Gyeryongsan Hike

We wanted to give you guys some bearings as to where we are located. Follow the numbers in the following picture. South Korea is about half the size of Missouri, but is the home of 48.4 million people. This means that it is approximately 17 times more densely populated than our home state. No worries though, as the kiwis who teach here say. We are located in a more remote location further from the heavily populated Seoul, Puscan, or Incheon. We love it here.


The following is a picture of Goheon Port and city. It is a hub for one of South Korea's leading industries, Samsung Shipyards. (Pictures of the shipyard will come later when we hike to a better photo location) Here is a closer shot of the part of town that we tromp around the most. The orange arrow is our apartment building. The green arrow is a hike that we enjoy throughout the week. At the top of the trail there is a workout area with pull-up bars, sit-up benches, and a small bench press. There are also hula hoops for those who want to work out that core. The yellow is where we work, ECC Foreign Language Institute. The last is our church indicated by the pink arrow. As you can see it is rather easy to get around here by foot. A taxi is very inexpensive as long as you know how to communicate to the driver where you want to go! As you might have already noticed from the maps and pictures, we are surrounded by mountains here. This makes for great hiking at a moments notice. We have made friends with a number of other English teachers in the area. Hikes are a great way to exercise and get some fresh air before school in the afternoon.

This weekend we were able to hike a peak, to watch the sunset, which is just due southwest of our town. The elevation change is pretty really nice. I am guessing it to be about 1500 to 2000 feet. We call it the stairmaster.

This can be a confusing picture. It is about a 270 degree panorama from the peak. On the left is our town, Gohyeon, and on the right is Oksan, a small farming and fishing village. There is a bus which navigated the 15 square mile Island. It costs about 1000 won (about $0.80) each time you board regardless of distance. It can be crowed with standing room only, but you can beat the price. We can see the main terminal from our house. So convenient. The fishing and agrarian culture in the valley below.

We are told that the rice patties will begin to green as spring and summer come. Greenhouses!

Chelsie, Dan, and I at the summit waiting for the sun to dip below the beautiful, distant horizon spotted with nearby islands. (Thank you Lindsay for the photo)
Oksan village below.

Click on the photo.

Click on the photo to enlarge the view.

God's creation is beautiful (아름답다 = a-reum-dap-tta). We are always amazed.

(Thanks again for the photo Lindsay its nice to be in a shot occasionally. You guys are awesome.)

We have had some trouble getting our photos to enlarge when you click on them. We hope to solve this problem soon. Sorry.

Greetings from Korea

안녕하세요 = An nyoung ha seh yo = "Hello"

An every day phrase around here.

We finally have some photos of South Korea and of what we are up to. We hope to be more punctual as we have kept you waiting for almost three weeks now. All is well and the settling process has actually been very easy. First things first. We want to take you on a tour of our place and then we will eventually branch out to the school, scenery, and friends.

There is so much to see everywhere around you. It can sometimes be very overwhelming. From the front deck of our cozy, 10th story apartment, overlooking a canal, the lights at night are dazzling. Characters in neon light which we don't yet understand advertise the bustling energy of the small city below.

We were placed in a very nice apartment which is fairly centrally located and is just a 10 minute walk from ECC, the Language Academy. It was well furnished and anything additional which we needed was bought for us as well. You can see our clothes drying in this photo. There are very few driers her because of the emphasis on space and energy conservation. Also the white cabinet by the door is for shoes. It is very traditional to take ones shoes off when entering a home or restaurant.

Here is Chelsie's kitchen complete with the standard mini fridge and a rice cooker (on the floor by the cabinets) Adjusting to the food is a challenge and topic yet to come. Our washing machine is through the glass doors, on the back porch.Another angle of the living quarters. We do have a guest room. We would love to have visitors. The cozy bedroom is very roomy and right close to the bathroom which is always a plus. It is very common here not to have a shower curtain, actually we were very fortunate to have a tub. Everything is tiled and there is a drain in the tub and a drain on the floor. It is very much a "water closet".

Chelsie works her magic in her new kitchen. MMM, Jesse loves leftovers too.

The fruit which we originally read was sparse, has proven to be bountiful. Horray! We have enjoyed a wide variety of fruits and veggies purchased at the local fish market. (Pi cures to come!!!)
The kiwi are fantastic.
We are once again sorry to keep you waiting for news, but now were back on track. God bless!