A Million Pics in Sokcho

For Chuseok - Korean Thanksgiving - we got three days off work in the middle of the week. We journeyed up to northern South Korea to Sokcho for strenuous hiking at Seoraksan Mountain - the third highest mountain in South Korea. It was beautiful in "Fresh Sokcho." It's a small town, but there were a lot of people around for the holiday and tons of foreigners visiting as well. 

We spent one day just hiking the giant mountain, or rock rather. There was one 14 ton rock that is famous for people trying to push it off the ledge. It still cannot be done. We tried and tried to make history and get on CNN but to no avail. We rewarded ourselves for our hard work and went into town for dak galbi (chicken korean bbq) and some drinks. There, we met a group of hilarious Koreans who were back home in Sokcho for the holiday.

The next day, we did the touristy things, checked out the beach, Sokcho Tower, etc. Dozens of adorable Korean children were driving around in plastic motor cars in the courtyard of Sokcho Tower. Some mistakenly were playing bumper cars with each other. One precious girl was just as fascinated with me as I was with her - she walked right up to my face.

When it was raining, we went to a Jimjilbang, which is a place with all kinds of saunas. There are some unisex areas with various temperature saunas to include 'ice' saunas. There are TVs in some of the sauna rooms, there are massage chairs, PC rentals, a cafe, draft beer area and a section separated by sex with different hot pools and showers for a no clothing, no swimsuit area. Beth managed to snap a few photos in the clothed sections.

It was an awesome trip, great scenery, excellent workout and couldn't have been a better break from Daegu.