An adventure down stream
The trip: Inflatable kayaking in Inje, South Korea, at Song Kang Canoe School
The people: Ross, myself, and Kim and Bart (two new people in Songchon-dong who are awesome!)
The time spent traveling: 10 hours (KTX trains, subways, buses and pick-up trucks)
The result: One awesome time.
Our trip started at 7am from Daejeon, taking the taxi to the train station and then catching the 7:38am KTX to Seoul. We didn’t take a bus from Daejeon to Inje, because apparently there isn’t a direct bus, so we took the bus from DongSeoul Bus station (Gangbyeon subway station) directly to Inje. We thought the KTX would have been more fun, especially for Kim and Bart who’d never been on the KTX. Mikyung, our host, was super helpful and provided us with a text message in Korean that we could show to the bus ticket lady. When we got to Inje, Mikyung sent our guide, Daehee, to get us from the station. He drove the four of us down the river and to the school.
Kim and Bart on the subway
On the way to Inje
Song Kang Canoe School, where we learned to float like pros! 🙂
Our porch.
Once we got to the school, and changed, it was time to kayak. Because we had 4 people, inflatable kayaking was perfect for us. Any more, and we would have gone rafting. But we had our hearts set on inflatable kayaking, so it was perfect. Our guide, Daehee, was wonderful, and instructed us on all the strokes we would need, and continuously made sure we understood what we had to do, and if we were okay. He was the perfect guide! What a great summer job for him, too – he said he was a 3rd year university student in Incheon studying Physical Education. He totally suited the part!
Daehee, our guide! He’s awesome!
Then we were off! There were lots of rafts on the river, because a) there are LOTS of schools, and b) there were lots of people on holiday. But the rafts were fun to paddle around (gave us an extra challenge) and the Koreans of course said hi to us over and over. The rapids were awesome, and Daehee was a perfect guide to take us through! (Go Straight! Sideways no!)
We ended up stopping at this beautiful little cold spring, where the Koreans were dunking their head in the water and taking pics. We couldn’t resist!
All in all, it was a wonderful experience on the river! Our room was wonderful, and Mikyung was a wonderful host, and everything was so wonderful! I would recommend anyone go, because it was such a good time!
Posted on July 31, 2010, in Around Korea, Friends/events and tagged kayaking, korea, white water rafting. Bookmark the permalink. 2 Comments.
The Lace Chronicles 
Nice post. I’ve been paddling on that river, and now the rains have started here again way down south in Gwangju, Jeollanamdo, i’m thinking of making the trek back up to that corner of the country. Good to see someone’s got organised with the full trip in English etc.
So hey, thanks for enjoying it and blogging it; well done!
j.w.
It’s worth the trip when the water is high. I wish the water had been higher when we went!