Autumn Trek

NOTE: I stopped updating my blog after the last entry. It is now almost 3 years later and I'm adding posts as if I was writing them at that time. So all of the blog entries from now until July 2012 are written from memory, with my pictures as a guide...





Ranell and I decided enjoy our Chuseok (Thanksgiving) holiday/long weekend to trek in the mountains to see the Autumn foliage. Our first stop was an old castle in the town of Jinju. It's always nice to end up in a town that's only meant to be a stopover on the way to your journey, only to find something really cool you never knew about. We did have a connecting bus to catch, so we didn't spend too much time here, but it was a nice break:

From Jinju we made it to our destination: Jirisan National Park. Our destination was a supposedly large and beautiful waterfall, set in a glorious Fall setting. After perusing the Buddhist temple at the base of the trail, we made our way up. Several miles in, we stumbled upon a little hermitage, where someone was blasting "Unbreak my Heart" from Toni Braxton (haha) through the speakers. Only in Korea. We finally ended up at the waterfall, which was nothing but a trickle. Damn. It was still a great experience, as I was able to take this picture, which has become one of my all-time favorites:

From there it was off on another late-night, multi-stop bus ride to some podunk Korean country town called Suncheon (hooray for memory!) and a stay at the BMW love motel (hooray again for memory!). The next day we trekked to one of my favorite temples, Songgwangsa, which I had visited my previous time in Korea. Unfortunately, they had put a footbridge over the old cobblestone walkway, which ruined my epic photo spot that was the purpose of going there. However, it's still a beautiful temple in a great setting. Here I was able to get my other all-time favorite pics, the red leaf in a bamboo forest one. There are only 2 pics from Korea that I have kept in my portfolio, and they both came in consecutive days from the same trip. This one has won me a couple awards and made me some money:

the new view at Songgwangsa, see 3/08 entry for a  pic of the view I was hoping to re-create:

 On our way back home, we stopped in Masan to try out some Mexican food we had heard great things about. Ranell and I were both dying of Mexican cravings for months, and we finally had the chance to get some. Now that I've been home for a couple years, this meal would probably taste awful to me. But at the time, it was the best we had, and it was an awesome experience:

The MIGHTY falls of Jirisan