The 1st Yeokku Island Ice Sled Festival was held for a single day on January 31 at Yeokku Island, in front of Yodo Village in Garye-myeon, Uiryeong-gun, South Gyeongsang Province. It was the first event in which residents themselves revived the village's winter memories of turning the frozen waterside into a playground. It was a day when the villagers set the date and welcomed guests on their own, rather than a schedule that began from an administrative proposal.
At the center of the festival is the sled on the ice, just as the name says. The sleds of country children in the past were made by driving thick wire into the underside of a plank, and riders pushed themselves along by stabbing the ice with an awl held in each hand. The sound of the wire cutting the ice is closer to a rustle than a metallic ring, and a cold smell of mixed earth and water hangs low over the frozen water.
Most winter games have disappeared. They were games that required rivers and rice paddies to freeze, and the generation that remembers those sensations in the body grows smaller each year. That is why the residents deliberately named it the 1st.
In the autumn of the same year, the 31st Busan International Film Festival runs in Busan for ten days, from October 6 to 15. Screenings revolve around the Busan Cinema Center, and the full lineup of invited films is announced on September 1. A large festival has prepared theaters and a fixed schedule, while a small village festival has the condition that the water must freeze.
The small scale is this event's weakness and at the same time the condition that makes it possible. If the festival grows, the ice becomes an object of safety facilities and management, and the share the village had carried passes outside. Conversely, if it keeps its current size, it may fade away with one generation without being recorded. Having finished its first edition, Yodo Village has until next winter to find an answer somewhere in between.
The ice does not disappear because the festival has ended. The waterside in February is still cold, and the dry reeds rustle in the wind. Visitors to Yeokku Island can walk slowly through that winter scenery instead of the day crowded with people. Whether a second festival will be held remains for the village to decide.
Event Information
Date: Saturday, January 31, 2026, one day
Venue: Yeokku Island, Yodo Village, Garye-myeon, Uiryeong-gun, South Gyeongsang Province
