Herb Hillz - Daegu, South Korea

Part One.

Rockin’ awesome.  I love it.  I had heard about this place not long after I arrived in Korea and have been wanting to do it ever since. I was told they had amazing zip line obstacle courses and that sounded fantastically fun. Like a Nickelodeon show for adults. Lee Ann and I thought for our joint 30th celebration that this was the perfect thing to do!

(I was frustrated about the lack of information available in English online when I was searching for information to plan this. Because of that, this blog is going to be fun and educational. Sorry to those that it may bore.)

Daegu is located about 2 hours southwest of Daejeon so we took the 12 o’clock train out which gave enough time for all the out of town guests to make it on time.  Once we arrived in Daegu we took a 45 minute bus ride out to Herb Hillz.  It’s crazy to think that this huge amusement park is hidden up in the mountains.  As an “Eco Theme Park” it’s much more nature oriented than most of it’s American counterparts and therefore much less land destruction took place for it to be created.

 

Thank you, Korea!

and no crossing the street naked. Sorry, bad joke but he looks like he’s wearing nothing but shoes.

There are several things you can do in Herb Hillz from a petting zoo, arts and crafts, plenty of silly photo ops, and of course, the zip lines.  We knew the courses took an hour or more to complete so we made our way back there first.  Normally they do training on the hour but since our group was so large they made a special class for us. 

Left to right – Lee Ann, Emily, Maggie, Jessica, Nadia, Madelein, Renee, Marisol and me.  We are way more hardcore than we look.

Getting in our gear was quite the struggle.  Instead of helping the workers just watched and laughed.

This was our trainer.  He showed us how to use our pulley and carabiners and how to land our lines most effectively.  The training was great.  All 5 minutes of it.  Eek. 

I love this picture of Nadia!  First landing on the training course.

Birthday Girls!

Here is where this whole experience becomes Korean.  In America, we would all have had to sign release of liability forms before even touching the equipment.  Also, each obstacle would have a trained employee to ensure we connected ourselves correctly to the cables each time and would be there to help us in the event we got stuck, hurt, or otherwise impaired.  In Korea, no release papers and we received about five minutes of training before sending us off into the mountains.  It was so much better that way!  The freedom of flying through the mountains with 15 obstacles and no way down was pretty cool.  I loved every second of it.

Before I get into the actual obstacles, here’s a bit about the courses.  They had 6 courses to choose from, two for children, four for adults.  The four adult courses listed hard to hardest were Chimpanzee, Gorilla, King Kong, and Tarzan.  We had a group of 8 people, five chose the Chimpanzee, and Madelein, Lee Ann, and I chose the King Kong.  I had read in other blogs that the King Kong course, while not as hard as the Tarzan, is the longest (it took us 2 full hours) and most fun.  I had to do it.  I was also informed by all 5 girls that did the chimpanzee course that it was still pretty difficult.

(Ps. We are going again this weekend and I want to try the Tarzan course…if I can convince someone to do it with me.)

For people in Korea reading this – it’s a great event to plan with friends!  Park admittance is 19,000 won ($17 for you Americans) and it’s a full day of fun.  I absolutely recommend it! Probably the most fun that I’ve had in Korea since I moved here.

I love this picture of Lee Ann and I, too.  even if her eyes are closed.

I’ve just made an executive decision… This blog is already getting too long.  You probably aren’t even still reading.  I have photos from all 15 obstacles so I will post a separate blog for those.  Stay tuned…

Obstacle one… the crazy high rope ladder. And the last time my feet touched the ground for the next two hours.