Day 3- Mt. Goryeosan (Nature)

The next day, I woke up completely panicked by the alarming noise in my room. Not realizing it was Kaitlyn who was playing the loud 80’s music to wake me up, I unconsciously threw a pillow, and almost knocked down Kaitlyn and her boiling hot Omija tea. (The Omija tea being a tasteful traditional Korean tea, that implied all 5 flavors of sweetness, sourness, bitterness, saltiness, and pungency.) I gazed at the alarm clock, it read 5:00am. Although it was not a good way to start off my first “official” full day in South Korea, I was still excited for the plans we had today. But before I could utter the words “I'm starving”, Shreya, Ananya, and Isabella came knocking on our door, Kaitlyn floundered to the door to answer. Without a word, we all looked at each other with the same thought: breakfast. It took sometime to decide where we wanted to go, as Ananya was stating how nutritional each restaurant was. Unfortunately, we didn't end up listening to her, as we made the choice of eating Krispy Kreme Donuts. We decided to get a dozen glazed donuts, meaning we each ate around two. After breakfast, we left to go back to the hotel to see our plans for the day. Of course Ananya needed a little help getting up, as her clumsy fall on the airplane yesterday wasn't very forgiving to her body. To start off our trip, we thought it was a good idea to explore the nature of this beautiful country. Today we would take on Mt. Goryeosan, the mountain that proudly stood high at an elevation of 1,430 ft.

Omija Tea

Conveniently, we would be taking a train from the Incheon Airport to the Gimpo Domestic Airport on the AREX ALL STOP TRAIN with a total of a 35 minute travel time. Unfortunately, this was only our first stop, as we still had to travel to Goryeosan after we get off at the Gimpo Airport. We gathered our belongings with us, and rushed to AREX Airport Railroad. The time read 8:00am and we were supposed to be comfortably sitting inside the train at 8:00am. I for one sprinted to the train, only to see the others casually walking. Of course I had to yell to get their lazy feet to moving! Finally we made it to the train, and we were quite disappointed to see the vast amount of people already situated. Due to how crowded it was, only Ananya and Shreya were able to sit together, and the rest were forced to scatter. Knowing me, I quickly dosed off to sleep, dreaming about how beautiful Mt Goryeosan would look like in person.

AREX ALL STOP TRAIN

This time I woke up to not only a loud and vociferous sound, but also a foreign sound. Turns out, Shreya had been blasting Kpop (Korean pop) music through her earbuds. She must have been going deaf if i could hear that while sleeping! I angrily snatched her earbuds, causing a very shocked response out of her. Right before I was about to furiously complain to Shreya about the lack of sleep she caused me, the train operator reported that we had reached our final destination: Gimpo Airport. Although the operator announced this as our “final destination”, it was sad to say that we were still not at Goryeosan Mountain. Before we got onto our next bus to Yangdo-myeon, we grabbed a bite to eat at Lotteria Lotte Mall. We each had a mango smoothie. Our next bus was going to leave at 10:00 am sharp, and this time I was going to make sure we were one of the first to be on the bus! After we slurped the rest of our smoothies, we were headed to Ganghwa Terminal. The time read 9:50 am as we made our way onto the bus. Since this time I got Ananya, Shreya, Kaitlyn, and Isabella to hurry, we all sat around each other. After another grueling 1 hour and 2 min of being jammed pack in an overcrowded bus, we finally got to breathe the fresh air of Yangdo-myeon. As we got off the bus, my heart started to race, knowing that we were only about an hour away from Goryeosan Mountain! This time the bus from Yangdo-myeon to Dokjanggol was only 37 minutes! Since it was a connecting bus ride that departed at 11:15 am, there was no time to fool around. We had to head straight to the next bus, luckily it was in the same terminal. As we got on, I could hear a brief sigh from the others. It had been a long journey, even on our first day! It made me wonder how many other buses and trains we would take during the trip to get around. As I day- dreamed of how perfect the plan would be for the next 11 days, the bus took off, and without a single other thought the others (including me) drifted off to sleep.

Ganghwa Terminal

Luckily this time, no one dared to wake me up, and instead I woke to the pleasant sound of the bus driver reporting our arrival at Dokjanggol at 11:50 am Korean standard time. When I opened my eyes I was quick to realize that the others were still sound asleep. Fortunate for the others,  I decided to let them arise themselves. I went back to daydreaming about the rest of our trip, until I was abruptly disturbed by a couple of sighs. Isabella had been the next to wake up and she didn't spare the others one bit. Without hesitation she quickly woke the others up in excitement of our arrival. Everyone else woke up and no surprise, was in awe just as Isabella was. I think it was fair to say that we all could already taste the excitement that laid in front of us, even if we still had to walk for 20 more minutes. I complained earlier about walking the distance, but Ananya and Shreya assured it would be fine. When we got off the bus, as normal, we were all starving. The only will-power we had left was knowing what lied ahead of that 1.4k walk, food and a beautiful mountain.

Dokjanggo Bus Stop

We continued on our way to our destination, picking azalea flowers as we go. I was having so much fun walking and enjoying the nature, that I had forgotten all about my hunger, and the 25 min went by like a breeze. We reached at 12:20 pm. Since only Kaitlyn knew where the restaurant was, she directed us to it. Already I could smell all sorts of foreign food, and I couldn't wait any longer to dig in. The restaurant's name was “Myujeu” and it was written in Korean block-like letters on the front of the door. As soon as Isabella opened the door, a rush of flavors hit my nose intensely. We walked in and sat down as luckily there was no rush at all. I took a glance at the English side of the menu, and was happy to see the “vegetarian dishes” section. Ananya and I have been vegetarians our whole life, and it was exciting to find out that we could still enjoy the country’s unique flavors. We both each ordered the dish “Japchae”, a stir fried dish with glass noodles and vegetables. Kaitlyn, Isabella, and Shreya ordered the “Dakjjim”, a fried chicken and vegetable dish. Both of these dishes are very popular here in South Korea and use spices and flavors you might not necessarily get back in the US.

     

Japchae Dish   Dakjjim Dish

After we paid the check, we proceeded to walk up to the mountain. The mountain that stood proudly at 1,430 ft. Known as the “pink mountain” due to all the bright azalea’s surrounding the mountain. What amazed us so much was the rich history of the mountain. Locals believe that during the Jangsu of Goguryeo rule, Buddhist monk after the name of Cheonchukguk climbed the mountain. He climbed the mountain and picked 5 Lotus flowers. He then let go of the flowers causing them to scatter randomly. Wherever they landed, Cheonchukguk built temples. He named them after their colors, Jeokseoksa for the red lotus, Baengnyeonsa for the white lotus, Cheongryeonsa for the blue lotus, Hwangryeonsa for the yellow lotus, and Heungnyeonsa for the black lotus. As we walked toward the historical mountain we noticed there was no fee to be paid and we were aloud to access the hiking trail on our own. Full of excitement, Ananya took out her phone, and started to take burst-photos. We all laughed and reminded her that we haven't even reached the top of the mountain yet! As we made our way up we were shocked to see the beautiful bright pink colors of the azalea flowers, in order to preserve the nature on the mountain we were told not to pick them. Soon enough, we discovered the “Oryeonji Pond”. The pond resembled King Jangsu's rule during the Goguryeo Dynasty, when he created his hermitage. A sightseeing pit stop later appeared in front of us. It overlooked the West Sea and the small villages surrounding it. As we continued on, we made our way to the Azalea Observation Point, where many blooming flowers were rustling in the wind. Ananya again pulled out her phone and took an overwhelming amount of pictures, but I couldn't blame her, the flowers were nothing like anything I've ever seen! Then, it was finally the moment, the moment we had all been waiting for! We were soon about to reach the top of the mountain, where the Azaleas were the brightest and the view was the finest. While walking up, I not only noticed Isabella, Ananya, Kaitlyn, and Shreya pull out there cameras, but I also noticed everyone else preparing for the astonishing view. Finally it was time, we climbed the last set of staircases and made our way up to the very top. A few sighs were let out, and I could see why. The view and scenery were absolutely breathtaking. I pulled out my phone to snap a million pictures to keep forever, I am now very thankful for clearing out my storage for these photos! After we had all enjoyed and embraced the view that lied in front of us, unfortunately it was time to go back down. We followed a different path to go back down than we did when we were hiking up. We walked down, enjoying every single moment until we were on the ground. The time read 3:30.

     

Once we were on the ground, more planning took place. In order for us to get back to the Incheon Airport where our hotel rooms lied, we had to walk for another 25 min to the Dokjanggol bus stop, hop on the 37 minute bus ride to Yangdo-myeon Office, then hop on another bus for an hour back to Gimpo International Airport. From there, we would then take the 35 minute AREX ALL STOP TRAIN ride at 5:00 pm back to the Incheon International Airport. The next 2 hours consisted of sleep, we were all very exhausted from today’s adventures. I for one couldn't wait to get back to our hotel and eat dinner.

The rest of our bus rides went smoothly, as I was only awake on the last train ride from Gimpo Airport to the Incheon Airport. Finally, I heard those amazing words come out of the train operator’s mouth: “we have arrived to our final destination, Incheon Airport, 5:02 pm, Korean standard time”, but this time we had actually reached our final destination. I was relieved to be back at the airport, and so were the others. After we got off the train and headed inside the airport, I had to practically chase down Shreya as she became distracted with all the shops again.  After we all gathered together in the airport, the main question was: dinner. Isabella and I argued that we should have Taco Bell as they were located everywhere in the airport so it wouldn't be a hassle to find one, the others agreed. We all ordered crunchwraps. After, since it was only 6:00, we decided to listen to Shreya and go look around and see what the shops had to offer.

 

Incheon Airport

After dinner and window shopping, we all headed back to the our rooms. Kaitlyn and I said our goodbyes as the others left to check into their rooms. Lying in my bed at 8:09 pm I still couldn't believe our first official full day in South Korea was almost gone. We had 11 more days, and realizing how tiring but exciting the first one was, showed me how the rest of our trip would go. Once again daydreaming about our trip eventually turned into me dozing off into a deep deep sleep.

                                              

Incheon Airport Hotel Room