Tag: Gangwon-do

Isabu, a Silla general famed for his conquest (AD 512) of the islands of Dokdo and Ulleungdo, will soon have a bridge in his honor. The city of Samcheok, Gangwon Province, will be building a bridge that will frame the island of Dokdo when viewed from the city, a symbol of the “eye” of Kim Isabu. The “Isabu Dokdo Peace Bridge” is expected to be completed in 2020 and will connect the city of Samcheok with Obun Port. A memorial hall for Kim Isabu and an observatory to view the port will be constructed nearby. A memorial stone honoring Isabu’s voyages was constructed along the harbor in 2010. (provided by the city of Samcheok)

It truly is amazing how South Korean politicians want to reward the Kim regime’s crimes against humanity and threat to world peace by letting them co-host a major sporting event:

A South Korean province is considering a proposal to co-host the 2021 Asian Winter Games with North Korea in a bid to strengthen inter-Korean ties, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency said on Saturday, quoting provincial governor Choi Moon-soon.

Gangwon province, host for the current 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, is considering the idea also as a way of making further use of Olympics venues, Choi was quoted as saying.

North Korea is participating in the Pyeongchang Games at the invitation of the South, which is using them to help ease tensions between the two countries, still technically at war.

The host city for the 2021 event has not been decided yet.

A spokesman for South Korea’s sports ministry said it “hopes to continue sports exchanges with North Korea after the Winter Games” but it had not yet discussed any bid for the 2021 Games.  [Reuters]

I hope Gangwon is not chosen for the host site for the 2021 Asian Winter Games simply because of this idea.  Plus how many missile and nuclear tests will there be between now and 2021?

This photo taken on Sept. 24, 2017, shows a peak on Mount Seorak in Sokcho on South Korea’s east coast turning red. (Yonhap)

Mount Balwang at the Yongpyeong Resort in PyeongChang, Gangwon Province, is blanketed in 10 centimeters of snow on Nov. 23, 2015. The snowfall was befitting of the day that in South Korea is referred to as “Soseol,” one of the 24 seasonal divisions of the lunar calendar that marks the onset of winter. (Photo provided by Yongpyeong Resort) (Yonhap)

Mountain areas in Gangwon Province, east of Seoul, are covered with heavy snow on Feb. 17, 2015. (Yonhap)

Korea has many great mountain drives for people who love the high peaks of this country to experience.  One of the remotest of those can be found just outside of Soraksan National Park.  If you have a day to spare while visiting the park then I highly recommend you take a drive up the little traveled Highway 56 in Gangwon province.

This country highway spirals up and down than many high peaks of Gangwon province and features a great distant view of Daecheon Peak, the highest of peak of Soraksan National Park.

Along the road you will get a chance to see plenty of wildlife, trees, mountain scenery, and country villages. The villages along this road are so remote that I felt like I was going back into time watching this farmer plow his field with manually with oxen.

This trip is not only a great day trip from Soraksan National Park but is also a great way to travel from Soraksan to Odaesan National Park if this park is also on your itinerary. A back entrance to Odaesan can be reached by turning off at the Odaesan park entrance on highway 446.

Along the way to Mt. Odaesan the rising highway provides incredible views of Korea’s Taebak Mountains:

If you have no plans of visiting Odaesan National Park then just stay on the highway which will eventually allow you to connect to Interstate 50 via highway 31 which will take you back to Seoul.

To get to this highway from Soraksan National Park just travel south on Highway 7 from Sokcho to the city of Yangyang. At Yangyang travel west on Highway 44 for about 10 miles before turning at the intersection on to Highway 56 heading South. It is a great ride that shouldn’t be missed for those already visiting the area.

Today the 9th of December is the 38th anniversary of the 1968 death of a young Korean boy, Lee Seung-bok, who was murdered by North Korean commandos who had infiltrated into Gangwon province. On the night of December 9th the communists stormed into the small traditional home that the Lee family lived, in search of food and shelter. The family gave them what food they had and hoped that the commandos would soon leave.

However, things turned tragic when the communists asked the 7 year old Lee Seung-bok if he preferred North Korea or South Korea. The young boy said he liked South Korea. The commandos began to beat him, but he would not change his mind and before being killed he said the now famous line, “I hate Communists!” The North Korean commandos then proceeded to cut out the 10 year old boys mouth and then began to butcher the rest of the family after they tried to stop the killing of Lee Seung-bok.

In total the 7 year old Seung-bok, his 5 year old, brother Seung-su, his 2 year old sister Seung-ja, and his 31 year old mother Joo Dae-ha were killed by the communists and left to die outside. However, his older brother who was also stabbed and had his head smashed with a rock, did survive. Though seriously wounded he was able to stagger to the residence of his family’s closest neighbor once the commandos left and plead for help and warn others of the infiltrators. Also a family friend had arrived at the residence and was attacked by the North Koreans and stabbed in the leg but he was also able to escape and warn nearby ROK Army officials.

The now alerted neighbors immediately began to take up what crude weapons they had and began guard shifts to watch for the North Koreans until local authorities arrived. The ROK Army arrived and began to secure the area and search for the communist spies.  Unfortunately the murderers were never found and escaped, but the words of Lee Seung-bok served as a rallying cry in schools across Korea and continue to resonate to this day. However, these words resonate today not with an anti-communist message but as a myth created by the authoritarian government of then President Park Chung Hee.

So how did this change in perceptions occur? Of course by repeating a lie over and over again until people just assume it is true. This is propaganda 101 for every communist and that is exactly what they did in the Lee Seung-bok incident. Over the past 12 years so called “progressive groups” using names that actually sound legitimate, which in this case the pro-North Korean sympathizers called themselves the People’s Coalition for Media Reform, to disguise who they really are because they just can’t come out and say they are communists because then people would not take them seriously. This is the same tactic being used currently in the General MacArthur controversy raging in Inchon. Anyway this group accused the then Park Chung-hee government and the Chosun Ilbo newspaper reporters who covered the tragedy as fabricating the entire story and not even being at the scene.

This tactic of disinformation in the Lee Seung-bok case has been allowed to simmer in the Korean publics for over the last 12 years where now people take it to be the truth even though last year the Seoul District Court sentenced the leaders of the People’s Coalition for Media Reform to jail terms for fabrication and libel, but the damage has already been done in the publics’s perception of this incident.

It is amazing to me that such blatant disinformation about the incident would be allowed to simmer for this long even though there are numerous eyewitnesses including Lee Seung-bok’s own brother who survived the massacre who verify the accounts of what happened that night. The only reason I can see that this disinformation has been allowed to simmer in the public’s imagination for so long is because more liberal governments who have come to power in South Korea over the last 12 years have been eager to defame the former President Park Chung-hee who still holds a positive image with many South Koreans for turning the country from one of the world’s poorest countries and into an economic power house. There is also the dual reason of appeasing the North Koreans as well in the name of the “Sunshine Policy” even if it means destroying the image and sacrifice of this young boy.

If you want to see for yourself the story of Lee Seung-bok, I encourage you to check out the Lee Seung-bok memorial located near the Soksa interchange on Interstate 50. Just exit off of Interstate 50 on the interchange and head North for about 10 minutes on highway 31 until you see the memorial located to your right. The memorial is quite large and with a huge parking lot, so you can’t miss it.

The memorial is located near where the incident actually happened and includes an accurate replica of Lee Seung-bok’s home, his grave site, a military static display, a park, and a museum with a theater that depicts all the details of the Lee Seung-bok tragedy. The video they play in the theater can also be viewed online by clicking here. I checked the memorial out as part of a side trip while traveling to Odaesan National Park. The memorial is an interesting excursion if you are in the area and the ride up highway 31 features some really gorgeous Gangwon-do mountain scenery.

This weekend I took a trip to the remote Northern Gangwon-do area to see the infamous Korean War battle site, the Punchbowl. I reached the Punchbowl by traveling North from Chuncheon on Highway 46. The highway travels up and twists around the side of some high mountains before traveling adjacent to the Soyangho Lake.

The mountains here are round, steep, and high; many reaching over 1,000 meters. They are not stunning rock monoliths like Bukhansan or Soraksan but more like mountains you would see in West Virgina. Never the less it is extremely beautiful up there especially along the lake. The best part about exploring this area is the fact very few people venture up there. No traffic jams, no cars parked all over the side of the roads, and no trails jam packed with hikers like a city side walk. You can pretty much pick a spot and enjoy it for yourself the whole day.

The lake itself was just beautiful. I just wish I had time and access to a boat. This would be a great place to water ski. The water was so calm and there was only one boater on the lake the whole day. I didn’t see any boat or water ski rental businesses or anybody water skiing the whole day; so I wonder if you can do water sports on the lake? Probably I don’t see why not.

The city of Yanggu just North of Soyangho Lake is located adjacent to another lake Paroho Lake. Supposedly this lake is famous for great fishing. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to find out but I am actually thinking of planning a fishing trip there in the future. The Marmot had sent me a message saying the city was a really nice place and he was right. The city has lots of flowers planted everywhere and was really clean and orderly. The school there was brand new with a huge gym and also a new soccer stadium with two practice fields. This city was impressive for being located so close to the DMZ. Border cities are usually run down and shabby, not this one. This picture is from a ridge on the Punchbowl looking South towards Yanggu.

Looking around this area I can’t help but think this would be a great place to turn into an adventure sports city. There are plenty of remote and steep mountains for climbing, hiking, and mountain biking, access to the lake for water sports, and down the road in Inje there is white water rafting and kayaking. It just needs to be developed to conduct these activities. Personally I would love to go mountain biking up there sometime.

The next stop was the Punchbowl to the north. Highway 31 travels north of Yanggu along a pretty valley filled with sporadic farms and military bases. Eventually you will reach an exit to the Punchbowl. The road to the Punchbowl travels up an extremely steep road that reaches over 1000 meters in elevation. From the top of the road you get a great view of the area and something that really sticks out is the deforestation that occurred here in the past due to the war. Many small trees have been planted to heal the scars here just like in other areas in Korea.

Once inside the Punchbowl you can really understand why they called it such. The valley is exactly the shape of a round bowl. This shape is due to the valley actually being the caldera of a long extinct and badly eroded volcano. Kind of like a really, really, old Paekdusan, the famous North Korean volcano.

In this picture you can see that the Punchbowl is actually visible from outer space.

Inside of the valley there are many farms and located in the middle of the valley is the village of Haean. Haean is a very small village with few accomodations and a heavy military presence. The village does have a small museum and you can book a tour to see the 4th Infiltration Tunnel and the Ulji Observation Post.

The Punchbowl is the site of the infamous Bloody Ridge and Heartbreak Ridge battles. On these slopes during the Korean War 183 ROK Marines and 245 American Marines lost their lives to take these mountains from the defending North Korean soldiers. The combined ROK and American Marines inflicted 2,799 KIAs on the enemy and captured 557 POWs during the fighting.  The memories of these casualties are enshrined at a memorial in the middle of Haean:

Securing these two mountains allowed the coalition forces to consolidate their hold on the Haean basin and to gain strategic ground over looking the North Korean territory to defend against any future North Korean offensives. This strategic ground remains valuable today in protecting the nation from future North Korean aggression.

The below pictures show the Heartbreak and Bloody Ridge battle sites.

Today the battle sites make up part of the demilitarized zone (DMZ) and is defended by the ROK Army. Looking at the Punchbowl today it is hard to imagine that such a tranquil valley as this was once the scene of the most ferocious fighting of the Korean War. Besides the DMZ the only reminder that this battle occured here, is the billboard in the city proclaiming this basin as the site of the final battle featured in the hit Korean movie, Taeguki.