Jikjisa

On Saturday, despite some suspect weather, Mike, Kris and I decided to head out to Gimcheon to see Jikjisa, a temple, park and town west of Daegu. This is somewhere that, despite having been in Daegu a couple of years, I had never gone to. We got up early and made our way to Dongdaegu st. to get the train to Gimcheon.

50 Minutes later and we were there. It's then a 20 minute bus ride from the station to a small collection of restaurants and shops in the mountain and a park that, unlike many parks in Korea, has open spaces and lots of grass (Korean parks can sometimes lean towards chaotic, with walking paths, sculptures and just a lack of places to with with grass). Though of course there was a collection of fountains, artificial waterfalls and sculptures but there was enough space to make it feel relaxing.

the river in town

Entrance to Jikji Park

The park

Park again

Now I say the weather had been suspect but by the time we got there the clouds had cleared and it was a beautiful day. From the park we made our way to Jikjisa. Here is the history of Jikjisa. Like most temples in Korea it has been largely rebuilt in the last few hundred years, but various pagodas are actually 1000 years old, and Jikjisa has a few of them. Jikjisa is also one of the few temples where you can photograph the Buddha images, so i took full advantage of that. 

the temple with the 1000 year old pagoda's

temple and trees

Buddha in the Korean style

me with Chinese Buddha

old lantern

other side of the temple

Buddha again

Almost a tropical look

the sitting Buddha

temple buildings with the mountain

video

(sounds like we are in the tropics)

After the temple we went back to the village and had a huge meal before grabbing a beer and meeting Chris, a very interesting South African who joined us for a beer or 6. He lived in Gumi, about halfway between Daegu and Gimcheon, and we had planned to meet up again later if any of us head up to Gumi or he heads to Daegu.

After that it was a bus ride through the mountains and a train ride and taxi that had me home by midnight.