Cave people

South Korea is a mountainous place. If you’ve only ever seen pictures of the country, you will most likely notice a mountain or two. Or at the very least, you’ll see some rather large hills. Many of the highways outside of the larger urban areas have long tunnels that go right through the mountains. So it was only fitting that one of our recent day trips took us to all sorts of elevations to see what structures may be there.

First on the itinerary: Ondal Cave. Although it’s not deep in the earth, it’s located underneath a mountain. The limestone formations throughout the cave were impressive to see. But perhaps more impressive to see was a 6’4” dude and his pregnant wife try to bob and weave their way under and around those structures. Maybe “impressive” is the wrong word…

Mind the roof!

How low can I go?

Shawty got low.

Near the opening of the cave we saw a network of traditional-looking Korean buildings. These, we leaned, were sets for the scenes of several Korean films. Kinda cool. But kinda gave us that touristy feel.

This one time, in Korea, we were almost famous.

So, on to hike number one of the day: up Seongsan Mountain. Not a terrible hike, if walking up stairs for about 30 or 40 minutes is your thing. Okay, it was exhausting. But worth it. From the top, we could see for miles. Excellent spot to build a fortress, if I may say so myself. Good thing one was actually built there at one point.

We hiked these steps. Times a thousand.

I bet they can see the whole kingdom from there.

Oh there it is. There's the kingdom.

Then, on to hike number two. Oh wait, it was supposed to be a temple visit. It just had a hike built into it, naturally, because it was on a huge mountain. Guinsa Temple was, nonetheless, very cool. If you want to pick one temple to visit in South Korea, pick this one. It is the headquarters of a huge range of Korean Buddhist temples, and over 500 monks live and work there.

This photo does no justice to how steep the hill actually was.

The area that the temple grounds cover is huge, the buildings are gorgeous, the sanctuaries are fully decorated and used regularly, and the monks will really bring you that feeling of inner peace. Just don’t go right after leg day. Guinsa Temple is leg day.

Wait...are those swastikas?  Nope, don't worry. They're backwards swastikas.
And the Buddhists said "called it" wayyyy before the Nazis. It represents good fortune and well being.
Classic mix-up! 

But we never found out how that stack of firewood got so tall.