Suwon is an old walled fortress, much of which still remains. There was a festival recently with many activities around the walls in different places. So I toddled off to look around and see what was there.

As it turned out, there was a parade going on (of course we went by bus, and naturally it was diverted, caught in a traffic jam, and we had to walk a ways to get there ... but that was fun too:-)

south gate

The parade left the "south gate" and headed around the city, so since I was there to walk the wall rather than sus out the parade, I watched it for about 20 min, then headed on up the wall.

wall

The walls are in very good condition (probably restored in many places) and I took the steepest path up to the west. There was a good view of the city from the parapets, as you can see in the video below its pretty urbanised

parapets

If you look at that cathedral, it looks like there's a multi storey carpark there doesn't it!!

Carpark Cathedral

I'm not sure if its a drive-in cathedral, but I'll have to go sus it out sooner or later.

There are turrets at regular intervals, and all are painted up with interesting designs around the window shutters. Perhaps you can make out the arrow hole, and sighting slots in the middle of the shutters ...

turrets

From along the top of the ridge, we head down again ... you can see that its at quite an elevation, and actually takes advantage of a long high ridge for making a natural defence.

going down

All the roofs have interesting designs where the support posts for the tiles are turned into features

gates

another entry gate, there's quite a few along the walk :-)

gates

Next we came to a part that's quite close to the University. Here they were starting a concert, and later fireworks (after I got home :-(

gates

Its amazing, that I could just walk along the wall (along with everyone else) right behind the preparations for the show, sure there were a few police, but its amazing that there is no massive security or blocking people from walking where they want to...

Actually, its worth mentioning at this point, you'll notice that there is not a single bit of grafitti, or vandalism anywhere to be found. NOTHING ... much like Japan for that matter I think that the civic sence of these people is a lesson for western people.

gates

As we were getting around behind the concert, we noticed a long line of drummers comming towards us, and we had to hug the wall a bit while they went past.

It was great! people were really happy, and bouncie, almost everyone waved at us, and tried to say "HELLO" in english. Not a single person seemed to think that we were in the wrong place, or acting like we were 'in their way'

gates

So, finally it back to the beginning ... hope you enjoyed the trip too!