Hiking Seunghaksan, Attempt One

Don't let the title fool you, we did make it up the mountain... just not the exact mountain we intended.

We rode the one line subway almost until the edge of town, and when we got off, we quickly realized our need for a compass. Put it on the list. Eventually, taking an educated guess, we landed at the campus of Dong-A University, the city's largest private college. The campus is wedged between two peaks, the buildings snuggly nestled into the side of Seunghak-san (in Korean, the suffix san means mountain). We found a trail up and started on our way. It was steep. Very steep. Kicked my butt steep, but it felt great. Most of the

hike, we didn't have much of a view, being surrounded with pines, but here and there we got an awesome view. To our right, the campus, to our left, the Nakdong river estuary, both a port and bird sanctuary. As we neared the peak, the trees became slanted, as if we had walked into the set of a

haunting movie. When we reached the peak, where we had an even worse view than a hundred years earlier, some Korean women urged us toward another trail, andwe realized we would have much better views at the actual peak of Seunghak-san, just across the way from where we were. Supposedly, the top is covered with meadows, yielding a spectacular view of the city.

Stay tuned for attempt two.