CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A 442 km round trip from Byeonggok - roughly 8 h 50 in the saddle. On the way it passes Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon, Dodong-seowon, Okjeon Tumuli and back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Hamyang is a quiet county in the mountains of South Gyeongsang, on the eastern edge of Jirisan, the great massif in the south of the Korean peninsula, and Namgye-seowon stands on a gentle slope a few kilometres from the county town. Founded in 1552 to honour the Neo-Confucian scholar Jeong Yeo-chang, it was one of the earliest private academies in Korea and served as a model for many others. Its layout set a pattern: the lecture hall at the front, dormitories on either side, and the shrine for the rites at the top of the slope, so that the buildings climb the hill in a hierarchy of importance. Unusually, the dormitories have small raised pavilions overlooking ponds, where students could rest and contemplate the landscape. Namgye is part of the UNESCO listing of the Seowon, Korean Neo-Confucian Academies.
Read the complete Namgye-seowon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Namgye-seowon is where the day begins. Next is Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon.
High in the forested folds of Gayasan, in South Gyeongsang province, a temple keeps one of the great treasures of the Buddhist world. Haeinsa holds the Tripitaka Koreana, more than eighty thousand wooden printing blocks carved in the thirteenth century with the complete Buddhist scriptures, an act of devotion undertaken while the Mongols were invading Korea, in the hope that the Buddha's protection would save the country. The blocks are kept in the Janggyeong Panjeon, a pair of long, plain wooden halls built in the fifteenth century, and the halls are the real marvel. Their design uses natural ventilation, windows of different sizes on opposite walls, and a floor packed with charcoal, lime, clay and salt to regulate humidity and temperature, and they have protected the blocks for centuries without modern technology. The halls were listed by UNESCO in 1995.
Read the complete Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon comes up about 63 km into the recorded legs. Next is Dodong-seowon.
The ginkgo tree in front of Dodong-seowon is over four hundred years old, a massive trunk with branches spreading wide, and in early November it turns a brilliant yellow and sheds its leaves into a golden carpet that photographers come from all over Korea to see. Behind it, the academy itself climbs a gentle slope in a series of courtyards and wooden halls, with a view over the Nakdong river. Dodong-seowon was founded in the sixteenth century to honour Kim Goeng-pil, a Neo-Confucian scholar executed in a political purge, and it is one of the nine Seowon, Korean Neo-Confucian Academies, inscribed on the UNESCO list in 2019.
Read the complete Dodong-seowon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 119 km into the recorded legs you reach Dodong-seowon. Next is Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon, about halfway. Next is Okjeon Tumuli.
On a ridge above the Hwang river in Hapcheon County, a row of grassy mounds rises against the sky, each one the burial of a ruler or noble of Dara, one of the small kingdoms of the Gaya confederacy that flourished in the south of the Korean peninsula between the first and sixth centuries. Gaya was famous for its iron, traded across the region and to Japan, and its tombs held armour, weapons, horse gear, pottery and gold ornaments. The Okjeon tumuli are one of seven groups listed together by UNESCO in 2023 as the Gaya Tumuli.
Read the complete Okjeon Tumuli write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Okjeon Tumuli sits at 167 km, about halfway. Next is back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon comes up about 261 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Dodong-seowon.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Dodong-seowon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 317 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Dodong-seowon. Next is back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon, late in the day. Next is Namgye-seowon.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Namgye-seowon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 442 km.
Namgye-seowon → Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon → Dodong-seowon is 56 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Dodong-seowon → Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon → Okjeon Tumuli is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Okjeon Tumuli → back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon → back through Dodong-seowon is 56 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Dodong-seowon → back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Haeinsa Temple Janggyeong Panjeon → Namgye-seowon is 64 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.