Korean Job Discussion Forums

[legalquestions]

I come from the southern USA, and "going to the lake/river for the weekend" (or actually living on the lake/river) is quite popular. Skiing, tubing, fishing, fish fries, friends,lots of cold beer, party (pontoon) boats, etc. Very fun/relaxing, indeed. Know what I mean?

Does this "lake" culture exist here in Korea? If so, where? If not, why not?

[Underwaterbob]

I live in one of the most fresh-watery parts of Korea. There are a fair number of waterskiiers out on the rivers (not on the lake, it's the largest source of fresh water in the country) and you can pay to do a bit of it. Good swimming holes are a rarity. They've recently banned swimming at the best place I knew of (it got pretty damned crowded), and at a few other places that weren't that good to begin with.

It's only faintly like back home anyway. I miss having friends with camps on the lakeside. The lack of leeches here is nice.

[Robot_Teacher]

That sounds like good ol' Lake of the Ozarks for me. Personally I prefer small lakes and ponds sponsored by towns and the state conservation department. Do you find this lake culture in Korea? Sorry bud. Maybe a little, but nothing like back home. I haven't spent Summer in Korea, but I'm sure you can enjoy a lot more if you have a car or motorcycle.

I hear there is a big lake near Andong, Gyeongsangbuk Province where largemouth bass were stocked 30 years ago and are doing well, but I haven't gone. I've seen pictures of the Koreans having Basstracker looking boats to go out bass fishing. The local catfish specie only gets up to 1 pound and it loves leeches though it's in very low numbers with limited habitat so it's catch and release though no fishing laws exist in Korea. No provincial or state conservation departments policing the outdoors nor sponsoring fisheries to encourage higher fish populations.

They have many shallow smallish rivers winding through the valleys with local varieties of fish that are mostly tiny fishes Koreans keep to use in a homemade hot pepper soup. Koreans have pork belly slice BBQ's (samgyeopsal) next to the rivers now the weather is warming up, but commonly leave all their trash like plastic beer bottles and all other crap behind instead of picking up. Again, no concept of preserving the outdoors by leaving it as you found it.

EDIT* Korea has beaches so swimming, sunning, and water sports are on the oceans' edge rather than lakes. I went to Gyeongpo beach in Gangnueng a month ago and it was very pretty with no one around. The water was a clean looking cold clear darkish blue with a huge wide crescent brown course sand beach with small shells. It was strange not seeing palms and lots of people on a beach, but it was chilly coldness in April. I then looked on the internet a moment ago when doing a search to see a picture of what it's like in July to find it's massively packed sun umbrellas and chairs on every square inch of the brown sand. I suspected it was a Summer party place.