Last Trip Around Korea

A few weekends ago I took an awesome two-day trip with two of my coworkers, Rob (of Cheju-do fame) and Ashley. We went to the North-Central part of Korea, first to a town called Inje, and later through several small towns on our way to Gangchon and then back to Seoul. Inje was our main destination, because it's known as an adventure sports center in Korea, which means that it has a bungee jump, among other things. We got to the platform where you board the little car that goes up a bright orange crane-like machine to the 60-meter (180 feet, approx.) high spot where you jump. After paying our $40 and being given instructions in Korean (which I, as best Korean speaker of the group, only partially understood), I went up with one of the operators in the mechanized car that takes you up over the (very shallow looking) river. I get to the top, my legs strapped in with only VELCRO (yes, only velcro) and a loose waist harness, and the guy tells me to step out and put my arms straight out to the sides. I start to do it and then rush back in, making sure that my harness isn't supposed to be tighter, there isn't more to hold my legs, that I'm supposed to just jump out like a swan dive and OH PLEASE I DON'T WANT TO DIE. After his assurances that it's all ready and a bunch of Korean that I don't really understand, I step out on the 2 foot-by-2 foot metal platform sticking out from the car, and slowly release my arms from the handrails. I look down from the sickening height (instead of looking at the mountain like I was told) and make my peace with God, stretching my arms out and listening to the count of 1, 2, 3... and then make the gut-wrenching swan-dive into nothingness, against all of my instincts and better judgement. Miraculously, the bungee cord holds and I bounce up, still trying to figure out which way is up and laughing in my ecstatic joy that I'm still alive. Definitely the most frightening thing I've done in my life, and definitely one of the most awesome.
We also took a variety of buses, a boat, and a standing-room-only train, and ate sea snails, conch, and bondegi (steamed silkworm pupae). The sea snails were pretty good, and the bondegi, as you might have guessed, was disgusting.
The last two highlights of the trip were in Gangchon, where we 1) rented 4-wheelers and drove around the town and some of the countryside, and 2) went to a nearby waterfall, which is probably a lot more impressive when it's been raining.
Here are the pictures: