Daegu

The next town I headed to was Daegu. This was a bit of a choice of convenience. My original plan was to go to Busan next, a major city, but when I went to find places to stay, all the cheap places were booked out. I set myself a strict $55/day budget (average) for this trip, and finding hotels in my price range, was unattainable for the weekend. Most places I stay here are around $13-20/night and hotels around $20-40/night. I’m not staying anywhere flashy or fancy, thats for sure, but they are probably the equivalent of a quality inn, a good enough, clean room in safe and convenient neighborhoods either close to the bus station or close to the city attractions. Unfortunately for the weekend, hostels were going for $100/night, to share a room. So, I looked at the train route and the stops and started looking up the cities along the route to spend the weekend. Which is how I ended up in Daegu. 

Daegu is the third largest metropolitan area in Korea. So, maybe I should have heard of it before… alas I had not, nor did I know this fact when I booked my hostel. I thought it was just a random city that had some decent looking hiking. My hostel was located in the city center. It actually ended up making for an interesting experience. During the day the streets were pretty empty and calm. 

The first day I arrived I wandered around the city, peering into shop after shop stacked with overflowing piles of electronics, clothes, cookware, electrical wires, or whatever special niche the shop owner had chosen. The stone streets were quiet and peaceful despite the dense amalgamation of items pouring out of the shops. After dropping my bags I headed to the train station where I took a bus 45 minutes to the botanic gardens (I was quite shocked at the length of time this took, but as it turns out, its quite a large city). I wandered through the moderately sized garden decked out with mum-topiaries shaped like beetles, giraffes, turtles, and many other creatures through throngs of families taking selfies and photoshoots with the flowers. I made my way through the crowds to the more empty surrounding trails where I wandered through the tall pines and birch trees and listened to the birds singing. I spent a few hours wandering the gardens before making my way back to the hostel. When I returned it was about an hour before dark and the streets had transformed. They were bustling with people and blinking with neon lights. I felt like I had been relocated to an entirely different place and actually had trouble finding my hostel again because everything seemed so unrecognizable in the hustle and bustle of the young people out on the town. 

I relaxed for an hour or so before venturing out to see the lively city bustling jut outside my door. It’s interesting because there are virtually no other foreigners in this city. In the 2 days I spent in Daegu I saw 5 non-Koreans. 2 in my hostel. Nonetheless, the city was packed and I wandered the streets listening to buskers play music and peering into restaurants, karaoke bars, and arcades. I soon because a bit over stimulated and decided to find something comforting and familiar to eat and settled for pizza. The pizza was quite to my liking. A soft doughy base with virtually no sauce and piles of cheese and plenty of toppings. I got half sweet corn/bacon snd half pepperoni. I had to try something weird and something safe. The sweet corn pizza was quite good, and a good compliment to the pepperoni. Both were interesting and good and just the right amount of different than what I’m accustomed to. 

The next morning I got up early and headed out to go for a long hike in Palgongsan National Park to Gatbawi rock. The park contains a number of relatively new (1960s) Buddhist temples and some very old Buddha statues. Gatbawi is the most famous of the statues, located at the top of a mountain, he has a rock hat, that many think looks like a graduation hat, so he is often prayed to by students and families of them in hopes of good grades. 

I took the bus about an hour and a half to the entrance of the National Park. I grabbed some gimbap (Korean sushi with egg instead of fish) and a coffee before beginning my hike. The first stop along the hike was a temple where monks sang and a few dozen people prayed. It was a short easy walk to this temple, which lulled me into a false sense of security for the hike to come. 

After the temple the real hike began. Around 1,600 steps to Gatbawi was as difficult as it sounds. There were many people walking the trail along side me, all huffing and puffing along with me, so at least I wasn’t alone in my lack of fitness. One lady, who I walked with for a while gave me some persimmons and mandarins to enjoy along my journey, which was so sweet. We couldn’t talk, but the shared snacks was really nice. 

Something I’m perpetually impressed by the oldies hiking the trails here. People who look to be well in their 80s and 90s will hike a trail to reach the temple at the top. Often outpacing me, which is not THAT big of a feat, but it is a bit humbling for myself. Often they even cheer me on at when I reach the top. Well meaning, but very humbling behavior lol. 

I finally reached the top to find Gatbawi and I was surprised by just how many people there were. There are 3 separate trails that all reach the same spot, and at the top with the Buddha is a chanting monk and probably 100 or so people at the top at any given time. 20-30 are doing bowing prayers where you stand and go down to your knees and return to standing a number of times, some stood and prayed, some brought candles, some drank coffee and took photos, it was a fascinating array of humanity, all of us here to spend a couple hours walking in nature to see a Buddha and a beautiful view. I decided to walk down a different way than I came to try a different bus home. In the end this resulted in me walking 7 miles through small farms, villages, and forests. I passed many bus-stops but was enjoying the walk. The first bus-stop from the temple was packed with people, as I continued walking on I went from one of hundreds on the trail to one. Greeted only by people working their small household farms. 

Local farms seem to be a big thing here in Korea. Every town has a market where locals are out selling their fresh food from their small homesteads. It’s run mostly by people who appear to be retirement age, and I’m not sure if that is a product of changing times, or if it is just a way to making a small living in retirement. Often markets and street corners have a person selling one or two farm grown products from a blanket on the ground, common items right now are permissions, cabbage, garlic, and green onions, but there are a plethora of items you can find. If I had a place to cook I would love to be able to shop from these individuals and buy the extremely local home grown foods. 

As the sun got low in the sky, I jumped on a bus back to town, where I would spend a few hours wandering around before retiring to my hostel for the night.