Day 93: At The Fish Market

We all slept in fairly late today, and didn't get rolling until much later than what we had originally planned. We drove on over to the East Gate entrance of Sorakhsan National Park to explore around there for a while. Upon arrival we were instantly confirmed that this gate indeed was the infamously crowded entrance. There was a long line of traffic funnelling into the park and attendants actually directed you as to where to park in the parking lot. Tour bus after tour bus was arriving and there was a steady stream of people making their way into the park. Oh, crowded Korea...

The weather was sunny and hot today, and it was a beautiful day to gaze at the enormous jagged peaks of Sorakhsan. Unlike the triangular-shaped peaks of Canada's West Coast, Sorakhsan's mountains are very jagged and craggedy (a word?) - the peaks are rough and chunky and the rock is a light-brown coloured. Kinda hard to explain it, but amagnificent sight nonetheless. Perhaps it was the weather or maybe the crowds, or most likely just because of our big hike the day before, but all four of us were feeling SO TIRED AND LAZY! Gone was our boundless energy we had the day before - we just dragged our sorry asses through the park and felt much less-inclined to race up any of the slopes. We went and checked out the GIANT statue of Buddha in the park, and then explored a nearby temple. We were probably only in the park an hour and a bit and we were all so tired we decided to bail out. The crowds were just too much anyways, and there were other things we wanted to check out anyway.

We headed on over to Sokcho Beach to relax in the sun instead. We changed into our bathing suits (wishful thinking) and found a spot in the soft sand to relax. The colour of the East Sea (known as the Sea of Japan by the outside world) was a beautiful and dazzling aquamarine turquoise - very Caribbean-like (not that I've ever seen the Caribbean, but how I imagine it to be I guess!) We all put our toes in to feel the sparkling waters, and were met with a sudden reality check - the water was ABSOLUTELY FREEZING!!! Colder than Lake Superior, colder than Shebandowan in the spring. "Colder than a witch's tit" as my Mom would say! lol ;-)

Well Michael was feeling especially bold and brave, so he actually took a run and leapt right into the near-frozen but oh-so-pretty turquoise waters. His scream upon entering the frigid liquid reconfirmed that yes, indeed, it was god damn cold!!! He was RIGHT IN, RIGHT OUT of the water faster than you can say 'Got Hypothermia?'! Well machismo kicked in and Eric and I decided that we couldn't let Michael be the only alpha-male brave (or stupid, depending on how you look at it) enough to take the plunge, so this time all three of us boys made the run and dove right on in....

HOLY FUCK WAS IT COLD!!!!

Next to my brief swim in the Mediterranean when I was visiting Nice in March '97 this was definitely the coldest water I've ever felt in my life!!! I knew it was going to be cold, but not *THAT* COLD! Like what the fuck, is there some sort of ocean current that pumps in freezing water directly from Siberia and delivers it straight to Korea, icebergs and all? LOL! It was fun and exhilirating though, and I'm glad I did it (I'm still looking for my balls though, which brought new meaning to the term 'cold-water shrinkage') Maeve just took pictures and laughed at all of us crazy boys, and we were attracting a lot of attention from nearby Koreans on the beach as well. The entire beach seemed to be in disbelief over what we had done! Hey, I'm always up for putting on a show, so I'm glad I could once again entertain the crowds of confused Koreans - seems to be a daily ritual in my life these days! ;-)

After drying off and getting dressed in warmer clothes again, we decided to make our way over to the nearby Sokcho Fish Market. This turned out to be my favourite part of the day! The Fish Market is a long street that hugs the waterfront where all the local fishermen bring in their daily catch to sell to the locals. They literally pull up on shore, moore their boats, drag out their sea-licious catch, and plop it down into tanks or buckets for whoever to buy. Seafood really doesn't get any fresher than this! Wandering through the fish market really is like wandering through the Vancouver Aquarium - there were ocean creatures of every species, colour, size, aand spectacle! Many of the tanks had sea creatures that I couldn't even tell you what they were! There were giant fish, octupi, squid, crabs, clams and mussels, eels, sea urchents, shrimp and scallops, and all other kinds of squishy ocean things. Some of the fish were absolutely massive - so big and heavy that it would take a very strong person to be able to lift them out of the tank! (Certainly enough to feed a Korean family for a week!)

The best part was when we came across this tank of crabs. Now there's tanks of crabs all over this fish market, but this particular fisherman seemed to know exactly where to catch all the Granddaddy Crabs of the sea - they were the biggest fucking crabs that I have ever seen in my life!!! ABSOLUTELY MASSIVE!!! Seriously, some of them, if you laid them out from toe to toe, would probably measure at least THREE FEET LONG!!! Where do the hell do these giant crab monsters live? And more importantly, do they ever come on shore??? Can you imagine being at the beach, all warm and relaxed on your towel, covered in tanning lotion, just catching some rays, and then looking over to see a CRAB BIG ENOUGH TO CARRY AWAY A PONY coming at you??? I'd probably have a heart attack...

Well I guess the fisherman noticed how excited we were over his crabs (we were taking pictures of ourselves next to the tank) cause he came over and decided to give us something even more exciting to take a picture of... He reached in, with his bare hands, and grabbed one of these super giant crabs and just chucked the thing down on the street RIGHT IN FRONT OF US! All four of us *SCREAMED* like little school girls and jumped back about three feet in a single bound!! OMG!!! We couldn't believe that one of these creatures from the black lagoon was now loose and crawling around on the pavement near our feet - no thick tank glass to protect us now!!! We laughed as much as we screamed, and Eric was even brave enough to kneel down next to 'the thing' so we could take a picture. SO CRAZY!!!

We wandered through the rest of the market and just marvelled at all the sea creatures that you could buy and eat - stuff that I didn't even know was edible. I think it's the Korean's philosophy that absolutely *anything* from the sea is edible to them. Not for me, thanks! ;-) We were hungry so we stopped at one of the nearby stalls and ordered a fresh seafood snack. We had some delicious grilled prawns, some shellfish (I passed on those) and then some squid stuffed with rice and octopus like a big fat purple sack! I was feeling a bit brave and a had a sample of the rice/squid and it was actually not bad I must admit!

After this it was time for us to make the big drive back to Seoul and head on home. We hit the highway and enjoyed the breathtaking views of Sockcho and the coast as we climbed back up and over the mountains, westward bound. We were making great time getting home but then about half way back to the city we hit 'The Wall.' 'The Wall' is the end of the line of traffic heading back into Seoul - a fluctuating yet permanent line of cars that appears at the end of every weekend, regardless of the time of year. We ended up just *crawling* back into the city on the highway and it was so frustrating to be stuck in the car! What is normally only a four-hour drive from the East Coast back to Seoul turned into a 6.5 hour ordeal. Another reminder that Korea is a very small, yet very crowded country. Michael told us that he knows of people who've driven back after a long weekend in the summer and it's taken them 12 HOURS to get back to Seoul because of all the traffic, so I guess 6.5 isn't all that bad after all. Still, not a fun experience anyways! By the time we got into the city it was almost 11pm and we were all soooo tired. We said our goodbyes and then I hopped on the subway and headed on home. A tiring end to a really great weekend!!!! :-)