Well, it was sort of a dud. I wanted to write up more for you at that stop in Iksan, but the cicadas were seriously giving me a headache, so I just posted a slew of pictures. I thought that I'd post more when I took a lunch break later, but I was so exhausted all I did was text pictures of the meal to friends and try to rest.
Because of the double typhoon threat, what I'd planned on being a nice, leisurely bike trip was once again going to be condensed into a crazy "Cycle 'til you die in hopes that you can finish it before vacation's up!" trip, which kind of put me in a weary mood right from the get-go. I'd really been looking forward to taking my time exploring the places I hadn't had time to explore last year, so when I finally reached Buyeo, one of the historically-charged cities in the area, I thought, "You know what? I want to go sightseeing around town instead of racing until my body shuts down in an effort to make Daecheong Dam before the typhoons hit!"
So that's what I did.
But I'll back up a little. I left off at Iksan, right?
Here's a map:
Gunsan's just southwest of the middle. See that big green patch further up the river? The one that says Ungpo-myeon? That's around where I left off. (I know it's pretty far from the city Iksan, but it's still within the Iksan signage on the Geum Gang Trail - just check out the picture that I posted earlier that says that I'm in Iksan!)
Shortly after that I saw what must be the Dauntless Headquarters from Divergent:
The weather looks great, doesn't it?
More photographic proof that Korea's spiders are too large...
In one stretch there was actually a canopy of spider webs stretched totally across the path. Fortunately, most of them were higher than my head, but still - that's kind of like the stuff of nightmares, a path with trees one either edge hemmed in by heavy spider webs above you. Not abandoned spider webs, but spider webs bouncing huge, fat spiders. As the typhoon winds come rolling in...
But I digress.
I continued on. Some of this scenery was beautiful, and some was more intimidating. Cycling is lots of fun...but not in high winds and rain. The sky kept looking ominous...but I kept on.
It's my personal opinion that my bicycle is very photogenic, so don't complain about the fact that there will be a lot of pictures of it here...heh.
I took a break to eat some PB & J - and, of course, to take more pictures of my handsome bicycle.
While I was there an old man rolled up on an ancient bike. I had anticipated maybe writing up a blog post while I rested, but he talked to me for thirty minutes in Korean, trying to teach me about all the history of the region. My Korean's only intermediate, so you can imagine how less-than-restful this became. Even so it was kind of nice just chilling with him.
Eventually I left...
And saw some familiar signs!
You see that little mountain path? The super steep one? Yeah...that's the bike path. I definitely got off my bike and walked for that.
And look where it leads: the creepy trail I was so scared of when I wandered through at dusk last year.
But what a pretty view!
I forget if I ever posted any other pictures on this blog of old Korean graves. If not, here's one so you can see:
And here's something to cheer you up after that last picture:
(What do you mean, there are too many pictures of my bicycle?!)
Do you remember when I heard what I feared might be lions roaring in the woods last year, but they turned out to be cows? Much less frightening in daylight:
And much prettier, too.
Both years I got to this hill and thought, "Man, am I gonna have fun riding this on the way down!" And both years I came back a different way and couldn't do it.
Not sure what happened to the scarecrows that were there last year. Your speculation is as good as mine.
This path rolls down into some kind of little town.
And then it gets to the little camping place where I spent my first night last year.
There's the booth to get the Iksan stamp! Except it isn't raining this time. I guess in some aspects I actually had better weather than I did last year, despite the fact that two typhoons were on their way.
Only 119 kilometers to go...are you feeling tired yet?
Some more pics of the place I stayed last year. This year I just replenished my water supply. My new bike doesn't have a basket so I was limited to what I could carry. Water gets heavy fast, so I didn't bring too many bottles to start out with.
I think they had barely opened when I came last year. There definitely wasn't this cool swimming pool last time.
Onward!
Hmm. I think there have been too many pictures in a row that didn't show my awesome bicycle...
And on that note, I think it's time to take a break. Look forward to the exciting next installment!
