our feet in a mountain stream. Many Korean families were around too, making lunch and enjoying their Sunday. On our way back to the temple
we were able to get lifts from some generous souls who didn't seem to mind having sweaty foreigners in the backseat!
The cycle back of course took less time as we knew where we were going and we were able to stop a couple of times. We had a snack break beside an ancient tree in the heart of what was the old village of Yangsan. The trunk was split below the ground so it looked like two trees but is still the one, and many people still gather here once a year to pray for a good farming year. We made it back to the subway station in good time, and celebrated by the river with beer and snacks. A great day out.
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