The Changto pinery, Living Monument of Korea

Changto pinery is in Mt. Kumgang on the east coast of Korea. Mt. Kumgang is a world-famous mountain, known for its beautiful scenery with many waterfalls and ponds, and fantastic rocks, and cliffs. Mt. Kumgang is divided into Outer Kumgang, Inner Kumgang, and Sea Kumgang for its diverse natural beauty and peculiar scenery of different districts.

Changto pinery is in Outer Kumgang. It is called Changto or Armory because there was an armory keeping spears and other weapons in the pinery in the olden times.

The pinery covers an area of 0.18 square kilometers.

There grow pine trees of various heights and ages. Tall trees are usually 16 to 18 meters high and their root necks are 60 to 80 centimeters round. The evergreen coniferous pine trees have three-needle leaves. Female and male flowers bloom on one tree. Cone is egg-shaped. There are as many as 8,230 trees which have grown almost for 200 years.

The pinery has great decorative significance as the trees have unusually strong vitality and are clean and nice-looking. The Changto pinery has been designated and protected as living monument, adding beauty to Mt. Kumgang.