Sept 11, 2008 – Seoraksan National Park

Sokcho / Seoraksan National Park

The day started off pretty nicely, up early to catch a city bus into the National Park. About a 20 minute bus ride later we arrived in the park, paid our entrace and started to decide on which trail to take. When we discovered that our camera was still in the hotel room. So back on a bus back to the hotel. Luckily the bus ride is short, frequent and cheap.

10:20 am – take two: we are back in the park and are heading off to Ulsan-bawi. The trail is about 5km one way and took us about 2 hours to complete one way. The first part is an easy stroll up to a buddist temple. The second part takes us past a hermatige in front of Ulsan-bawi. There a few food stands along the way to refresh the weary traveller. At the hermitage we there a boulder perched on a rock. The boulder can move slightly on the rock but has not been pushed off – yet. Neither Darlene or I succeeded.

From the hermitage we proceeded further the trail getting harder. Sections have ropes to help pull your way up. As we get to the vertical face of Ulsan-bawi the stone paths and boulder we have traversed change to a steel stair case. That goes up, some sources cite that their are 808 steps to the summit. As we reached the summit, out of breath and drenched. As we were there a older gentleman arrived at the summit and seemed quite relaxed and freshed. Another woman arrive looking like we felt – tired hot and drenched!

The trip down was eaiser that we thought it would be, and it was not as freaky as I though it would be going down a staircase that just drops out of sight as you descend.