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Pyeongchang, Proposed Site for the 2010 Winter Olympics -Snow Festival |
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A Step Back in Time to the Days of Childhood |
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Pyeongchang, a proposed site for the 2010 Winter Olympics, and the rest of Gangwon-do province, holds a winter snow festival annually. What started as winter pastimes by the residents of mountain villages grew larger and more varied each year, becoming an eagerly anticipated festival. Those who attend forget the cold while enjoying various games, and are transported back to their childhood years. |
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Already this year, Pyeongchang, where the Daegwallyeong Snow Festival (which takes its name from a pass of the same name) is held, has seen several major snowfalls, and the mountain peaks sparkle with silver beneath the blue skies. The festival is held in Hoenggye Village, and there the smoke wafting up from the chimneys of houses here and there evokes the romantic atmosphere of a mountain village. This year's festival, the eleventh, was held in and around the Yong Pyong Dome, which was used as the main stadium of the 1999 Winter Asian Games for the opening and closing ceremonies and the figure skating and short track speed skating competitions. |
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Ice sculptures adorn the festival grounds. |
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The Snow Castle, which was made from 10 metric tons of snow and whose towers rise over 12 meters in the air, greets visitors to the festival. Tourists from such places as Hong Kong and Taiwan, where it does not snow, stare at the sculpture with wonder in their eyes, like little children meeting Santa Claus, and even pose for pictures in front of it. Off to one side people are engaged in a snowball fight. Transformed into little children, people play hide and seek among the various ice sculptures. When they get cold, though, they thaw out with a cup of hot tea in the Igloo Cafe.
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Snow sculptures at the Mt. Taebaeksan Snow Festival. |
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| Tourists enjoying the Daegwallyeong Snow Festival. |
Traditional games are the highlight of this festival. One of the most popular pastimes, enjoyed by children and their parents alike, is riding on the ice on wooden sleds and pushing oneself along with a wooden stick. People also greatly enjoyed riding the balgu, a sleigh drawn by horses or oxen.
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Tourists enjoyiing a ride on a sleigh. |
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Snow sledding and ice slides are perfect for those who desire speed and thrills, and the cheers of young people on the sleds never end. Laughing and cheering can also be heard from the ice bowling lane, which brings to mind the sport of curling. Over 900 amateur runners participated in the shirtless marathon, and the spectators forgot all about the cold while watching the men run shirtless across the frozen fields. |
For those who enjoy the elegance of snow-covered mountains, there is also trekking. A winter trekking course is set up in the area of Mt. Barwangsan in the Yong Pyong Resort, and anyone can enjoy an easy walk through the snowy mountains. There are also many who take on the challenge of the cross-country course, which runs for 15 kilometers from the 1,458-meter peak of Barwangsan. From the top of the mountain, one can see the entire ski resort, but also the neighboring snow-covered peaks, and even the blue line of the East Sea in the distance.
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Dogsledding draws much attention. |
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Sliding down the mountainside is great. |
This year's festival was marked by the desire of Gangwon-do residents for the hosting of the 2010 Winter Olympics. The area of Pyeongchang has the optimum natural conditions for winter sports. Each year over three million ski enthusiasts come to this area's Yong Pyong, Phoenix and Sungwoo resorts. If the Winter Olympics are held in Gangwon-do, which has already successfully hosted the Winter Asian Games and the Winter Universiad, the people are confident that it will be the most successful ever.
At the end of January, after the Pyeongchang festival, Mt. Taebaeksan and Mt. Seoraksan also held snow festivals. At this year's tenth Taebaeksan Snow Festival, the invitational exhibition for snow sculptors, the national snow sculpture competition and the Siberian dog sleds were very popular. The highlight was hiking the snow-covered slopes of Taebaeksan. Visitors enjoyed the scenery, walking through tunnels covered with snow and glistening with icicles, and they enjoyed sliding down the mountainside on plastic sacks.
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There is even an igloo at the festival. |
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Ice slides, the ultimate in thrills. |
The highlight of the snow festival in Seoraksan National Park was ice climbing up the frozen Towangseong Waterfall. The area of this ice cliff, which is over 350 meters high, is off limits during the winter season, but open during the festival. The white wall of ice rising up into the heavens, surrounded on all sides by the walls of the gorge like a folding screen, is a magnificent sight in itself, but the sight of people climbing up it is also quite amazing.
For more information on winter activities in this area, visit http://www.happy700.or.kr.
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