Blogs from Chungcheongbuk-do, South Korea, Asia

We arrived in Danyang around lunchtime having left Gyeongju earlier that morning. After lunch we went for a walk through the market. We'd read a few blogs about Danyang before we arrived which said that you can see more garlic than you've seen in your whole life at the Danyang market; being garlic lovers we were fairly skeptical about this. After having walked two out of the three aisles of the market without seeing much garlic we were were certain the author must have been smoking something funny, but as we turned into the last section we were proved wrong! So. Much. Garlic! After taking some photos we headed to the black garlic bread shop and purchased a few to sample. They were quite sweet which was a little odd, but they were definitely edible though ... read more

Crocodile Peak seems to be a relatively new place to visit in Korea, I have only heard of it in the past couple of years. Maybe someone in a marketing department somewhere visited and came up with the idea of calling it Crocodile Peak. We drove for a couple of hours, maybe three and arrived at where we would start hiking. This place seemed off the regular tourist trail, we pulled up at a carpark, near the lake. The carpark was for a restaurant, which was abandoned. Whether it had been shut up for good or just for the winter, I guess I will never know. We walked down the road for a few minutes and crossed by a bridge. We joined the trail by the edge of the bridge. It wasn't marked at all and ... read more

Another sunrise hike! I must be mad. We left around midnight and we arrived at Sobaeksan around 2:30 am, it isn't too far away and the roads were quiet. We napped on the bus or another half an hour to an hour and then we headed off in the darkness. We started in what I think was the southern part of the park. The first part of the trail was nice, as it was on a paved road that gradually rose, so not too much huffing and puffing from me. We hiked 4.5 kilometers to reach our first peak, which is Jei 2nd Yeonhwabong Peak. It was starting to get light, so I took some photos of the peak marker with my phone, as my flash less camera wouldn't cooperate. There was some kind of observation ... read more

12th Oct: We were picked up not long after eight am. The highway bus stop was heaving. Obviously it's the place to be on a Saturday morning! The traffic was moving pretty well, so we got to the first stop pretty much on time. Our rest stop was at Dodamsambong, which is three rocks in the river, where the emperor used to come to chillax and for sexy time, if I remember correctly. I had been here before a few years ago, but the place looked very different. Last time I came the area was pretty quiet. I don't remember all the shops or the pavilion halfway up the hill. Maybe we came from a different entrance or they have done a lot of development in the area. We walked up the the pavilion and got ... read more

Jecheon City is located in Chungcheongbuk-do it is the only landlocked province in South Korea. Leaving Seoul Station onboard the TongTongTong Music Train we headed for the Oriental Herbal Medicine Expo 2 1/2 hours away. Pulling away from the train station the five foreigners on board tipped back their chairs plugged in their ipods quickly falling asleep. Excited about the day trip, James grabbed his camera and headed for the first train car. Passing through his car James spotted adjushi's (older men) around tbles happily sipping out of paper cups chatting and drinking with a bottle of bakbonju, a berry wine. Checking his watch it was 8:05 in the morning, laughing to himself, James continued onward. Scanning out the front windows watching the two engineers drive the engine down the tracks he noticed a strange herbal ... read more