Back in Seoul » Sports

Hiking with Mr. Han

Manolo — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 06:58:32 +0000

Last weekend we went hiking with Mr. Han, the driver in our office. What we thought would be an easy hike in Bukhansan (북한산) with some ajossies and ajummas turned into a quite hard climbing and at some points even dangerous I would say. Anyway we had a fun day and the scenery was just awesome. The good thing of Seoul is that being a city surrounded by mountains, as soon as you get away from the high buildings you can find yourself at places like this:

Pablo with Mr. Han, right before starting the hike.

Koreans were so well equipped. That’s so common here. Anything they do (hiking, soccer, cycling…), they dress like real professionals. Nothing to do with easy-going Spanish people

This days are perfect for hiking. It’s not so cold yet, but you can already see red leaves everywhere in the mountain.

With Pablo, almost at the top. At this point we were sweating all over and I couldn’t feel my legs anymore.

It’s unbelievable how many people you find at the mountain on weekends. Koreans really love hiking.

The scenery was so good. It was a pity it was cloudy and a little foggy but anyway I took some nice pictures.

King of the mountain

With Pablo and Mr. Han, taking a break.

While going down, we kept seeing a lot of people still going up to the top.

These piles of stones are made by monks that usualy go to the mountains to find a quiet place not so far away from the crowdy and busy Seoul.

Snowboarding

Manolo — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 04:00:49 +0000

Another post with almost two months delay (I’m writing a post about snowboarding when it’s almost summer already!)… this time Alex and I went snowboarding with 주연 (Ju-Yun), a friend of 가영 (Ga-Young), to StarHill Resort, a resort with some artificial snow tracks only one hour and a half drive from Seoul. The place is not so big, but for beginners like us, it was more than enough. Apart from not being able to sit down for one week (I fell down on my ass so many times, some of them really spectacularly), we had a blast, and everythig was quite cheap:D

At the rental, with 상표 (Mark), Ju-Yun’s friend.

Getting ready to… ¿fall?

From left to right, Ju-Yun, Alex, 은미 (Enice), and I.

Alex, 정은 (Ellen), and I.

The kings of snoboarding, I think that I fell down more times than Alex, but my style was much better than his:P

So yes, we had a lot of fun. Thanks a lot to Ju-Yun and her fiends!

Taekwondo

Manolo — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 11:32:16 +0000

Yes, yesterday I signed up for taekwondo lessons at Yonsei University, the university in which I am also learning Korean. I’m gonna be taking these lessons on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 7 to 8:30 PM.

First lesson was yesterday, and I really liked it! Seems like a great work out, lots of stretching, kicking, defense, relaxing, etc. Much more fun than going to the gym or swimming pool:P