The eleventh day of my big walk finds me in the Suanbo region. I've been here three times, now, and I've never once seen the dam (the bo in "Suanbo" means "dam"). The town is quiet; unlike in previous years, there's no big event happening, so motel-room availability wasn't an issue when I arrived. I also arrived about thirty minutes earlier than anticipated, which was a pleasant surprise. My late lunch was a simple, near-vegetarian spread: soondubu-jjigae plus veggie banchan (side dishes). I got a room at the Limons Spa Hotel (리몬스 온천 호텔), yet another motel optimistically billing itself as a hotel. My room is fine, but the walls are paper-thin, so I can hear the group of teens babbling loudly next door. I'm using my headphones to watch YouTube; this way, I'm not disturbing the teens by making my own noise, and I'm also shutting their chatter out.
I had a bad night last night thanks to a whole squadron of mosquitoes that somehow invaded my room. It got so bad that I got out of bed around 1 a.m., stomped across the street to the convenience store, and bought a small pump-spray bottle of ladies' hairspray. You've doubtless heard that the spray's chemicals dry and harden when they come in contact with the beating wings of mosquitoes, and that's what I was banking on. To hunt the mosquitoes, I turned off all the room lighting and used the glow of my cell phone to perform the "longshadow" technique to find skeeters that are poised on the walls. It's a remarkably effective technique: you hold your light source right against the wall, and any skeeters will cast long shadows that make them easy to spot. Then all you do is sneak up close enough to blast 'em with the hairspray, and down the little fuckers go. I think I killed nine. Two of them contained blood that showed up when I popped them inside some tissue paper; I had to wonder whether the blood was mine. In the end, though, the presence of the mosquitoes caused enough paranoia to prevent me from sleeping more than an hour straight. A shame, too, because I otherwise liked the Hotel Soo, and my first night there had been rather blissful.
So last night sucked, and it was a relief to be out and walking. Because I was leaving from a different location than the tacky, wacky, now-defunct Baekun Park, today's walk was only 25 kilometers. The first part of the walk was along a highway that had a lot of traffic; I resented the noise and the truck exhaust. A few kilometers in, though, and the route I was on met up with a route that was familiar to me. l checked Naver Map regularly for some of the walk, but muscle memory took over and guided me during the final ten kilometers.
The Suanbo region is known for pheasant-based dishes, but I have no idea why this region, in particular, gets that honor. In 2017, I did my walk in the spring, and I quickly learned that the April-May time frame was pheasant mating season: the cock-pheasants (수꿩, su-ggweong) were gabbling and cackling along almost all of the Four Rivers path. Pheasants are definitely not unique to Suanbo. That doesn't stop eager Suanboners from erecting pheasant statues everywhere, effectively fetishizing the bird. I tried a pheasant dish in 2017, and while it was good, it didn't bowl me over. As I wrote at the time, pheasant meat might best be used in sausages. It's certainly flavorful enough.
Today's walk was once again gorgeous. There were a few long stretches with little civilization; this is one of the things I like about the Saejae portion of the trek. As always, I'm impressed by the massive scale of the agriculture I see all around me. It's incredible to realize that farmers timed the planting of various crops so that everything would be ready to harvest at just about the same moment. These good folks can read the earth in ways I'll never understand, and it's humbling to know that.
Tomorrow's walk is the shortest walk on the schedule: not even 14 kilometers. I can therefore afford to sleep in a bit. Two days after that, I've got my 44-km walk to look forward to, followed by another two-night motel stay. That long walk will mark the end of the Saejae portion and the beginning of the final segment: the Nakdong River trail, which winds all the way down to Busan. (The French use the evocative verb serpenter to describe something winding its way across a region.)
At this point, I'm over 240 km into my trip. That leaves me with just under 400 km to go. Maybe I'll do a video when I reach the halfway point. I should probably practice recording myself before then. Exposure to the outdoors is making me less and less photogenic: my nose and my hands are dry, peeling masses of flesh. I finally applied first-aid cream to my burns, and I might think about getting some sort of SPF lotion for my schnozz, which I'd rather not lose to cancer.
And here, at last, are some pics from today. As I mentioned before, I won't publish the full photo essays for each day until after I'm done with the whole walk. Sit tight: I think you'll enjoy the full presentation once it's ready. Meanwhile, here are some images (out of over 210 pics taken today) to tide you over.
2 comments:
Beautiful. I think this is my favorite portion of the hike so far. Korea has such diverse elements in its landscapes. I don't think I could live this rural, but walking through it would be a joy.
I laugh when you say "only" 25K. And here I was bragging about my 9K beach walk! But it really does seem like this trip is going so much smoother than previous efforts. Except for those damn skeeters. I can totally relate, once I hear them buzzing around me it is very hard to go back to sleep. I've been very pleasantly surprised that the mosquitos here are not nearly as ubiquitous as they are in Korea. Thank you, Jeezus!
Enjoy your "short" 17K stroll today.
Highway bicycle lane bit looks fairly dangerous! Any other stretches of the serpentine trail along major roads? Soondubu definitely beats random bird meat. Hate mosquitoes, but for some reason, they never bother me...
Post a Comment