Happy Birthday Buddha

I'm not sure anyone is aware of it, but Buddha turned 2576 years old this year.  Or I guess he would have turned 2576 years old had he not left this physical world almost 2500 years ago.  But his death was not in vain.  Not only do we have the ability to make jokes about people with large stomachs, we here in Korea are also awarded a 3 day holiday weekend.   So how did we celebrate over 2500 years of Buddha?  We took a 4 hour, (more like 9 with holiday traffic), bus ride to the small sea side village of Sokcho.  Why?  Because we felt like it.  (And also, there's a beautiful National Park near Sokcho called Seoraksan and this was the actual reason for enduring such a long and terrible bus journey).  

I said terrible but I'm just exaggerating as the bus was actually pretty comfortable and we were traveling with friends so there was never a shortage of good conversation:

Luckily, I remembered to pack my Josh, so I wasn't bored on the ride up.

Okay, enough with the Josh and on to the real reason I'm even writing this: Seoraksan National Park.  Although I was only there for a day and only able to complete one hike, Seoraksan has sky rocketed to the top of my favorite-places-in-Korea List.  In fact, I didn't even have a list prior to this trip, I had to create one because this place deserves to be on the top of something.

Here's a quick rundown of the park presented in list form (complete with bullet points):

-- Seoraksan was the first National Park in Korea being designated as such in 1970

-- The highest peak is Daechongbong at 1708 meters (5604 ft)

-- The rock is granite and gneiss

-- More than 1,000 different plant species have been classified

-- More than 1,500 different animal species have been classified

The Hike:  We decided to hike Ulsanbawi, which means wobbly rock.  The wobbly rock wasn't at the top of the trail, it was towards the middle.  There was a really long line to get to the rock and once there, you could push it and make it wobble a little bit.  Then you got to have your picture taken so that you could prove that you were there.  We elected to skip the line and continue on to the top of the mountain.

I'm going to apologize in advance for what's about to come.  I'm not really sure what else I can write so I'm about to flood your digital space with photos.  I'm not much of a photographer and I attribute that to either a) I'm not much of a photographer, b) my camera reacts weird to natural light, c) my eyes aren't that good and I can't tell when things are in focus, or d) a combination of some or all of the above. 

The Quest

The different shades of green were so vibrant that even someone as remarkably colorblind as I am could appreciate it.  I especially liked how some of the taller pines created dark green ribbons that cut through the rest of the forest.

The final kilometer of the hike was mostly just a long, winding staircase.  I suppose stairs are a better option than say, scaling the side of the rock face.

Here's a view of Ulsanbawi taken from the balcony of our hotel room.  This photo does very little to capture its majesty but let me point out that I spotted our hotel from the top and I've seen bigger (and better looking) lego structures.