Before I left for Japan back in 2005, my buddy Fudge and I spent about 5 months training for the Vancouver Marathon. Even though we trained very hard, the marathon did a number on us. We both managed to finally stumble across the finish line, but we were each in a tremendous amount of pain. We vowed then and there that we'd never, ever, run a marathon again.
Well somehow, back in December last year, I managed to convince Fudge that if I was in Vancouver at the beginning of May this year, we'd run the Half-Marathon together.
As May approached, it looked like I was going to be in South Korea for the marathon, so Fudge was not too consistent in his training.
Well I ended up with more time in Vancouver than expected, which was bad news for Fudge. I spent the last 3 weeks before the Half-Marathon training him like a dog, and he loved every minute of it (although he might disagree.) We went biking, rollerblading and did a ridiculous amount of running. Again, we both stumbled across the finish line in a lot of pain, but it was nothing compared to when we did the Full. However, after we finished this time, he told me he's never running with me again. We'll see.
Okay, admittedly I'm using the word "stalked" a bit loosely, but if I end up disappearing into some cult, sitting around a campfire singing "Kumbaya," never to be seen again, at least this leaves a trail.
I came home from the beach this evening, and found this "Awake" magazine stuffed into my door. It's only in English and there was no Korean version. I am definitely the only non-Korean in the area, and there weren't any in the other doors. There is also a phone number written on the cover, with a Korean's name written beside it (in English). This is the second time I've had English-only Jehovah propaganda in my door. And although I know that this is not really stalking, it does mean that there's a Korean somewhere nearby who has made converting me to the dark side their mission. All I can say is, "Good luck."
I was back in Vancouver for about a month in April/early May. Fortunately the weather was awesome, so I got to do a lot of great outdoor stuff, a lot of which helped me prepare for the Vancouver Half-Marathon Fudge and I were training for.
I'd heard about the hot springs up past the top of Pitt Lake several times, but I'd never made it up there. Derek had been up there before, and suggested we take our bikes up one day when the weather was good.
So one Wednesday when the weather was supposed to be sunny, we grabbed his boat, our bikes and my Dad, and headed for the lake. I've been on Pitt Lake several times, but I'd never been to the top before. It took us about 50 minutes, and the weather was perfect. Because the snow on the peaks was melting, there were several huge waterfalls coming down the mountains and into the lake.
When we got to the top of the lake, we moored the boat and got the bikes ready. Because of the distance to the hot springs, Dad had decided to take it easy and just hang out around the dock. I'd read/heard that it was about 22 km to the hot springs, so we knew we had a lot of work ahead of us. It was a pretty good logging road most of the way, well-maintained and I think we only saw 2 or 3 vehicles the whole trip. It was uphill pretty much all of the way, but it wasn't steep, so we made pretty good time, and saw several deer along the way.
Due to Derek's probable inebriation the last time he made the trip, we made a wrong turn near the end and ended up climbing a steep hill for about 20 minutes. Finally we'd had enough and turned around to try the other way, which actually went downhill and got us to the springs in about 5 minutes (go LEFT when you hit the big fork in the road when you think you're really close.)
Above is the view from the bridge of the canyon the hot springs are in. The hot springs are near the top of the river on the left, but you can't see them.
You hike in for a minute or two from the bridge, and then climb down the rock face using this rope that Derek's showing off on. There are two pools at the springs and one of them is visible at the very top left of the picture. A bit of cement was used to make the pools, but other than that they are pretty much untouched.
The temperature was pretty hot, but it felt really good because we were both in a lot of pain from the ride, since neither of us had been on a bike for a while. Derek checked the temperature of the river, but said it was way too cold - not surprising since it was mostly meltwater.
We returned to the boat to find Dad drinking and eating so he was happy. We loaded the bikes up, and headed back to the main dock. In the morning we had seen an old paddle wheeler on the lake, as they were preparing to film some kind of movie. As we neared the main dock, we saw the paddle wheeler was out on the water, with another boat a ways off set up with cameras filming it. And although I'm sure they would have loved to have had us in it, I don't think we made it into any of the shots.
So I'm back teaching in South Korea after a fantastic month living the good life back in Vancouver.
The humidity's already started to kick in, but I decided I wanted to go out for a hike today before it really gets bad. My new job is only 4 days a week, Monday to Thursday, so I thought today (Friday) would be a good day to go and avoid the crowds.
From what I'd heard, the Mureung Valley is considered one of the nicest in South Korea, but I've been misled before so I didn't have high expectations.
Turns out, they weren't lying. I'd have to say it's probably the nicest place I've been in Korea so far. This second waterfall is one of the biggest draws in the area, as there's a nice little pool you can swim in in the summer. I stuck my feet in to check it out as I really wanted to go for a swim, but after 30 seconds my feet had had enough, so no swim today.
There's very little wildlife left in Korea, as most of it has been hunted to extinction. So all I saw today were a bunch of these little chipmunks darting around all over the place. This one paused just long enough for me to get a picture.
On a completely unrelated note, there's a mountain spring about a 3 minute walk from my apartment where I fill a huge jug for my drinking water. So I was there on Monday and while I was filling it, an old Korean man came up to fill his bottle. He started talking to me and realized quickly how bad my Korean was. So he tried Japanese. Apparently he had been a Japanese professor at the university 10 years ago. He kept talking to me in Japanese for at least 10 minutes, and then finally decided it was time to go.
Well a couple of days ago I was walking home from the grocery store with a bunch of stuff, and I guess he'd seen me, because he pulled up beside me on his bike, and again in Japanese, asked me where I was going. I explained that I was going home so he offered to double me on his bike. He had told me that he was 86 years old, and I'd be surprised if he weighed much more than 100 pounds. Well I weigh around 200, plus I had all my groceries, so something about accepting a ride from him just felt wrong, so I had to decline.
The military presence is HUGE in South Korea, especially up toward the North Korean border. I'm far enough south however that I don't see them that often. There's a very small base about a 20 minute walk from my place, but they usually stay there and train in the mountains.
There's a tiny park across the street from our school, and the kids usually play there before and after class (sometimes even during, so I have to go over there and corral the little buggers).
Yesterday, for some reason I can't fathom, the army was holding some kind of military exercise in this tiny park, at the same time as the kids were playing there. I assume that they don't carry live ammunition, but it was still pretty strange to have these little kids running around all these automatic weapons.
In the second picture you can see part of a little bunker they've made out of green sand bags.
I wanted to get closer to take some better pictures, but as South Koreans can be quite xenophobic and paranoid about foreigners, I didn't want them mistaking me for a spy.
While I was taking pictures, some of my students got jealous and insisted I take pictures of them. This first one is Gilbert, one of my more "energetic" boys.
In this picture you can see Gilbert with his sister Amy in the white, and some of the other girls.
I was up in Seoul for the weekend, and I'd heard that White Spot had recently opened their first Korean location. I haven't had a good burger for a long time, so I made it my mission to find it.
It was buried in behind another building, and it wasn't cheap (about $10 for a burger platter, on the high side for Korea) but man was it nice sinking my teeth into a nice BC Burger (bacon and cheddar).
While I was in Singapore I decided to make a day trip to Pulau Ubin (Ubin Island), which lies off the northeast coast of Singapore's main island. After a half hour subway ride, and then another half hour on a bus, you end up at the little "ferry terminal", which is basically just a couple of docks with some small boats called bumboats (I don't know why they call them that).
After waiting about half an hour for enough customers to fill the boat, we made the trip across in a torrential downpour. Although this wasn't a good sign, when we got across I went and found a place where I could rent a bike for the day for about $5.
Because it was raining so hard, the guy who owned the bike shop let me borrow this pretty pink poncho. Fortunately the rain stopped within an hour, so I was able to regain some of my dignity.
Before going to the island, I'd read that there were some hornbills on the island called Oriental Pied Hornbills, though I never expected to see any. However, after biking for about an hour, I came across a whole group of them just hanging out feeding. There must have been about 15 to 20 of them in the flock. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't cooperating, so the shots didn't turn out very well.
Here's a little butterfly I came across. I also saw (and heard) some wild pigs which I've never come across before, but I only managed to get off one shot, and it didn't turn out.
Before I left for Japan back in 2005, my buddy Fudge and I spent about 5 months training for the Vancouver Marathon. Even though we trained very hard, the marathon did a number on us. We both managed to finally stumble across the finish line, but we were each in a tremendous amount of pain. We vowed then and there that we'd never, ever, run a marathon again.
