Did someone say Dalk Galbi?

When I/we were planning this trip, we knew the third day was going to be one of the hardest days of the trip. Our route had us doing 3 climbs (that we knew of) and taking a very hilly road around some lakes as we made our way to Chuncheon. Chuncheon is known for their delicious Dalk Galbi (닭갈비) and we were hoping we could be dinning on it that evening. Unfortunately day three was also the official day of Chuseok and many stores and restaurants are closed on Chuseok. Regardless, I set off that morning already dreaming of Dalk Galbi.

The road leaving the Peace Dam only goes one way, and that is up! There is nothing like starting the day climbing to the top of a 500 meter mountain. The good thing about the start of the day was that I knew what to expect. This was my third time doing that same climb so I knew what was in store. I find knowing what the mountain and climb consist of helps the psyche. Once up, we fell back down and had a nice valley ride until the next climb of the day. It was good to get two of the three climbs out of the way before lunch. The next climb was another 500meters or so but like the first climb, I had done it before and I was prepared for what was ahead of us. Since Jared and Katie usually kick my butt up the mountains, I did my best to stay with them on this climb. It wasn’t easy but I somehow managed to get to the top about the same time as them. I don’t know if it was thinking we only had one more climb left that day or if it was the peanut butter and banana sandwich I ate that morning, but whatever it was it worked.

Once we made it to the top, the sun was starting to break through the fog of the morning and we enjoyed the glorious downhill. We made our way into a small town of Yanggu to pick up some water and grab some snacks. You would have thought the town was deserted by how empty the streets were. So many stores and restaurants were closed because of the holiday but we were able to find a few open coffee shops and convince stores so we could reload. We were also waiting to hear from one of our friends who was joining us for the day. Once we knew where to meet her, we were on our way to the lakes. I had heard a lot about these lakes from Jared and I had had two chances in the past to ride around them but the other two times we had chose to bypass them and go through the tunnels. Not this time and I was excited to finally get a chance to see them. Once we started I could understand why we had gone around them in the past. The road around the lakes was a relentless up and down, up and down, and up and down. Even though the terrain was tough, it didn’t seem as hard as I thought it was going to be. Maybe it was the fact that the three of us spent the time talking about various things or that the lakes weren’t as hard because I was a lot stronger now than when we bypassed them the first times. Whatever it was, I was feeling pretty good about myself at this point.

The lakes weren’t a short distance so about halfway through we decided to stop and eat lunch. We were also waiting for our friend to catch up to us so we thought a break would be a good idea. We stopped right in the middle of the road and took out our food. The road was completely empty since everyone used the tunnels instead of going all the way around the lakes, which was good for us. After eating our lunch and resting for a bit, we were ready to charge on. Just as we were getting going, our friend caught up to us. We let her take a breather, not too long though, and we headed on.

After lunch, we didn’t have much left of the lakes. As we were heading toward the main road again, we had a decision to make. Our original route had us taking an unknown road through some mountains before heading up the last 600 meter climb to Chuncheon. The other way had us taking the main road and a route we knew. It was early in the day, the weather was great, so of course we chose the path less traveled. It started innocently enough. We had a small climb up a short hill with a nice downhill ride. Then the next climb started, this one definitely qualified as more than a “small climb”. As I was climbing, I just kept thinking, ‘Man, I still have a 600 meter climb to end this day.’ After pushing our way to the top, we were all so very glad to see the top. We knew there would have to be a great downhill ride since the way up was so tough. Once at the top, those feeling of joy slowly turned to dismay. From the top we could see the road ahead and sure enough, it led straight to the top of another mountain. I don’t know what the others were thinking at this point, but I was tired and didn’t know how I was going to do ANOTHER climb and still do the last 600 meter climb to end the day. It was also here when Jared gave us all a great idea; finding a great Dalk Galbi restaurant next to a motel and instead of camping that night, treat ourselves to a great dinner and a shower!!! It may have been this suggestion or the fact that I just wanted to be done going up mountains but regardless, we all got right back on our bikes and charged on.

The next climb was equally as steep and trying as the last one had been. At this point, my peanut butter and banana sandwich power was all used up and I was battling to make it up the mountain. I was just trying to keep the others in my sight as we climbed but it was getting harder and harder to push through the tiredness of my legs. After about a half hour, I saw the others on the top and their faces didn’t look happy. As soon as I got to the top I realized why. From the top, we could once again see another mountain climb! By this point Jared got out his phone to check the map for a different way out of this torturous climb. The bad news was that there was only one way to go and that was through the mountains. The good news was that once we were done with that climb, we out of the mountains and back on the road to the last 600 meter climb.

The day was getting on a bit so we didn’t waste any time on the top and powered on. The last climb was probably the toughest of them all. I don’t know if that was because it was the end of the day or if it really was that much harder but I felt like I was climbing for about 2 hours. After what was probably more like 35-45 minutes, we were at the top of the “mountains of doom” and were finally on our way to the main road and what could possibly be a great dinner (if we could find an open restaurant) and sleeping with a roof over our heads (if there was a hotel close by).

The ride down was too quick. After all that climbing, I felt like we deserved an hour of downhill riding. That was not the case. In the matter of minutes we were at the bottom and found a small mart to refill our bottles and then be on our way. The road to the last climb was a busy one filled with road works everywhere (not until I moved to this country and started dating Jared did I call it road “works”. Where do they get the “s”?) At any rate, it was not a fun road to the climb and once we got there it wasn’t much better. There was car after car honking at us and at the same time we were trying not to hit the construction cones. I had my head phones in and tried to just focus on finishing the long, demanding day.

At long last, I saw the top and the rest of the crew waiting for me. We didn’t celebrate too much at the top since we were all so hungry and tired we just wanted to find a restaurant and eat but we were all so very glad that the day was almost over.

Now, most or all downhill rides are fabulous but this downhill ride was probably the most rewarding one I had been on. The beginning was a little windy and we couldn’t go too fast but it seemed to just keep going. I still had my headphones in and I was having my own little dance party in my head celebrating the end to the day. Not only do the others get up mountains faster than me, they all fall faster than me too. After the glorious downhill, they were all waiting for me at a stoplight. We were all so tired, hungry, and dirty but we all had one thought in our minds, Dalk Galbi!! Then, it was like heavens doors opened for us. As soon as we turned left, there was a hotel with multiple OPEN Dalk Galbi restaurants! I had never been so happy to see food.

Since Jen, our friend who joined us for the day, was not staying the night, we didn’t bother showering before dinner. Katie, Jared and I unloaded our bikes in our room and we headed to dinner. The inspiration during the day, the motivation to keep going up those mountains, the reason we were putting ourselves through so much pain was finally a reality. The Dalk Galbi dinner we had so so so delicious! We devoured the four servings along with tons of sides and some well, well deserved bottle of soju. It was a great way to end the day.

After dinner we said good-bye to Jen as she made her way to the bus station to catch a ride home and the three of us headed back to the hotel to get clean and go to bed. It felt great to shower on a full stomach and to go to sleep on an open floor and not a squished, hot tent.

Day three was the hardest day thus far, but the next day brought our ride home. Chuncheon to Bundang was not an easy task, as we found out soon enough.

The journey continues

The second day started with rain and we were all glad Jared had the great idea to move our stuff under the gazebos. It was nice to be able to make breakfast, pack the gear and stay dry. It is never fun packing up wet tents and wet gear because you know that night, everything will still be wet. Since we were in no rush to get on the road, we took our time getting ready hoping the rain would let up. We knew the weekend would bring rain, they had been forecasting it all week, but we were hoping it would be less than the 10-24mm they were predicting.

We took our time breaking down our tents, Katie took some time down by the river to get clean, and Jared and I enjoyed our coffees. While we were getting ready, the rain let up a bit and we decided to hit the road. We knew this day wasn’t as big of a day as the day before so we weren’t too worried with our 9am start.

The mist and rain weren’t too bad and actually made for really cool views and a really creepy trip through a tunnel. The overcast skies also made the greens of the rice fields almost glow in the gloom of the day. Since we had a monster of a day the day before, we were well away from the busy cities and fully immersed in the mountains and farm villages. The roads were quiet and made for easy and downright delightful riding.

When I made the map, I made a few different routes we could take on day two. We knew one route would have given us a few mountains to climb while the other added a few k’s to the day but took us on a road extremely close to the North/South Korean border. Since we had our far share of climbing the day before and we knew we had a lot of climbing the next day, we decided to take the road close to the DMZ.

The road was flat and unassuming, until we ran into the military road blocks. The road was being controlled by the Korean military and we had to check in and show I.D. After they checked our ARC cards we had to read the list of rules and sign a sheet saying we agreed to the rules. I don’t remember all of the rules but there were about 10-15 of them with things such as No taking pictures and You must obey the time limit to cross the two check points. They took down our phone numbers, told us we had two hours to reach the next check point, and we were on our way. It was an interesting ride through this area. We were about 3k’s or 1.8miles from the actual border. I was tempted to whip out my camera real quick and take some pictures but as I was riding and taking in the scenery, I spotted about 4 different guard posts camouflaged by the trees and figured it wasn’t worth being hunted down by the military to get a few shots. The road was nice and had one pretty easy climb in it. As we were biking through this area without a care in the world, I couldn’t help but think about the soldiers who hiked and marched through the mountains and along the roads 60 years ago during the war. One of the unique things about Korea is your ability to get up close and personal with not only the current political situation of the country but the rich history it has.

We made it to check point number two with plenty of time to spare and we had an easy road to Hwachon, our lunch stop and where we would pick up dinner for the night. The day had been pretty easy but definitely interesting. Once in Hwachon, we found a small kim bap shop to eat at and figure out what we were going to pick up for dinner. Jared was dead set on fried chicken so he went off and ordered it while we waited for lunch.

Once we were done with lunch, Katie and I set off to the open markets to get some food for dinner. We decided on fresh veggies for some stir fry and also picked up some fruit for breakfast. One of the best things about cycle touring is the freedom that comes in every aspect of the day. Everything from choosing the road to follow to picking out dinner in an open market can be changed from one minute to another. Sometimes that change is your own decision but sometimes you don’t have a choice. In the end, we both got some good food for dinner and met back up with Jared.

We spent a bit more time in Hwacheon than we planned to but since we knew where we were going and how long it was going to take us, it didn’t’ matter too much. We were about to climb a mountain all three of us had climbed before and were quite familiar with. And even though I had done that climb three times before, I was still surprised with the climb before the climb. To get to the Peace Dam climb, we first had to climb a smaller “hill” and go down the back side to get to the start of the peace dam. This climb is not hard but always messes with my mind.

The rest of the way to the Peace Dam was fast and harmless. Once at the base of the climb, I stopped and put in my music. Jared and Katie are much better climbers than I am and usually kick my butt to the top. I needed something extra to get me up the mountain at the end of that day. The Peace Dam climb is a tough one but has become easier from all the biking I have done and the stronger my legs have gotten. The music helped charge me up the climb and shockingly it was easier than I had remembered. Jared and Katie were at the top waiting for me but we wasted no time getting going again. All we had to do was drop to the bottom and find our camp spot for the night.

Going down is always the fun and easy part. Unfortunately it was drizziling a little bit, which made the down a little cold but nothing too bad. We got to the bottom and took a few minutes to look around the Peace Dam. It is a really cool place and has a lot of cool War artifacts to look at. It is also a huge dam that is not daming any water (If you want to read more about the Peace Dam and its purpose here is the wiki link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_Dam) We didn’t spend too much time doddling though because we were getting cold (the drizzle had stopped) and hungry and wanted to set up camp.

It didn’t take too long to find a good spot to set up the tents and since Jared and Katie are masters at making camp it wasn’t long before everything was set up and dinner was started. Another great thing about cycle touring is living by the day light. We are up at sunrise, looking for a place to set up camp about an hour before sunset and usually in bed and asleep by about 8pm. This night was no different. After Katie and I cooked and cleaned everything up, we were ready and in bed before 8. We needed our rest for what the next day had in store!

4-Day Chuseok bike trip

September in Korea brings many wonderful things. The weather has started to turn cooler, the humidity and rain are gone, and best of all September is Korea’s Thanksgiving, or Chuseok. For Koreans, it means time spent with family, a lot of cooking, and perhaps visits to the tombs of those who have passed away. For foreigners, it means a long weekend. This year, we had a four day weekend and since traveling by car or plane during Chuseok is either too expensive or a complete pain in the butt, we decided to do a 4-day bike trip starting and ending at our doorstep.

I had the great pleasure of mapping this trip. On all the trips we go on, day rides or long weekend rides, Jared is always the one making the map. He has taught me how to make the maps so this ride, I wanted to do the whole thing, well most of it, on my own.

We started off bright and early on Saturday morning. Katie, one of Jared’s good friends and cycling mates from his 6 month trip, joined us on our trip. Katie came back to Korea last year and is just as nuts, probably more nuts actually, as Jared and I when it comes to cycling. She was more than excited to be riding for 4 days with us and we were more than excited to have her along.

Saturday was planned to be a relatively easy day. Most of it was spent riding on the bike paths up and out of Seoul and to the city Uijeongbu, which is where Jared started his adventures in Korea way back in 2004. After the trip down memory lane in Uijeongbu, we were finally leaving the cities and heading to the countryside and mountains of Korea. Since I was the one who planned the route, I threw in a few back/country roads into our route. These roads are my favorite kind of roads in Korea. We ride through small farms and houses and usually get pretty funny looks from the locals. But these roads are great to stay off busy roads and get to see real rural life in Korea.

Before we knew it, we had already done 80k’s and were well on our way to our destination for the night. Our route kept us off busy roads and gave us great scenery during the day. As the afternoon grew on, we knew we had to think about dinner that night and what we were going to eat. Since we were camping and cooking we didn’t have a lot of choices. One easy thing make on the road is eggs and vegetables. Jared and Katie had plenty of practice wild cooking on their 6 month trip across Asia and Europe so I just went with what they thought would be good. We stopped at a mart and bought bread, eggs, cheese, and vegetables. We were planning on having vegetable omelet sandwiches for dinner. One of the great and horrible things of cycling is the amount of food you get/have to eat. Since we cycle for close to 7 hour every day, we need a lot of calories and energy to keep us going. We are constantly snacking and eat big dinners at the end of the day to refuel. Many days I get to the point that I don’t want to eat anymore gummy bears or pretzels. Putting food in your mouth gets old after 7 hours of doing it.

After we picked up dinner, we soldiered on. The afternoon was growing late and we were getting close to the area we had picked out to camp for the night. We had reached a small mart, which we thought would be our last mart before camping for the night. But in true cycle touring fashion, when we got to the mart, we looked at the roads and found a new place to go and a new place to camp. It was about 5pm when we decided to change routes and by looking at the map, we had just added a 600meter climb and about an hour to the end of our day. I was hurting pretty bad and I had started shaking because I was getting tired and really hungry, but I didn’t want to be the one to icksnay the idea of going longer and harder so I just put my head down and powered on. Once we started the climb, I had to gobble up a power shot just to make it up the climb and get to the campsite. Jared stayed with me for the entire climb since he knew I was struggling and he really helped me through it. We made it to the top and stopped real quick at the top to get some Gatorade but didn’t want to be up there too long as we were getting cold and just wanted to be done riding.

Our campsite was just about half way down the mountain. Once we got going off the top, it was only about a 5 minute ride down to the site and it was a glorious site to see. By this time it was about 7pm, we had been riding for about 8 hours and had covered 151k’s. We quickly set up our tents and got dinner going. By this time, we had to use our high power lights to be able to see what we were doing. We were in a nice quiet parking lot right next to a river on a pretty deserted mountain. We were actually in a resort area but since it was past peak season, there was no one around. Dinner that night had never tasted so good. We stir fried some veggies, mixed them with eggs and plopped all that on bread with cheese for some delightful sandwiches.

After filling our stomachs, we quickly cleaned up and got ready for bed. Wild camping has quickly become one of my favorite things to do. There is just something so liberating about being out in the open, eating huddled around a small burner, cleaning yourself in a river, and just being one with the world around you.

As we were just about to get in our tents and call it a night, Jared had left to go to the bathroom and discovered two gazebos on the other side of the parking lot. Gazebos are great when you are camping because it gives you shelter from rain, not only keeping your tent dry, but gives you a dry place to get packed up in the morning. After a quick discussion about the pros and cons of moving all our stuff into a dry area, we decided to quickly pick it all up and move under the gazebos. It only took us 10 minutes to move it all and we were thankful the next morning when we woke up and it was raining.

E-mailing our works from our hotel room in Manila

Waiting for our flight leaving Hong Kong that was delayed

The 'taxis' in Manila

Fishing boats

Old and new

Victoria Harbor at night

Fishing villages in the countryside of Hong Kong

The country side of Hong Kong

Doing a little market shopping

First views of Victoria Harbor

The big Buddha

Making our way up to the Big Buddha

The view from the hotel room Jared surprised me with