왕룡사, Pohang's Hidden Temple

Find the road that winds, the road that twists, the road that nearly disappears.  Follow that road through the trees and past the houses falling down, follow that road as it wraps around a mountain and begins to rise.  Follow that road as it dips, as it breaks, as the potholed concrete gives way to dirt and gravel.  Take a deep breath and slip the car into second gear, push the pedal hard and steer over the deep vines of dirt, hollow paths carved by running water, pray that no other car will come down the one lane road on top of you.  Get to the top, find a parking lot with a bus that somehow made it up that road, and mutter under your breath, "fu$!@#& Korea."  

This is where I found myself Saturday night, breathing a sigh of relief that the tires on my car had held to the road and the brakes had not let go and no one had come barreling down the mountain and slammed into me.  In the end it was worth it, it's almost always worth it in Korea to follow the path just a little bit deeper into the woods, just a little higher up the mountain; there's awesome shit out there.  At the top of this mountain?  A five building buddhist temple and a view of Pohang I've been looking for for two years.  The entire city spread out, the river leading the eye into the apartments and the buildings, the steel plant, the stacks of smoke rolling out of the tubes, and finally the sea - with ships dotting the water, fading into the white haze that seems to always hang over Pohang.

Here's what I know.  The temple's called 왕룡사.  Which I can barely say.  It's near the top of a mountain in between Pohang and Gyeongju, and the view from the top is one of the best in the city.  Plus, the guy's hanging out around the temple were decent people, they said hello and waved, which is pretty friendly.  As always, here's 10 pictures and some foolish comments.

The pink, purple, and orange flowers are just about ready to give way to the red and orange leaves of fall.  It won't be long now.

The more temples I go to, the more I realize the personalizations that make each temple unique.  This temple had some pretty serious depictions of Buddhist Hell.  After some quick research, that's probably oil those people are boiling in.

This picture doesn't do much justice for the size of this statue.  It's three meters tall and big.

I saw a ton of frogs, a ton of slugs nearly the size of my hand, and got bit a half-dozen times by mosquitos.  A lot of nature up there.

Here's the view.  This picture doesn't really do it justice, as everything's been reduced to super-tiny size because of the lens I'm using.  You can see the nice brown band that kind of hangs out over Pohang most of the time.

As I started coming down the mountain the sun started to set.  I pulled over at the first rice field and started shooting.  Easily the most beautiful sunset I've seen in Korea.

One more of the rice field.  It'll all be gone soon.  Winter turns everything into a brown wasteland.

Sara and I were on the move this weekend, heading out to both Unmunsa and Manbulsa, two of Gyeongsangbuk-do's more famous temples.  It was a great time and I took nearly seven hundred pictures, hopefully I can find 10 worth a post.  Also, Wednesday is the beginning of Chuseok and were headed to Busan and then on to Mokpo.  Can't wait for a couple days of vacation and a chance to see a new part of Korea.  Happy Chuseok everyone!