Wild Korea

I took the local bus to the tourist village at the South end of the park. Mungyeong SaeJae is a Provincial Park located right on the western border of Mungyeong-shi, in Gyeongsang buk-do. I walked up through the village. Near the park’s entrance is a large collection of these Korean wooden carvings, known as Jangseung. They are designed to keep away evil spirits.

Walk up the trail a little ways and find a movie set for a traditional Korean village.

Koreans have sought out interesting boulders and given them names. Here are a couple in the park. The first one is known as Mujuan. The flat rock in the last two photos is called Madangbawi.

Jagok P’okp’o is a waterfall just near the side of the trail, farther on up the valley. Nearby is the mineral spring of Jagok Yaksu.

The colorful late-autumn leaves and grasses provided a contrast to the dull overcast day.

A two-headed jangseung, then a pinetree for remembering the colonial era.

This gate gave access through the highest of the three walls in Mungyeong SaeJae. These walls were designed to protect the route and the country beyond from invasion.

At this point I had climbed to the crest of the mountain range. The pass stands at 642 meters. Here I left the park and came into the neighboring province of Chungcheong buk-do. Dropping down into the valley, I found a temple, Joryeongsan Taegilsa. It’s a modern one, but has some interesting features:

Links: Here’s some more information on Mungyeong SaeJae:

This entry was posted on Friday, November 4th, 2005 at 10:50 pm and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.