Ice Fishing festival in Korea is known as Hwacheon Sancheoneo(Mountain Trout) Ice Festival. There are many different events take place during winter. Some of the events are ice fishing, ice soccer and snowman making. There are more than 40 events take place and visitors from all over the world go to this festival and enjoy.
The ice festival was firstly set up by the farmer resident of the Gangwon-do 2o minutes from the Korean border. The farmers struggled a lot and they were able to make money during the long winters in mainly in ice festival. The idea of ice festival was introduced to pull the tourists as there were hardly any visitors outside of the military passing. To organize this ice festival they stopped the flow of one of their large rivers so that the area can be covered with the ice and then filled it with mountain trout that are abundance in this part of Korea. Lastly, they began the ice fishing. Now a day’s Hwacheon’s ice festival is not only limited to the ice fishing, it includes sledding, ice skating, ice bumper cars, ice football, an ice sculpture exhibition and much more. It pulls thousands of tourists every year who come from all over the world in groups and experience this festival.
Despite being on lake of ice, the sky was almost clear and it was not that cold also. This type of weather makes easy for the patient fisher to survive. And as the people eagerly waiting for the fish we can also notice that the other people eagerly stopping over their holes to catch the fish. Since, it is the winter season the school holiday is the longest holiday in Korea and the large population of Korean family along with their children come over the festival and enjoys their vacation. People come here with some well-equipped with camping chairs and hot drinks.
Some major programs of ice fishing are:
Sancheoneo Ice fishing
Despite the extreme cold, the tourists are alive and are found swimming underneath the thick ice. Those people craving some fresh fish can simply claim one of the over nine thousand holes drilled into the surface of the two-meter deep river and then they start fishing. But in this fishing the people have to keep changing their sear as the groups tend to keep moving from place to place.
Catch Sancheoneo with bare hands
In this type of fishing the luck matters a lot to catch a fish, but to catch a fish with our bare hands all we need is courage. There will be lots of excitement that we will easily forget the cold weather and starts enjoying it.
Trying out the Trout
This festival is not only about catching a fish but it’s about enjoying our fish catch. When we bring out the fish then we can take it to any of the counters that are scattered all over. The counters chef’s will cook the fish in front of the people and grilled it. It is sweet and tender. After having the dish will find that it will literally melt in our mouth.
World Winter City Square
World Winter City Square presents snow sculptures representing the winter culture of cities worldwide. This square offers a range of things like super-sized snow sculptures, World Winter hall, 4om-long LED tunnel, and a large watermill.
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