our friendly neighbours to the north.

somehow my updating has slowed down to a weekly thing. i suppose because our weekends are the most exciting part of our time here, and thus prove to have the most content to write home about! regardless, thanks for checking in and i’m going to try to be more consistent in getting updates on here.

we vetoed seoul this weekend and instead headed north to an area called yeoncheon, which lies right on the north korea/south korea border. which is oh-so-exciting these days, isn’t it? to be honest, as much media attention as the good ol’ NK is getting back home, it really barely registers as news around here. south koreans seem generally undisturbed about the north’s threats – they’ve been living with this “fear” for more than 50 years.

a korean friend of ours offered to be our gracious tour guide, and she drove us up to taepung observatory (which was an hour+ car ride from the last subway stop). in my naivety, i was expecting some sort of wilderness-platform-lookout with public access and a number of stairs to climb. obviously, i was mistaken. i quickly realized how wrong i was as our 4-door kia approached a barricaded military checkpoint. however, our happy korean friend effectively got us past the armed guards, which required confiscating our IDs and a somewhat-lengthy sign-in. as the area we were headed into was “top secret” (her words), the GPS in her car showed no directions on the screen. the car climbed slowly uphill until we reached our destination.


the view at the top was nothing short of astounding, complete with three rows of barbed-wire fence overlooking kilometres of uninhabited fields. there were also tourist-friendly coin-operated binoculars and telescopes to enhance your viewing experience. apparently, you can often see north koreans working in the farm fields on the other side, but we saw no life to the north. the military on guard at the look out were understandably very serious about their jobs (and made me really nervous!): no pictures allowed, and they criticized my shorts for being too short. i'm not sure why the concern about the latter was really necessary, it was more than 35 degrees outside! nevertheless, mark took some prohibited photos … just so you at home can get the secret gist. or not get it, since the pictures are literally of landscape.

we’re still intending to go on an official DMZ tour, complete with up-close-and-personal encounters with NK military and tunnel tours. there will be more north/south commentary in the future!