Hunting for Inwangsan's Mountain Spirits

These platforms were probably established there for military purposes.

I looked right and saw the bas reliefs staring back at me.

The way up.

Here are the first two, showing a wife and husband. The husband is eating a fried chicken drumstick and has a cat between his legs.

Here's the other, which shows a mountain god with a child and a tiger.

There is a bit of an altar in front of it.

I was curious what this was.

Here you can see both sites I found, side by side.

Closeups of all five figures.

This rock shape caught my eye. There's no indication anyone else made anything of it but it looked kind of like a human figure. The object in front is not an altar, probably the former base of a lamppost or something.

Looking back the way down.

Hard to tell from this picture but this is an incline I had to scramble up.

Part of the brush was cleared so these lines could be run down.

A log bridge.

This big rock had these odd impressions.

Bridge ahead.

This stump also made me do a doubletake.

Heading back.

Going downhill.

Another path up.

A very landscaped streambed. This water flows into Cheonggyecheon.

I returned after the city edition deadline and shot the reliefs in the dark.

The rock was different colours, probably due to the rain, which made it a little difficult to capture evenly.

This might be the best.

A very glowy look at the mountain god and his companions.

A little more sensible.

I had a bit more fun with the altar in front in this one.

This one looks more natural.

Someone had placed a coin on top of his ear.

I was shooting with long exposures painted either by a small flashlight or a speedlight. This was the speedlight.

This was the flashlight.

There was a tree off-frame to the right, and I managed to add some leave shadows by shining my light from behind them.