Today we went to the DMZ and it was pretty awesome. The DMZ (De-Militarized Zone) is the border between North and South Korea. We (Alicia, Liz, Nikki and I) started the trip at 6:30am, when we left the hotel in Itaewon to head for the subway to get to Camp Kim (the tour was through one of the US military offices). It was an hour and a half bus ride to get from Seoul to the DMZ and we had to go through 2 security checkpoints where they checked our passports. The we went to the US army base and got a tour of the DMZ. I took a lot of pictures, but there were some places where we couldn't take pictures for security purposes.
Then we went to the 3rd Infiltration tunnel which is where the North Koreans dug a tunnel to try and break into South Korea. This is one of a few tunnels that they have found, though they estimate that there are as many as 14 tunnels that they haven't found yet. I even took a picture of Alicia in the tunnel, though I'm not sure if I was supposed too :-)
Then it was off to Dorasan Observatory where you can look through binoculars at North Korea. There really are no trees on the mountains in North Korea. The ROK (Republic of Korea) soldier explained to us that it was due to all the logging that the NK's had done because of their energy crisis.
Then it was time to head back onto the bus for the journey back to Seoul. All 4 of us fell asleep almost immediately on the bus... we were exhausted.
Then I head back to Osan, due to a lack of funding (luckily I get paid on Wednesday).
Check out my photo album for pictures of the DMZ:
http://www.imagestation.com/album/pictures.html?id=3728370093&code=13518213&mode=invite&DCMP=isc-email-AlbumInvite
The DMZ pictures are 484-508 and I have tried to label most of them!
