Best Places To Visit In South Korea
If you hear about Gyeonju or Daegu, you probably do not know how to place them in a specific place on the map. It may sound like Chinese, but little else. And it is that South Korea, a country in which these cities are located, has a good number of attractions and tourist places that we have never heard of.
We know that its capital is Seoul, that a few kilometers from it you can visit one of the most guarded borders in the world, the one that separates the two Koreas since 1953, and that is one of the ten world powers in the field of electronics.
The Koreans say that their country seems small but that, if they extended the mountains to create a flat territory, South Korea would be as big as China. Luckily for the moment they continue with the mountains, the distances are not long to get from one place to another and good transport.
With all in favor and these suggestions I think that after reading this local tour guides, you will be encouraged to travel to the Far East to spend a few days discovering the attractive and unknown South Korea.
Suwon and Hwaseong Fortress
There is no excuse for not visiting this city whose fortress is included in the list of UNESCO World Heritage sites. It can be reached by subway since the trip from Seoul only lasts one hour. Once in Suwon kilometers of built walls take advantage of the undulations of the land. You can walk on them and walk the perimeter of the old city. Observation towers, monumental doors, and guard posts are the elements that you will discover.
Once you have seen the wall, nothing better than going through the streets of the old city to visit the sanctuary and the palace guarded by soldiers dressed in the same costumes that they used at the time of the kings of Joseon, founders of Suwon. After the cultural visit, we must not forget to enjoy a walk through alleys in which the protagonist is urban art, or sit in one of the cozy cafes near the palace.
Bulguksa Temple
20 minutes from the center of the Korean city of Gyeongju is Mount Tomamsan, and on one of its slopes is this temple. It was built between the 6th and 8th centuries on different stone terraces. The upper part symbolizes the land of the Buddha and is attached to the lower level, the mundane part of the temple, by four staircases under which there was once a canal.
At its peak, it had 80 buildings. Today only a handful of them are conserved and those of wood are recent reconstructions. It is a very popular place among Koreans who come to him to enjoy the surroundings and know one of the most beautiful temples in the country.
Mount Namsan
They say in Gyeongju that who has not climbed Mount Namsan does not know the city. It is a visit that offers the traveler to enjoy that nature that Koreans like so much while looking for Buddha sculptures and carvings hidden among the vegetation.
This place in Korea, one of the last in the country that has become part of the World Heritage, has a special value and is that when the Buddhist temples were reserved for the nobles, the peasants and common people chose this mountain as the place to honor Buddha with these sculptures they made themselves.
Today, much of the mountain’s heritage has disappeared, but in a day’s walk, you can still make a good route through different sculptures and temples.
Traditional village of Jeonju
Just by visiting this village with a thousand years of history it is already worth traveling from Seoul to Jeonju. Once in this city, it is enough to get on a bus that in 15 minutes takes you to this village, which with 700 houses is the largest set of hanoks in South Korea.
Walking through it is going back in time while discovering other buildings such as temples, shrines and Confucian schools. In addition, this place is perfect to be encouraged to wear a hanbok, the traditional Korean dress, and pose thus dressed with an ideal background for the photos that you will bring home as a souvenir.