Daegu & Pohang

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(Delayed blog)

The bullet train that took me from Seoul Station to Dongdaegu station lasted a mere one hour and forty minutes, at its top speed travelling 297 kilometres an hour(!) Wow! Getting out of the station, I decided to drop my backpack in a locker (7000 Won) to explore and find a place to stay before rushing into some overpriced love hotel. Not feeling tired due to the excitement of being in a new place again, I walked out and soon discovered that Daegu (obviously) was not Seoul. I think I must've walked south a bit at first. The streets were hilly I noticed and not as clean and developed you could say as its northern capital neighbour.
It just sort of gave the idea of being a 'second rank' city. After not much time I did start feeling a bit fatigued, but couldn't find a subway station. I took a taxi (the first of only two during my whole trip) and asked him to take me to the nearest one. That's when I found out I had been walking east instead of west...

Getting 'down below' only amplified my feeling of Daegu being a 'second rank' city within South Korea. Maybe it had something to do with the fire that broke out in February 2003, in which an astonishing 198 people died and another 147 were injured. Some idiot set fire to a train at [Jungangno station and combined with errors made by both train drivers, the death toll was astoundingly high. In fact, this is not the only disaster to have ever hit Daegu and its subway system; In 1995, during construction of line 2, a gas explosion killed another 103 people and injured dozens.
I got off at Jungangno station to check out the Seomun market, a huge complex of over 4000 shops cramped into 4 separate levels. I came away with some good jogging pants and socks. Nothing hugely fascinating. For lunch I ate at one of the many stalls set up in the passages between the ground floor, a cold noodle dish with small green peppers to chew on. (No kimchi!)

I continued to Daegu's main shopping centre where I had a quick look around. At this time, I was actually getting extremely tired. The combination of hiking, cycling and just the general walking around Seoul, combined with a sleepless night at the bath house before, my legs just started giving way, so I took a rest on a sofa positioned sort of in between two parts of the shopping centre. Here I feel asleep, pretty much as soon as I sat down. I must've slept full on for like an hour or so. I woke up drooling all over myself, and felt I had been wasting my time,making a fool of myself, so I quickly got up and went out. It was not until I was back underground, feeling in my bag for my travel guide to see where I was headed with the subway, that I noticed I'd left it behind in the shopping centre... SHIT!
So I ran back up, down the shopping street, up the elevators to the 4th floor, trying to locate the sofa I'd been sleeping on. GONE of course! Aiya, I felt shit after that, the combination of lack of sleep, with the sort of comedown of arriving in Daegu after my fantastic time in Seoul an now the losing of an expensive guide book... I went back to the train station where I had left my bag in a locker, and while there, impulsively decided on a train to Pohang. I'd been reading about it before hand, and I sort of remembered things it said about it, so left with an early afternoon train. If I remember well, it only took 2 hours (slow train) before it arrived at the small Pohang station. I immediately felt much better. A city bus took me a bit further up the coast to Bukbu beach where I checked in at a charming little hotel right behind the first row of shops on the beach. I might've been the only guest, because the place was very quiet. The room with TV, bathroom and flowery bedding was well priced at 35.000 Won!

Happy to be at the coast and see a beach, I went for a stroll, admiring the fountain a 25 meters into the sea, pushing up a very tall line of water, with the spray blown across the beach. In the background, to the south-east, you could clearly see the world's second largest steel making factory, POSCO, or Pohang Iron and Steel Company. The importance of this ugly sprawl, polluting the panoramic view from the beach, shows in the Wikipedia description of posco;

With the strong Korean shipbuilding and automobile industry dependent on POSCO for steel, it has been seen as the bedrock of Korea's industrial development over the past 40 years.

Walking inland from the beach, revealed the small town feel of Pohang. Neat, little traffic, and no rushing about by hundreds of people, it is so much different from the big Korean cities. I ordered a stuffed crust pizza at a small family run place and took it back to the hotel with a few beers. The pizza was a big disappointment, with the crust being filled with some kind of sweet potato / corn filling, similar to the kind of pizzas they make in China. The beers though, being kept cold by the small fridge in my room were not. Neither were the English movies on TV.

My second day I slept in, reassessed my time left in Korea, and decided I liked the town, so paid for another night.
After a breakfast of 7-11 packaging and ready made foods, I walked along the beach heading north. At the north end of Bukbu beach, the sand made way for concrete dykes and a cute little harbour. I followed the road around the headland with the Hwanho Sunrise Park on top. Behind the headland was a parking lot with entrances to the various walks to the top, on which sits a observation platform. Unmanned when I was there, you just take the elevator to the third floor from where the view out over the bay is fantastic. The park itself is obscured by trees, but in between you do see the old people resting on benches chatting about years gone by. I spent a few hours walking the hills of the park, before walking back to the main drag along the beach. The remainder of the day was basically spent sunbathing.. Aaahh ...
I had planned a nice seafood lunch on the beach, but the prices were that high, that I decided against it, and opted for the easier stomach filler; A city bus into town and a large meal at a Lotteria, the Korean version of fast food.

A great website for the city:


I headed back to Daegu by bus the next morning, I had planned to take the train, but upon arriving at the train station, it had just left and the next one wasn't for another 2 hours. The bus was more expensive than the train though, but fast nevertheless. In no time I was back at Dondaegu station where I walked down from the pedestrian bridge to the east of the station and checked into the Amor motel. For 25.000 Won, a cheapie (and a good example of Korea's many love hotels). I immediately went back into the city to ask the shopping centre if perhaps somebody had found my guide book, but as expected, it wasn't there. So I walked a bit further to the second hand book / coffee shop I had seen a few days earlier. Here I found one from 2004. For 5000 Won, it had to make do.
As planned, my next move was a local bus to Gayasan national park, and the adjacent Haeinsa temple.
On the UNESCO list of world heritage, it lists as one of the most significant temple complexes in the whole of South Korea. It draws its fame from the ''Tripitaka Koreana'', 81.340 carved woodblocks, inscribed with the complete Buddhist scriptures, which unfortunately, I didn't get to see due to my timing.
I read that every day around 6.30 pm all the resident monks get together for prayer time, an experience not to be missed. It being already late, around 4 pm, I thought my best bet was to tackle Sangwangbong peak first. At 1430 meters above sea level, it was supposedly going to be a two hour climb up plus the descent down. With the clouds gathering quickly, and the light fading, plus the added rush of wanting to be back before prayer time AND the LAST bus back to Daegu departing at 19:20, I had about two and a half hours, and guess what? I MADE IT! (just)
It really wasn't easy, with the drizzle rain coming down increasingly nearing the top, where the climb itself was starting to get tougher as well, making my way across large boulders and over rocky paths amongst the low trees. Amazing views from the top though, with the dark clouds exaggerating the feel of being out there alone (the last climber I had seen passed me at the very beginning of the track) on top of a mountain. I enjoyed the view, but with the chilly wind drawing the heat from my body as the sweat accumulated from the fast ascent evaporated into the air, I quickly made my way down again, afraid of getting lost.

Back down, the procession of monks in light-grey robes had just started, making their way into the main temple for prayers. Down a few levels from the main prayer hall hung a large gong. Here a group of mostly young monks proceeded banging on it at a fast pace, with the rhythm and the bass being reverberated by the surrounding buildings and the forest. Fantastic woodwork,some older than others, adorned most of the temples, but it was mostly the forest setting that gave the whole place quite a magical feel to it. Like said earlier, I had really wanted to see those 81.340 inscribed wood blocks, but that particular building closed at 6 pm.
The bus back to Daegu arrived in time, bringing me back to Dongdaegu. I wondered for a bit and took the subway to a district for nightly entertainment, but the whole place seemed fairly dead, so resided to my love hotel.
The next morning early I took another great train to my last stop; Busan, or also spelled Pusan.
See you next blog!

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Photos

Bukbu beach fountain
(Cosco in the background)

Comments

[Traveling Hawk]

Daegu&Pohang
The temple is great and I like the video with the gong.

[Maarten]

video
mooie video!! wist niet dat Korea veel invloeden had van het Buddhism... keep on going!