January 2018.
At first, I wanted to ski. We had been in Seoul for three days, braved the butt-freezing cold, but still hadn't had a chance to see snow. At the very least, on the ski slopes, we would be guaranteed snow, even if it was compacted and not the powdery sort we were after.
So we made online searches to see if there was any ski resort within the immediate vicinity of Seoul. There were three: Yisan Forest Resort, Yangji Pine Resort and Konjiam Resort. Out of the three, Konjiam had the easiest access from the city. Also, it had hourly tickets, unlike the other resorts, which only sold daily passes or rigid morning/evening slots.
We found a blog post written by someone who had been there recently, and followed his instructions on how to reach the place. There were several options. You could stop at Jamsil, Sadang or Gonjiam metro station and get a bus or a taxi to the resort. Because Sadang was the nearest to our hotel, we went there. As stated on the blog, the waiting place for the shuttle bus wasn't immediately obvious. We had to go to a parking lot and hope to see other people with ski gear. We didn't see any. But we sat down anyway and looked out for the shuttle bus.
After waiting for over an hour in the cold, we walked back to the metro station and took the train to Gonjiam station. There was a bus stop right outside Gonjiam station with a schedule of the free shuttle bus. Not long after we sat down, the bus arrived. It was only 4 km to get to the ski resort.
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| Source: snowguidekorea.com |
Unfortunately, to enter the ski slopes was not as simple or as cheap as we thought. The hourly entrance fee was one thing, and then there were also the rental fees for helmets, goggles, gloves, jackets, pants, knee pads, hip protectors, ski boots, ski poles and ski blades. Usage of the ski lift too was charged separately. No, we couldn't go just to have a walk on the ski slopes and come back. And no, we couldn't go on a fun ride on the ski lift either. They were pretty strict about the rules. Either you rent the ski gear or you bring your own. No gear, no go.
But, but... they didn't understand. Skiing wasn't our priority. We came from the equator. We just wanted to step on the snow.
Oh well. My partner didn't want to ski. And I didn't want to go alone. What if I fell and couldn't get up? It would be less awkward if I had someone with me. We could fall together. And if all else failed, we could just stand to one side and talk to each other. Besides, if she didn't come along, who would help take pictures of me? 😁
Just as we were about to give up, we saw something that we didn't notice before. Right at the bottom of the pricing chart was something called "sledding". It was only KRW15,000 per person for five rides.
We had no idea what sledding was. What we did know was that we could enter the ski slope for cheap, and without any of the ski gear nonsense. And we got to do it five times, whatever it was.
So we quickly bought the tickets and went up to the access gate. And there, right in front of us were the sloping hills all covered in white. It was a tremendous sight. Skiers dotted the slopes like ants on mounds of sugar. The ski slopes were fenced in. Non-paying guests could watch or talk to the skiers from the other side of the fence, like in a prison.
It turned out that we didn't get to go on the ski slopes after all. The sledding field was a small space located on one side of the ski slopes, but cordoned off from the skiing area. There was an underground walkway to lead us from the access gate to the field so that we wouldn't disturb the skiers. It was sort of like a playroom where the parents left their smaller children to entertain themselves while they took the older ones to go skiing. Indeed, we were surrounded by preschoolers. The only other adults around were the crew members and parents accompanying their kids.
Each of us was given a wrist tag to be shown to the attendant at the entrance of the sledding field. The attendant would put a mark on the tag, to indicate the number of times we had entered. After the fifth entry, the tag would be removed.
Upon entering the field, we each took a sled and went up the snow escalator to get to the top of the sledding slope. The sleds were actually those round floating tubes with a hole in the middle. When the snow fell on them, they looked like large donuts dusted with icing sugar.
The field had about 10 lanes. People queued up at the top of each lane to wait for their turns. You could go on your own, or if you're scaredy cats like us. you could hold on to your partner's sled and go together. It was terrifying at first. We were both scared of heights and on top of that, I was also scared of speed and the free-fall sensation (the first few centimeters of the slope were vertical). But as we were whizzing down the slope, the fear was gone, and we were thoroughly enjoying ourselves. The five rides were over very quickly.
Click here for more info on Konjiam Resort.
