15 November 2022
Penguins and Caves
Gwangju Penguin village and Dwinggul cave
A non hiking no plan day. I scrolled the map. It is a Korean map so that did not help much. Brown labels are generally tourist places so I looked up a few. A cave that is not a cave, a penguin village without penguins. Sounds too good be true!
Actually Gwangju is a very artsy city, they heavily advertise their Biennale, and folk music. Everywhere seems to be a mini art gallery, usually also selling speciality coffee and more often then not, croffle.
This seems to be linked to the Gwangju student uprising democracy protests that killed either 600 or 2300 kids in 1980, with mass rapes carried out by soldiers on students. Go read wikipedia, Gwangju uprising. The uprising failed, it was not until 1988 that South Korea became a democracy. However because of it, many buildings from that era are now art galleries or cafes.
I was too early to go to the cave, so I headed back up the mini hill to the observatory to see the day view. The weather was great, but as you shall see, the mountain from yesterday still had fog on the top.
I went to ascend the stairs to the top of the observatory only to get yelled at by some guy part way up... He was just dressed in normal clothes and I had no idea what he was on about but he insisted on escorting me back down the stairs and depositing me into the elevator (lift) instead, then stood by the door of the elevator and yelled at me some more as I went up. So that was entertaining. Whatever you do in Korea, do not take the steps.
Great weather today, about 15c, not a lot of pollution, the only rain is yellow leaves.
Early on I explored some streets with many brown signs for student resistance and communist leaders. It seems there was something communist related in the resistance? Wikipedia says that is the case.
Historic chimney.
This is the main place I wanted to go in, but it seems the public cannot go in there anymore. I stood on a little ladder that someone had conveniently left nearby and took this photo. Maybe I was just peering over the fence of someones private house. Looks good though. No sign of any communists.
After being goose stepped down the stairs, I am back on top of the observatory.
Greater Gwangju.
There is Mudeungsan from yesterday, with the summit still shrouded in fog.
When I came here and was chased by cats the other night, it looked like the trees were colourful, and they are.
The stop wars car. I think the owner was nearby and thrilled that I was taking a photo. He gave me a thumbs up.
Here is the 'cave'. It is not even 50 metres long. I presume it was a small mine at some point. It is a dead end.
There is no fee to go in the cave, and no guard. So you can just hang out in the cave. They provide helmets in case you forget to head careful.
Nearby the cave, the penguin village. Why they chose a penguin as the mascot for this group of small cafes and art galleries and outdoor junk, I have no idea.
It is a nice spot of little shops and alleys, with lots of penguins painted on everything. Hard to capture in photos.
Here are a few penguins.
And when they run out of penguins they just nail junk to the walls.
Oh look the observatory again. This whole area is very nice, every street is art galleries, studios and cafes, often all 3 at once. Oh and English language teaching places. Lots of those. They also have a cafe.
Back closer to the city centre is one of the main markets. It is like most other markets. Lots of fish.
Just what everyone wants in their life.
Since I already revisited the observatory, I also revisited the Asian Culture Center and hole in the ground. Here is a view from an elevated bit from which you cannot see the hole.
This is the democracy bell. It is built on the site of an infamous police station where many students were tortured and killed. But in true Korean fashion, even this is controversial. The bell was funded by donations, but apparently whoever made it cheated the public and delivered a bell that weighs nowhere near as much as it is supposed to, and soon after it was delivered in 2005 it started cracking. There were mass protests about it.
Here is a view from the elevated corner of the other far corner of the Asian Culture Center. There is a bamboo grove on the roof of a building on the right, hard to see here, I could not work out how to get into the bamboo grove.
And this being a non hiking day, I had time for a late lunch from a chain bakery. I think inflation has hit these places, seems a bit more expensive than I remember. Currently I have no plan for this evening either so anything could happen.