Yo what up homies? It's ya boi, Baby White Bread. I decided to stop by to drop some knowledge on ya dome pieces. Ok, that was way too much for me to keep up with. If you haven't figured it out by now, it's Drew. I was voluntold by an unnamed wife of mine to make a post about my AF sponsored resiliency trip to Mt. Seoraksan. Basically, it was the Air Force's way to get us to 'find inner strength to become better members in our unit.' GREAT. I was thinking this whole trip was gonna be some Kumbaya, ice-breaker kinda deal. I was wrong. It was hardly anything like that.
Anyway, day one started off at noon on base, we all checked in, piled on to two big charter busses and headed out to the hotel. We arrived 3 hours later, get our room assignments and go get cleaned up for dinner. After dinner, we all meet in the hotel's ballroom where the chaplain explains to us what we should expect and what is expected of us. Nothing out of the ordinary. After that little meeting was over, we were left to our own devices for the night.
Day two. We wake up around 7 for breakfast and are done and out of the hotel by 9 to make our way up the mountain. Chaplain explains that there are basically two routes to take, the path to the right is the most commonly used and where the majority of the hiking is. The second path, to the left, is where hardly anybody goes and isn't where you get the best view. I think it was his attempt at telling us to go with the big groups without actually saying that. I had a few friends go on this trip with me and we had decided collectively that we wanted to go on our own adventure. So naturally, we chose the path less taken. I am so thankful I didn't go with the group, because we had a freaking blast. I took pictures along the way, so I'll caption them as we go on this adventure together.
Anyway, day one started off at noon on base, we all checked in, piled on to two big charter busses and headed out to the hotel. We arrived 3 hours later, get our room assignments and go get cleaned up for dinner. After dinner, we all meet in the hotel's ballroom where the chaplain explains to us what we should expect and what is expected of us. Nothing out of the ordinary. After that little meeting was over, we were left to our own devices for the night.
Day two. We wake up around 7 for breakfast and are done and out of the hotel by 9 to make our way up the mountain. Chaplain explains that there are basically two routes to take, the path to the right is the most commonly used and where the majority of the hiking is. The second path, to the left, is where hardly anybody goes and isn't where you get the best view. I think it was his attempt at telling us to go with the big groups without actually saying that. I had a few friends go on this trip with me and we had decided collectively that we wanted to go on our own adventure. So naturally, we chose the path less taken. I am so thankful I didn't go with the group, because we had a freaking blast. I took pictures along the way, so I'll caption them as we go on this adventure together.
This is a cool time lapse of the cable car we took to get to the initial hiking spot. No sound, don't worry.
So after we had taken in as much of this spot as we could, we decided on a different peak to scale and made our way over there. We saw a smaller, more secluded section of the mountain behind the cable car station. We made our way over there and realized the only way we could get to our destination was to pass directly through a Buddhist temple. We quickly and quietly made our way around it and started on the second leg of our dude-venture. After we arrived, we saw it had not one, but two spots to climb. I took one while Webb and Thomas took the other.
Once again we had enough of this site and wanted to do something else. I had seen a pamphlet at the hotel of a path in this national park that led to a remote waterfall. I ran it by the guys and we thought it would be a waste to NOT try and find it, so off we went.
And no. I did not jump in. Why, you may ask? Let me tell you. That was some of the coldest water I've felt. No way on God's green earth was I going to remove my clothing, in the wilderness, jump off a ledge into a pond of unknown depths, just for fun. I did however, drink the water. Here ya go..