A trip to Jiri-san

The weekend of May 21st/22nd was the weekend of my long-anticipated and hard-trained for hike on Jirisan, the second most important and beloved "mother mountain" in South Korea (after the father Soraksan, of course - this being still a very gender-conscious society).

I'd like to get the disappointing aspects of the trip out of the way first so that I concentrate on the great things we have seen and done there. Chang-dae, our hiking 'boss', didn't book the shelter on time, so we couldn't do the long 'cover the whole mountain' hike. I was very disappointed because I trained hard for this hike and it was supposed to be the fitness challenge of a lifetime. Also, we didn't travel by train as originallly planned, but instead we rented a bus.
Trains are far more comfortable and I can also sleep on a train, which is not the case with rickety buses. Other than these two major glitches, the trip was great.

We arrived to Jiri-san at about 3:00 am and started hiking at 3:30 or 4:00. A lot of merriment ensued upon seeing one another resembling big lightning bugs with our miners' lamps attached to our foreheads. After Chris treated us to numerous cups of sweet steaming coffee from a coffee vending machine, we started our hike. Surrounded by total darkness interrupted only by the beams from our lamps we started our hike at a quite quick pace. At one point we turned our lamps off and looked up to gaze at the sky covered in bright shiny stars. The Milky Way looked really milky, standing out like a pale dotted snake in the darness of the night sky.

Having started the hike early, we were high up on the mountain before the sunrise. We witnessed the whole sun-birthing process, the sky changing from dark blue to paler blue, golden blue, purple,pink,orange... Finally, a thing line of gold along the dark ridges appeared and soon the bright blinding ball rose gradually behind the peaks. We all suddenly looked fresh and rested awash in the benevolent early morning sunlight that peeked from behind the thick leaves, pine needles, and azalea blossoms.

Most of us didn't have a wink of sleep on the previous night. Frequent stops for 'power naps' proved themselves very necessary and welcome. It's amazing how quickly one falls asleep anywhere on the most impossible of terrains. Clare made a photo of me lying on an unfriendly rock, all twisted, with lots of loud Korean hikers around me. It didn't matter, I was sleeping through it all like a baby.
The trail was not difficult, there were no bald rocks and no very steep slopes. In spite of the lack of dramatic scenery, Jiri-san is truly magnificent, glorious, unforgettable. It's so green and so lush... I'll never forget walking along narrow paths lined with royal azaleas in full blossom, under the canopy of fresh young leaves, intricately shaped, nor the chirping of the birds.

After a 15 hour hike we ended up on a farm where our club members had stayed about 3 years ago. The owner of the farm sacrificed three free-range chicken to our hungry selves. He also deplted the mountain of its numerous herbs and plants to make savoury side dishes to go with the chickn. When we got to the farm, the chichen was already waiting to be barbecued on huge makeshift grills made from old oil barrels cut lengthwise and covered with an iron sheet. As for drinks, we enjoyed Chris's Hennessy and the farm owner's "omija sul," a type of drink made from the omija root soaked in soju (?) -I suppose.

The merry post-hike party started already during the dinner. We were being silly, feeding each other with chicken and herbs wrapped in lettuce leaves, drinking, singing, laughing... A big surprise bonus entertainment came from our bus driver who turned out to be a trained opera singer. He treated us to his rendition of "O Sole mio" that was absolutely Pavarottiesque. Robert, an Aussie guy who's been hiking with us for a couple of months did some serious male boding with the farm owner, the bus driver and CD and ended up absolutely plastered. We had never seen him so relaxed and exuberant before.

After the party we went to bed, all in different degrees of drunkeness. Some had sleepless nights running to the bathroom, some were tossing and turning because the onduled floor was too hot and bedrooms felt more like ovens for roasting than places for sleeping. In the morning, we staggered out of our rooms, half-baked and puffy-eyed. Chirs cookd us a wonderful and healthy breakfast of ramyong (spicy noodles) that we devoured with kimchi, lots of Debbie's nuts, Georges' cookies, chocolate, instant coffee....

With breakfast polished, we proceeded to one of the temples on Jirisan, Wha Om-sa. The temple claims many of those ever-so-Korean numbered 'national treasures', including the biggest stone lantern in the world. It is a magnificent place, soaked in history and stories, nestled at the bottom of the amazingly green Jiri-san. We walked around the temple grounds, admired its beauty and laughed at its water fountains that had stone sculptures of two turtles, male and female, in various phases of love-making, from chasing to scoring.
A little creek ran by the temple grounds; that's where we went to soak our tired feet, nurse hangovers, finish Debbie's nuts...
Of course, as any other hike so far, this one also finished with a meal of pajong (Korean pancake) and dong-dong-ju. The bus ride back home was long, but I slept through most of it, so didn't mind it too much.
Although the hike was not what I expected it to be,it was still a truly amazing experience. I loved the mountain and I can't wait to go back. Perhaps, next time we'll cover the full length of its beautiful ridges and have more of the beautiful memories to cherish.