I am not sure if we have missed out a whole host of sites in South Korea or if it is just that the east side of the country doesn’t have as much to see as we seemed to have another long day of driving with a couple of sites to visit on route. We started at 8am to make sure we could fit everything in and our first stop was Hahoe Village which is another world heritage site, unfortunately our early start meant that when we arrived it was still shut which in one way worked in our favour as it meant that we were able to take the car down to the second car park rather than leaving it at the first one and having to take the shuttle bus although to be honest I think they were only about 500 metres apart so I am not sure why the bus was necessary but all the same we arrived at the village while the people that lived there were still starting their day which meant that a lot of houses were still closed but we did see some locals out planting things! This village is where the Ryu family originated and where they lived for 600 years. It has a combination of tile-roofed upper class and straw-roofed working class houses. It is also the birthplace of Ryu Unryong and Ryu Sengyong, who were brothers, the former was a great confucian scholar and the latter prime minister during the period of the Japanese invasion from 1592 – 1598. The name of the village comes from the river that flows around it in an S shape, ha means river and hoe means turning around. Hahoe is famous for the Byeolsingut Mask Dance play which is performed by the general public and the Seonyujulbul Nori an activity enjoyed by nobility that includes fireworks! We walked round some of the streets with Paul stopping at the 600 year old zelkova tree, then we were given time to walk round on our own, it was really interesting to wonder in and out of the courtyards occasionally coming across the people that live here! The main difference with the houses here and others we have seen is that the houses are constructed with the inner structure being for women and the exterior structure for men with the servants housed by the gate and the shrine. Some houses also had a small wall separating the women and mens houses which according to confucion teachings meant that they would not face each other in anger – not quite sure how that worked but it is a nice idea! After that we had a couple of hours drive via Pyeongchang, where the preparations for the 2018 Winter Olympics seem to be progressing well, to get to Woljeongsa temple which is a temple complex in the mountains. I have to say it is a wonderful setting as it is surrounded by mountains and trees and is very peaceful. It is the most popular place for both Korean’s and tourists to carry out a temple stay and I can understand why as it was very peaceful although Paul did say that the beds are even harder than the ones we have been sleeping on as you actually sleep on the floor! You enter through the temple gate past the guardians who protect buddha, above the gate is Yoonjangdae which is octagonal and spinning it once is equivalent of reading the Buddhist scripture once. There is a nine story stone pagoda which is one of the few original buildings in the complex as it was burnt down during the Korean war to stop north Koreans using it for shelter during the winter. The main buddha hall was reconstructed in 1968 and contains statues of Buddha unfortunately we didn’t time our visit with the monks chanting so we just had a look inside then carried on walking round the complex. We got back in the car for another couple of hours drive to the hotel which is on the Eastern Sea we drove through really thick cloud on the way but by the time we arrived it was a lot less overcast so hopefully it will be a nice day to head off up the mountain tomorrow.
