Geumgang Park and a Gate

After leaving the temple on high that I was at this morning, Beomeosa Temple, I soared to another height with a visit to Geumgang Park this afternoon.

I then visited an old fortress, or, rather, mostly its gate. To be honest, I probably didn’t give the fortress anywhere near its due because I was exhausted at that point.

Speaking of exhausted, I’m going to try to plow through this post, which will likely turn out to be short, so I can try to get to sleep at a decent hour.

Getting from Beomeosa Temple to Geumgang Park required a short walk to a bus stop, a bus directly to a metro station, a metro, and then a somewhat longer walk to the park. I forgot how long it required, but it was considerably less than the time it took to get from my hotel to Beomeosa Temple.

By the time I got out of the metro station, it was well past my normal lunch time. My stomach had something to say about that, but I can’t report what it said without search engines labelling this page as adult content.

I looked for a restaurant on my mapping app, but didn’t see anything suitable. I wanted something quick and light.

By the way, Starbucks is big here. I’ve seen them all over in all the cities I’ve been to in Korea so far. There was one near the metro station. But I refuse to go to Starbucks.

I’ve always had a policy of not going to Starbucks, or any North American chain, when I’m not in North America. It just seems wrong. But lately, I’ve been trying to avoid Starbucks and all U.S. businesses everywhere. I need only two words to explain why. Donald. Trump.

When the United States decides to elect a president who doesn’t want to make Canada the 51st state and doesn’t want to try to impoverish Canada, so, in his feeble mind, he thinks it will have no choice but to become the 51st state, then I’ll go back to patronizing American businesses without even thinking about it. Until then, not if I can help it.

Okay. Rant over. I wanted to rush through this so I could get to sleep early. Onward. Ever onward.

As I walked toward Geumgang Park, I kept my eyes peeled for a place that might sate my hunger, without taking up too much time. (Public service announcement: Never literally peel your eyes. That’s not the meaning of the expression.)

As I walked, I spotted a patisserie. I’m not saying I saw a shop with baked goods in the window. I couldn’t see what’s in the shop window from where I first saw the store. I’m saying I saw a store with a big sign declaring only in English, “Patisserie.”

In addition to pastry-only pastries, it also had a few sandwiches. Despite the big English-only sign out front, all the labels inside were in Korean only. I spied with my little eye a sandwich that looked good and appeared to have ingredients that I thought I recognized, so the lack of English labels wouldn’t matter.

I thought I spotted prosciutto and vegetables in it. I know. I know. Prosciutto isn’t Korean. Why wouldn’t I eat local if I come all this way? Because I was already tired at that point, and I didn’t want to spend time trying to figure out which of the foods I didn’t recognize I might want to eat. That’s why

I bought the sandwich, took it to a little nearby parkette with some chairs, and ate it. I was right about the prosciutto and vegetables, but it also had some small shrimps and a sauce. It was delicious. I lucked out with that one.

Dammit, Joel. Why did you go off on that tangent? You’ll never get to sleep if you keep this up. And, by the way, this business of talking to yourself in the third person can’t be a good sign. You might want to see someone about that.

Lunch finished, I walked straight to Geumgang Park.

Geumgang Park

Geumgang Park is a lovely forested park. According to my guidebook, its lower level has a Marine Natural History Museum, a folk arts centre, and a few temples. I intentionally didn’t look for or see those, although I did see signs for the Marine Natural History Museum. It also said the park has some patriotic tombs. I saw some monuments in the park, but I don’t know if they were marking tombs or if they were something completely different.

And there’s supposed to be a botanical garden. I would have gone to that, but when I searched for it in my mapping app, it found it and said it is closed. So, I didn’t bother going.

My guidebook also says Geumgang Park has a pine tree that is notable for growing out of a rock. I think I saw it on the way out of the park, but I’m not sure it was the pine tree in question. The one I saw was growing out of a clump of rocks, not a single rock. But it’s possible that, over time, the tree’s roots proved mightier than the rock.

The tree I saw was leaning over at about a 45º angle. It was held up by a sling under one of its limbs, and two shiny metal poles angled together to hold up the sling. Trees get by with a little help from their friends, I guess.

But none of that is why I went to Geumgang Park. I went because my guidebook told me I should add the Geumgang Cable Car to my list of must-do activities in Busan. Who am I to argue? I could spend an hour unconvincingly making the case for who I am to argue, but I’m too tired for that.

Keep going, Joel. Keep going.

Geumgang Park is beside a mountain, Geumjeongsan Mountain. The lower station of a cable car, namely the aforementioned Geumgang Cable Car, is in the park. The cable car ascends the mountain, almost to the summit.

It’s one of those cable cars with two cabs suspended from overhead cables. When one cab is at the top, the other is at the bottom. Their movements are synchronized by the cables. When one is going up, the other goes down as a counterbalance. Halfway up the mountain, they pass each other on their own half of the cables. Or halfway down, as the case may be.

Each cab is probably able to hold maybe a couple of dozen people if you cram them in. On my way up there were, in addition to me, two other customers, plus an attendant. On the way down, there were six other customers plus the same attendant.

The top of the mountain is dense forest, with lots of paths. The cable car doesn’t go quite to the summit. There is a relatively gentle trail up the rest of the way. Up there, there’s an observation platform where I could look down on one side of Busan.

The views of Busan were a little better from the windows of the cable car because some of the view from the summit was obstructed by trees. Then again, the view from the summit wasn’t distorted by glass, nor did it have cables running through the field of vision.

Between those two views of Busan, my impression of the city changed considerably.

Up until I saw it from that vantage point, I thought of Busan as a city with several high-rises, skyscrapers, and super-tall buildings, particularly in a few clusters, but mainly low-rise and mid-rise. Looking down from that height, I was amazed at how many high-rises and skyscrapers there were.

From up there, the high-rises and skyscrapers almost blend into a single form, with just a few small sections of predominantly low-rise and mid-rise buildings. Perhaps my earlier, shorter impression of Busan was a consequence of the places I’ve walked through so far, but I now think of Busan as primarily an exceptionally tall city. And I’m not even talking about its mountains, which are ever so much taller than the buildings.

After I spent time staring out from the observation platform and strolling a wee bit around the forested summit trails, I took the Geumgang Cable Car back down to Geumgang Park and headed to my next destination.

Dongnae Village Fortress

At that point, taking in another sight turned out to be a bit over-ambitious due to my oft-mentioned exhaustion. (Oft-mentioned above, that is. I don’t imagine anyone else talks about it anywhere else.)

The recommendation to visit the Dongnae Village Fortress (aka Dongnaeeupseong) came from my walking tour app. It talks about it being a historic gem from the Goryeo era. The app highlights three command posts, including a two-storey wooden watchtower, along with the “grandeur” of the North Gate.

I made a beeline for the North Gate. It’s okay. I don’t think I’d use the word grandeur, though. I didn’t see the wooden watchtower. There is an oldish building by the gate, but I don’t know if it was a command post. Possibly not.

The two hokey mannequin guards in front of the gate didn’t add to it in my tired opinion.

Close to the gate, there’s a small science park. It contains some centuries-old sundials and astronomical equipment, or maybe replicas of them. I’m not sure. Some of them were cool, particularly one that sat on supports that looked to me like stylized fish.

By the fort, there are wooded grounds to walk along, including a trail through a residential area. Or so my walking tour app says. I did some walking through some trees to get up to the North Gate, but by then, all I wanted to do was get back to my hotel.

I forget the times my mapping app gave me, but I seem to remember that walking to my hotel would take well over an hour. If I remember correctly, transit would take anywhere from 45 minutes to more than an hour, depending on which route I chose. Each route had its advantages—shortest time, fewest transfers, or least walking. But they all involved at least two and in one or two cases three transit vehicles.

My exhaustion wouldn’t let me do that. I walked to the nearest street, opened up the Uber app, and summoned a chariot to take me back to my hotel (about a 25-minute drive). Uber sent a taxi, rather than a chariot. But when travelling, it’s important to remain flexible and learn to accept some disappointments.

And now, once I hit the “publish” button, it’s time for sleep.

Some of the old astronomical equipment: