Hiking around Seoul

Yesterday my last midterm exam ended, which means I’ll have a bit more free time coming up. It’s already been about two months since I’m in Korea and to say the least, I did a lot. One of the things I really got into is hiking. So far I’ve hiked Inwangsan (인왕산), Gwanaksan (관악산), Bukhansan (북한산) and Geomdansan (검단산). The hikes actually were all quite different. Starting with Inwangsan, we went there to watch the sunset. It literally only took us around an hour to get to the top and the view was really beautiful. The sunset that day made it even more so,  by coloring the city in shades of red. And we by far weren’t the only ones up there. There were actually quite a lot of people in sneakers and street wear, supporting my opinion that it’s a quite fast and easy hike. But I guess compared to the trip through Bukhansan National Park every hike I did now seems easy haha. This tour was really intense. We planned a whole day trip from the get go because we knew it wasn’t going to be a chill day. All in all it took us like 6 hours and 6 peaks to reach Bukhansan but it was worth it. There were parts where the hiking felt more like climbing, which was really exciting for one of my friends who was part of the group (we only were three people but ok let's call it group) because he is really into bouldering. So eventually we really climbed to a more or less hidden spot for which you had to pass a stone crack. The view there was stunning, since autumn is coloring the trees in intense reddish colors these days. After our 8 hour hike (including Bukhansan) we finally took a taxi to the subway station since we couldn’t even walk properly anymore. That’s another thing: Public transportation makes hiking around Seoul really comfortable because you can easily reach every starting point of different trails!

Gwanaksan was another quite long hike I did with my bouldering friend and it took us about 6 hours. We again took a little detour over smaller peaks. To be honest, this peak definitely had it’s own vibe because on the top there was a military basis kind of thing, but there also was a temple, which made the atmosphere quite weird.  But still it was a nice hike. Going down we passed by another temple and a mountain stream where we cooled off our feet afterwards. We didn’t bring a lot of food so luckily we were invited by two elderly man to have lunch with them 2 hours in. They also provided us with makgeolli (막걸리) which is basically rice-wine. I’ve seen so many people drink it during hiking haha, and it seems to be a cultural thing here. Especially the older generation will probably always have a bottle with them. They are also the ones you will meet most while hiking anywhere by the way, which is quite impressing if you ask me.

Geomdansan also had quite an interesting view. At the top you could see the place where Han-River (한강) flows into Paldangho-Lake (팔당호). The hike also only took 3 hours in total. The only thing is that Geomdansan is located in Hanam which will (depending on your location in Seoul) take you up to 2 hours to reach. We started from CAU-campus and it took us one hour and half by subway.

These days the weather in Seoul is getting colder, so maybe hiking season will be over soon. At least for the people who didn’t bring their winter hiking equipment as there will be a lot of snow.

See you soon and enjoy the photos ^.^

Luisa