Ice fishing festival attracts more than 1 million visitors

The ice fishing festival has attracted more than 1 million visitors in the northern town of Hwacheon. The visitor numbers has exceeded to this mark after eight years.

In just three weeks after its opening, according to the organizing committee and Hwacheon county officials the number of foreign visitors surpassed the 100,000 mark.

The festival, which is set to run from Jan. 4-26, marked its 11th anniversary this year. Since 2006, the number of visitors has surpassed the 1 million mark every year.

Since 2003, the festival attracted visitors to the Gangwon town some 118 kilometers north of Seoul, offering a variety of programs including ice fishing and sleigh riding. In 2011, the festival was not held due to an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.

Festival-goers bobbed their fishing lines in and out of some 15,000 holes drilled into the river ice to catch sancheoneo, a type of mountain trout.

Tickets for ice fishing, the main attraction at the festival, were sold out within three hours, according to the organizing committee.

Many of the visitors also enjoyed catching sancheoneo with bare hands and explored a high ice wall, it added.

Jeong Gab-cheol, head of Hwacheon County said that they plan to promote the ice fishing festival as a cultural event with a global touch. He also said that he appreciated all for helping in the festival for recording more than 1 million visitors for the eighth straight year.