Taebaeksan Hike

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Winter hikes are upon us. YES, they are cold. YES, they are tough. YES, they are AWESOME.

Taebaeksan is the 5th highest peak in mainland Korea.

Here is a link to more information about the mountain. http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/ATR/SI_EN_3_1_1_1.jsp?cid=791747

Also Taebaeksan has a winter festival as well.

http://english.visitkorea.or.kr/enu/ATR/SI_EN_3_2_1.jsp?cid=892611

But this post is to give fellow hikers some advice when hiking Taebaeksan in the winter (or anytime ;) )

*Things you need*

1) Hiking boots

2) Crampons

3) Warm clothes (wear in layers)

-gloves

-beanie

-snow pants

-winter coat

-scarf of face cover

4) Water

5) Snacks

6) Stretch

The total hike time was about 4 and half hours.

So I started at Yuilsa which is about a 2 minute drive from the beginning of the festival.

Here is a starting map.

From there, you will begin to hike up the mountain. If you are lucky, you will see beautiful fresh snowfall, and hopefully not many people (that wasn't my case).

There were hundreds of Koreans trying to reach the top, which lead to a lot of traffic jams. If you are fast hiker like myself, you can bypass some of these lines by squeaking past on the left side. Trust me, it's worth it.

Continue on the path to take you to Taebaek Peak. It takes about 1.5 to 2 hours to reach depending on the people traffic.

You will see this shelter on the way up. From this point it's about 25 minutes to the top. It starts to get really cold here.

These are the views you will get a the Taebaek Summit.

It's hard t believe, but these peaks were used for military purposes to seek out the enemy from far distances. Now they are National Parks for casual and fun hiking.

Although we are smiling and look warm, it was minus 20 celcius with windchill and we were ready to continue the hike!

From here, you continue on to Munsubang Peak. It is about another hour to that peak from here.

Munsubang Peak is even more beautiful than Taebaek.

Here are some views.

I made it tot he 5th highest peak!

There are many inuksuk shaped rock formations throughout the peak.

Once you are done browsing the scene at the top, continue your way down. There is only one path down. No confusion :)

Now the rest of the hike is about 45 minutes to an hour to the bottom near the festival.

Once you complete the hike, you will be able to view this incredible snow festival with tons of snow sculptures! There are some talented people who had made these! I only had about 20 minutes to chill and observe as my bus left around 5 pm.

There are also many restaurants at the bottom near the festival where you can get a nice bowl of noodles or jiggaes to warm you up!

If you took a bus to the festival, there will be a shuttle bus at any parking lot bring you down to where your bus is parked. You can jump on any shuttle bus to take you down (for free).

I hope this helps you in your journey to Taebaeksan!

Enjoy the beautiful mountain and awesome festival!

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