Yangyang

The next destination after Hwacheon is Yangyang country washed by the East Sea.

Yangyang is not a big country too, having a population of over 27,000 people.

The area was called Yangyang 襄陽 since 1416. The area has a long history since it was known to be a part of Ye-guk 濊國 (3rd-century BC to around early 5th-century). Later it has become a part of Goguryeo and the area of Yangyang was called Ikhyeonhyeon 翼峴縣 or Imunhyeon 伊文縣. It is surprising for me, but both variants are quite nice (if compare to what I have seen before, Hwacheon, Boseong), the literal meaning is Wing Hill or That Culture (it is too complicated to find a proper translation for this pair of characters as the second character have too many meanings). Later, the name of the area was changed several times. In 1222, after a successful defend from Mongolians, it was renamed to Yangju 襄州, where the first character yang means a defender. Later the name was changed again until it has got its present name, consisting of the same yang 襄 and yang 陽, one of the meanings is the sun.

The way to the sea lies through many spots with beautiful scenes. Views from Hangyeryeong.

Even it is just a small observatory with a few buildings, there are many special souvenirs and amazing views to have some meal.

Step by step I am coming closer to ….

Naksan! Naksan is used to designate a few spots in the area, the first one I am going to visit is Naksan Beach.

I was swimming there a lot, that is why I did not take many photos. It is quite an awkward feeling to swim in a sea in Korea, because the swimming area is limited, and I could say it is much narrower than that one could be found in Odesa, Ukraine, moreover, there are so many active lifesavers, what makes the swimming quite tense, all the time I have to check if anybody of them is not running to catch me. I still remember the sea bottom there, it was shallow on the right and unexpectedly deep (for South Korea) on the left, about 2 m deep.

The other place called Naksan is a temple. Naksansa 洛山寺 was built in 671 by a scholar-monk Uisang 義湘 (625–702) who was a close friend of the man I met before in Soyosan and Namhae, it is Wonhyo. The temple is named after Potalaka mount as an abbreviation of the Chinese transcription of from Sanskrit, 補怛洛迦山. By the way, Bomunsa Temple I visited before in Ganghwa before stands on Nakgasan Mountain 洛迦山 which also is named after Potalaka mountain. The legend of the temple foundation explains the reason this name was chosen for the temple.

One of the legends says, when Uisang returned from the Tang empire, he heard that Guanyin Bodhisattva lived in the cave at the east coast of Naksan. He went there to pray and after 7 days praying he has received crystal beads from magic general Sinjang 神將, after 7 more days a dragon from the sea appeared and gave Uisang cintamani (wish-fulfilling jewel), after 7 more days Guanyin Bodhisattva appeared and said, “at the place you sit, a pair of bamboo will spring up, build a temple there”. As it is believed Guanyin or Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva lived in Potalaka mount, this place was called after the mount.

The temple has lived over many events during almost 1400 years. The last notable event happened in 2005 when the temple was burnt due to fire that started in the surrounding forest. The charred remains of the temple recall that day.

In 1925 Uisangdae Pavilion was built on the spot where Uisang once meditated.

Buddhist statue of Haesugwaneumsang. It was built in 1977. The height of the statue is 15 meters, the pedestal is 2.8 meters high.

And a beautiful sunset. Like a painting.

An interesting path to walk for leaving the temple.

My trip around Yangyang is coming to the end, but there is one more very important thing to do…

To eat unlimited sushi!

The huge crabs in the weak lights I saw on the way home reminded me of a horror movie.

That is all about my travelling around South Korea, tomorrow I have a flight back to Ukraine!

North Jeolla

After Gwangju city, I am going to discover a few spots in Gochang and Buan countries, North Jeolla province.

It is not my first time coming to North Jeolla province, this year I have also visited the capital city, Jeonju, along with Gunsan city, Jinan and Muju countries.

The first place I am going to visit is Pansori museum in Gochang.

Pansori is a Korean genre of musical storytelling performed by a singer and a drummer. The word Pansori consists of two words, pan, which is supposed to mean a situation where many people are gathered or a song composed of varying tones, and sori, which means sound. The genre is thought to be originated in the late 17th century during the Joseon Dynasty. The earliest performers of pansori were most likely shamans and street performers, and their audiences were lower-class people.

The Gochang Pansori Museum was established in the old residence of ‘Dongni’ Sin Jae-Hyo (a musical theorist and arranger and a sponsor of Pansori) with the aim of honoring the great Pansori singers of the past (including Sin Jae-Hyo) and preserving and developing the indigenous tradition of Pansori***.

Except exhibiting numerous items related to Pamsori like music instruments, vinyl records, fans, the museum provides records of various songs performed by famous singers which can be listened in several ways, via video, from a music box, or in culm with headphones, what makes the acquaintance more adventuring. Also, one can try to play the drum like a real Pansori drummer.

Examples of different styles je 制 of pansori, loud and powerful Dongpyeonje 東便制, smooth and sorrowful Seopyeonje 西便制, and compromising between two those styles, Junggoje 中高制. ***

During the 18th century, 12 song cycles madang were established as the repertoire of pansori stories, but only 5 of them survived until now.

Chunhyangga – the story of love
Heungbuga – the story about a poor but good man with many children
Simcheongga – the story about a daughter and her blind father
Sugungga – an adaptation of “A Tale of Rabbit and Turtle”
Jeokbyeokga – Chinese historical legend of the Battle of Red Cliffs

Mosaics on the museum facade depict scenes from these stories.

One story might last for 10 hours, so, musicians may only perform certain sections, highlighting the most popular parts of a madang.

I will show just some passages of Chunhyangga too:***

… Don’t you know the butterfly must pursue the flower, and the geese must seek the sea?…
…No, I shall not look at you, I shall not listen to you. Cut my body into pieces if you like, but I shall never go to you…

Very dramatic scenario. This story is considered to be the most popular.

And, it is time to leave the museum and move on!

From Gochang country I am moving to the neighbouring Buan country. The first place to visit here is Gomso salt fields.

The first records about salt production in Buan country date back to 1454.

In 2018 South Korea produced 264.6 thousand tonnes of salt (#49 in the world), for comparison, Ukraine produced over 23 times more, 6,279.77 thousand tonnes (#11). ****

The wide set of the mirror square fields seemed to be covered with snow, the ordered wooden paths leading almost to distant mountains in the horizon produce a futuristic scene which lets the visitor feel being on another planet.

A nice woman presented two packs of salt to me. I still keep it.

The next destination in Buan country is Gyeokpo Beach.

The beach attracts not only the one who loves to enjoy the sea waves but also geologists.

The Chaeseokgang cliffs was formed millions of yeas ago:****

You will find rocks of Paleoproterozoic (1.8-9 billion years ago), granites of Jurassic Period of Mesozoic Era (170 million years ago), volcanic & sedimentary rocks of Cretaceous Period (about 87 million years ago, dinosaur footprints fossils inside rocks, etc.

The hard work of the waves and sea animals created various patterns on the cliffs. Previously, at Namhae, I was looking for dinosaur remains, and seems here I found it, at least something like a footprint.

The way to my next destination lies on Saemangeum Seawall, connecting Buan with Guansan through Gogunsangundo islands (one of them, Seonyudo Island I visited previously). Saemangeum Seawall is the longes man-made dyke in the world, 33 km long.

Let’s go!

Boseong

After the intensive trip around Suncheon, I am heading to a neighbouring Boseong country.

A population of Boseong country is just 42,803 people by 2018, in 2001 it was 61,329 (30% decreased).

Same as Suncheon, Boseong was a part of the Mahan confederacy. During Baekje, it was called Bokhol country 伏忽郡, and it 757 the country was renamed to Boseong 寶城郡. Boseong 寶城 literally means a precious town, from 寶 – jewel, precious stone, precious and 城 – city, town. The former name Bokhol 伏忽 caused difficulties in the interpretation, as the word bok 伏 might mean to lie hidden, to conceal, to subdue or a surname, and hol 忽 means sudden or to underestimate, to neglect or a surname. Why would the name of a country have a relatively negative meaning? I found quite interesting information about it:

The word hol 忽 was used as a synonym to word seong城 in Goguryeo place names to emphasize the area is under the Goguryeo reign. Baekje used the word hol 忽 in place names in the same manner. During the Unified Silla period, in the toponyms, the word hol 忽 was replaced by seong城. Probably, the word bo寶 simply is the homophone to the word bok 伏.

Seems Baekje wanted to show the dominance over the region, however when the time came for better, the governors would not want to cause disambiguation in the country name for the ordinary citizens and just replaced to the meaning with a really positive homophone. By the way, the creator of mankind in Chinese mythology is named Fuxi 伏羲, I got to know him at the National Museum of Korea.

The main attraction of the country is tea fields. The tea fields are shown even on the profile picture of the article about Boseong country on Wikipedia. The country is the greatest tea producer in South Korea.

These tea fields lie on hills of Hwalseongsan 活城山 mountain, 498 m.

Green tea has been produced in Boseong for the past 1600 years. The earliest mention of tea in Korea dates to the 7th century, the time of Queen Seondeok reign.

A restaurant with a view on the fields serves food with green tea, this is dongas.

The free of pay view on tea fields, on a roadside.

After the walks around the peaceful tea fields, I am heading to the south, to Yulpo beach washed by the waters of Deuknyangman (Deukryangman) Bay.

The water here is not so clean, I have even photographed some rubbish, but I do not dare to post it. And me, with the new skin tone after a walk in the Suncheon garden. However, as I remember, the water here was warm. There were foreigners on the beach too.

That is not all for today yet, one more destination is ahead!

Namhae

The next destination after Sacheon is a neighbouring Namhae country.

Namhae country lays on two big islands, Namhae and Changseon, three smaller islands, as I think, having quite funny names, Jodo, Hodo, Nodo, and 65 (76) other uninhabited islets. Namhae Island is the 5th biggest island in South Korea with an area of 301 sq. km., right next after the Ganghwa island (302.5 sq. km), which I visited before. The total population of the country is about 44,642 people.

The Bronze Age dolmens found on the island evidence the people lived here as early, as at inland. The first records about the country appear in 690, during Silla, when the area was named as Jeonyasan-gun 轉也山郡. In 757, it was renamed to Namhae-gun. The name Namhae consists of two quite popular and meaningful characters, nam 南 – south and hae 海 – sea. As a consequence, there are a few geographic objects in the Far East region called 南海. Among them, 南海 – a sea near North Korea, 南海 – the Chinese name of the South China Sea, 南海道 – a region in Japan and so on.

A quick review:

Changseon 昌善島, chang 昌 – prosperous, beautiful, bright; seon 善, same as in Jeongseon country 旌善郡, good, beautiful, good, kind, excellent, best; kindhearted, hospitable, friendly; auspicious, happy, 島 – island;
Jodo 鳥島, jo 鳥 – bird; 鳥 in Chinese usually is pronounced as niao; diao and dao are other possible pronunciations; in the cases when the character designates a geographic place, it is pronounced as que, resembling that of Korean, jo;
Hodo 虎島, ho 虎 – tiger;
Nodo 櫓島, no 櫓 – castle, scull, big shield.

One of the notable spots in the Namhae country is the German village Dogil Maeul.

In 1997, Du-Kwan Kim, the mayor of Namhae-gun, visited Nordfriesland, a city in Germany, where he met Korean migrants, who went to work to Germany in the 60s. The migrants shared with the major a wish to return back to their home country at retirement age. This wish, along with the fact the population of Namhae country was decreasing since 1965 due to the migration of people to the industrial areas, gave the beginning to the village foundation in 2000.

The district acquired almost 100,000 sq. m. of land to build houses which should look as “German”. This also would be an attraction for tourists. In July 2012, the village had 39 German-looking houses.

A view from a roadside.

Because Namhae is an island, one thing I must to do here is to swim! The island is washed by waters of the Korea Strait, which connects three seas, the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea and the East Sea (the Sea of Japan). Consequently, I would expect the water here to be better than in the Yellow Sea, but not as good as in the East Sea.

I think it is that girl with her mother that I gave the shellfishes I collected. The girl did not dare to take my shells, even though she was looking for them, I just threw it in her bucket after the parents made me understand it is ok, they requested her to say “thank you”, but seems she was really shy seeing a hairy stranger. The whole bottom is full of these shells, one just needs to know how to find it, so, I do. The shells won’t float in the water waiting for you to catch them, you need to get into the sand to grab it. I will not die if I live in a wild in South Korea.

Since visiting the Museum of Natural History, I am always looking for fossils, such as dinosaur eggs or dinosaur excrements, just like those.

One of the attractions on the island is Guemsan mountain. With a height of 681 m, it is the second biggest mountain on the island, the first one is Mangunsan, 786m. There is a country with exactly same name Geumsan, 錦山, bordering on the south with Muju and Jinan countries I visited before. The character geum 錦 means beautiful, luxurious, refined or brocade; bearing such a positive sense, no surprise it is used in geographic names.

That day the mountain was shrouded with fog, so, it was hard to see the environment.

On the hills of the mountain, there is Boriam hermitage 菩提庵. Bori 菩提 is a Buddhist term, meaning perfect comprehension, insight, consciousness, and am 庵 means hermitage; Boriam – the hermitage of perfect comprehension. The temple was founded in 686 by Wonhyo, a priest and commentator of the Korean Buddhist tradition. I met this man before when studied the history of Soyosan mountain, Jajaeam temple also was founded by Wonhyo. It seems that the circumstances do not let me see the creations of Wonhyo, as the first time I was too tired to do that, and now, the fog hid the hermitage.

Many stones with words carved on it are lying on the hermitage territory.

The patterns on some stones draw unusual pictures in my imagination, the reddish blot looks like a dinosaur head, and the roundish stone looks like a big tooth.

This is the comparison of that what could I see and that what do I see.

Dinner is the best way to finish the active trip around Namhae country!

Gangneung

My next destination is Gangneung.

Gangneung is a city on the east coast of South Korea bordering the East Sea.

As long as I am in South Korea, the sea is called the East Sea, if I would be in North Korea, the sea would be called the East Sea of Korea, and if I am somewhere else around the world, it would be the Sea of Japan. A dispute is going on about the sea’s name.

The population of 213,199 people is quite bigger than that of some countries I visited before, Jinan (24,00), Buyoe (95,213), nevertheless, it is just 46th biggest city in South Korea.

Gangneung was the place where Yemaek people lived from ancient times (an ancient tribal group who are regarded as the ancestors of modern Koreans). First records about the city appears in 129 BC, when it was a part of Wiman Joseon (Gojoseon kingdom), the next year, 128 BC, it became a territory of the Han Dynasty. So, this city exists at least for 2148 years.

The city had many names, and only in 1263, it was renamed to Gangneungdo 강릉도 江陵道. It is that case then the letter ㄹ is pronounced as n but not l or r. The name of the city could be translated as river hill. By the way, the place I visited before, Ganghwa, contain the same word gang 江.

That day, the weather was rainy and on the way, everything around was flooded with impenetrable fog. But once we passed over that magic river hill, the weather surprised with the clear blue sky!

Amazing feeling and amazing photos. As I mentioned in my previous story, I like the East Sea more than the Yellow Sea. Same as the dispute, the waves rage on the sea, the sun plays along with them making up the dramatic scene.

The other stop I have visited in Gangneung is Gyeongpodae Pavilion, 鏡浦臺, Mirror Shore Tower.

The pavilion was built in 1326 at the site of Inwolsa temple, and in 1508 it was moved to the present day’s location. The pavilion opens a panoramic view of the mountains, the lake, the sea and the pine grove by the beach.