Yep, you CAN go skiing in South Korea. I went with friends Libby, Ken and Robert over the Chinese New Year (said no to the craziness of Chinese holiday periods once again) for a couple of days at Yong Pyong resort ('Enjoy your life? Say "YongPyong"'). We do, and we did.
According to the website, YongPyong was born in 1975 and is "innovating a new leisure culture known as "Korea's Ski Mecca" with a growing reputation as an internationally-renowned resort. " It is "located at a very inhabitable range of 700 meters above sea level." It's true, I have never know 700 metres above sea level to be so inhabitable. It offers excellent accomodation - "Adding to the usual anticipation and excitement that make up the joy of going on a trip, YongPyong offers the mystic wonder of falling asleep with this joy."
It was host to the 1999 Winter Asian Games and is trying to get the 2010 Winter Olympics, so the skiing is OK, although we had basically skied all the runs by the end of day two. It was challenging enough for me but a big boring for Ken, who grew up on skis (in Texas).
As well as being the host of the Winter Asian Games, YongPyong was also host to the famous Korean soap opera 'Winter Sonata', and if you need a break from skiing, you can take a tour of the filming location and "be moved by the passion once again". The movement of skiing was enough movement for us so we gave it a pass.
Anyway, I rediscovered skiing on this trip. The last time I went I tried snowboarding 
and spent a miserable day on my backside, after which I refused to go again. I think the time I went skiing before that it was freezing so I mainly had bad memories of skiing. However, this time the snow was fantastic, the temperature was perfect and I was with a great crowd, so had a fabulous time.
It was also my 29th birthday on the 2nd night of our trip and the gang took me out for dinner (including a cake that the waiter carried in!!) with a big drinking session afterwards (including tequila slammers). We had some heated drunken discussions and generally yelled loudly. The drinking session was especially effective in helping us sleep - our accomodation was in an 'ondol' which is basically a square room with a heated floor and a few blankets.
The other highlight was Libby and my trip to the "sauna" after a hard day's skiing. It turned out to be more of a communal bath than a sauna. They don't really do this in Australia but basically you walk around nude with all the ladies (if you're a lady) and go in different spas and saunas for as long as you can stand it. They had spas with various ingredients too. There was a slightly browny coloured spa we went it that was apparently some kind of tea. In China you can also go in spas with milk and beer (although not together).
