Travel Information

A precise survey in 2005 corrected the height to 1,947m (1,947.06m); the 1,950m printed on older maps is the outdated figure. You only need a reservation if you are going all the way up to the summit crater, Baengnokdam (백록담) — 1,000 people a day on the Seongpanak (성판악) trail and 500 on the Gwaneumsa (관음사) trail, with the whole of the following month released at once at 09:00 on the first working day of each month. Seongpanak as far as Jindallaebat, 7.3km, and Gwaneumsa as far as Samgakbong, 6km, are open without a booking, and so is the 4-5 hour route up to Witseoreum (윗세오름) from Eorimok or Yeongsil. Allow 8-10 hours round trip if you are going to the top.

The "about 500m" quoted for Seoul Sky, the observatory spread over floors 117 to 123, is measured from the ground rather than from sea level: the highest deck, on the 123rd floor, is 497.65m up, and the glass-floored Sky Deck on the 118th floor is at 478m, the highest glass floor anywhere in the world. Jamsil Station on subway lines 2 and 8 runs straight into the building underground, so you arrive dry even in the rain, and the slot half an hour before sunset is worth booking ahead.

At the 48th session of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, held in Busan in July 2026, the flats of Seosan, Yeosu, Goheung and Muan were added, so the World Natural Heritage property "Getbol, Korean Tidal Flats" now covers six areas totalling 1,563.86km², of which Sinan makes up around 70% (the 85% you may still see quoted was the figure at the 2021 inscription). At high tide it is simply sea, so read a tide table and go at low water; Jeungdo (증도) and Jaeundo (자은도), reached from Mokpo by causeway or ferry, are the easiest to visit.

The 510km river and the 385km cycle path are two different numbers. If you are planning a ride of several days, the figure that matters is the 385km Nakdonggang cycle route from Andong Dam to the estuary barrage in Busan. If you only want a taste of it, pick a single spot — the migratory birds at Eulsukdo (을숙도) in Busan, or Hahoe Village (하회마을) in Andong, where the river loops right around the houses.

The road around the island, National Route 12, is 181km rather than the 200km people usually quote, so a rental car gets you right around it in a day. Without an international driving permit you can still reach the main sights on the red express buses in the 100s (101 to 182) and by taxi — the 1100 you see signposted is the name of a road, not a bus number. It is about an hour by air from Gimpo Airport in Seoul, and as the busiest domestic route in the world it has no shortage of seats.

When the hall was taken apart for repair in 1972, a record of a renovation in 1363 came to light, which places the original building in the early 1200s. It is not a lavish main hall but one restrained gable-roofed structure, so come in the spirit of standing in front of 800-year-old wooden pillars rather than expecting grandeur. It is one of the seven temples in the UNESCO property "Sansa, Buddhist Mountain Monasteries in Korea", and most people pair it with Hahoe Village in the same city for a single day out.

A toll cut on 18 December 2025 brought the charge down to 2,000 won for a passenger car (1,000 won for a light car, 3,500 won mid-size, 4,500 won large), which is now cheaper than the 3,200 won on the upper deck of Yeongjong Bridge — the 6,000-won figure still floating around dates from before 2017. This is the bridge the airport buses and taxis take between Incheon International Airport and Gangnam or Songdo, so you cross 12.3km of open sea on your first day without setting any time aside for it.

Board an SRT high-speed train at Suseo Station and you run underground for about 15 minutes straight from departure — that is this tunnel, so save the window for the approach to Pyeongtaek-Jije Station. It is the fourth longest tunnel in the world, after the Gotthard in Switzerland, the Seikan in Japan and the Channel Tunnel. Express buses from Seoul to Sokcho and Yangyang take about seven minutes to pass through the Inje-Yangyang Tunnel, the longest road tunnel in the country.

It covers 70km² and holds more water than any other artificial lake in the country, which is why people call it the inland sea — and the boats crossing it are real transport rather than a sightseeing ride. Ferries run from the Soyanggang Dam pier to Cheongpyeongsa (청평사) from 09:00 to 17:00, 15 minutes each way, so half a day is plenty. Chuncheon is about an hour from Cheongnyangni Station in Seoul on the ITX-Cheongchun (1 hour 10 to 20 minutes if you board at Yongsan), and a city bus runs from Chuncheon Station out to the dam.

Sources disagree on the height: UNESCO astronomical heritage documents give 9.17m, the sign on site says 9.4m, and measuring down to the lowest base stone gives 9.51m. Its name as a National Treasure is simply "Cheomseongdae, Gyeongju" with no number attached — designation numbers were abolished in November 2021, so "No. 31" is no longer used. You do not go inside; it is a stone structure you walk around, and 15 minutes is enough. The lawn is free to visit and the tower is floodlit after dark, which makes it better as part of an evening walk taking in Daereungwon (대릉원) and Donggung Palace and Wolji Pond.

The largest traditional market in the country began in 1414, when the authorities put up shops beside the Namdaemun gate and rented them out; today it covers roughly 66,000m² with more than 10,000 shops. Note that the first permanent market in Korea was Gwangjang Market (광장시장), opened in 1905, so Namdaemun is the biggest but not the oldest. It is a five-minute walk from exits 5, 6 and 7 of Hoehyeon Station on subway line 4, and since the trade is mainly wholesale it is liveliest from dawn through the morning. Many shops shut on Sundays, so come on a weekday.

City buses 10 and 11 take 35 to 45 minutes from central Gyeongju to Bulguksa, and opposite the Bulguksa car park you change to the number 12 shuttle for the 20-minute climb up to Seokguram. That shuttle leaves Bulguksa from 08:40 to 16:40 and only once an hour, so anything earlier means a taxi or a 50-minute walk — build your day around it. The main Buddha at Seokguram is normally seen through a glass wall and photography inside is not allowed, but on Buddha's Birthday you can go in and walk around the statue.

It closes on Tuesdays, and on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays the only way in is a guided tour leaving at a set time. If you would rather wander slowly on your own without booking, come on a Saturday, Sunday, public holiday, or the last Wednesday of the month, which is Culture Day. There are separate tours in English (10:00, 12:00, 14:00 and 16:00), Japanese (from 09:40, every two hours) and Chinese (11:00 and 15:00), so no Korean is needed. The palace joined to the shrine by the walled path is Changgyeonggung, not Changdeokgung, and the two together make half a day.

The rear garden, Huwon (후원), needs its own 5,000-won ticket on top of the 3,000-won adult ticket for the palace buildings, and each tour takes a fixed number of people, so tickets go on sale online at 10:00 six days before the date and are sold first come, first served. In high season booking ahead is effectively compulsory, and only leftover tickets are sold at the gate. Wearing hanbok gets you into the four main palaces and Jongmyo for nothing, but the Huwon is not covered — you still pay the 5,000 won.

Walking the full 5.74km circuit takes two to three hours, and Suwon is an hour from Seoul on the subway, so it works as a day trip. Since March 2024 the Hwaseong tourist trolley has run only as a loop from Yeonmudae (closed Mondays, 20 departures a day, 6,000 won for adults), covering the 30-minute Yeonmudae to Hwahongmun to Janganmun to Hwaseomun stretch as far as the north side of Maehyanggyo; it does not climb the Paldalsan section where Seojangdae stands, so it is no substitute for walking. The walls themselves are open all year, so Janganmun and Seojangdae are there to be seen lit up on any night, but the evening opening of Hwaseong Haenggung palace runs only from May to November, Friday to Sunday, 18:00 to 21:30.

Hahoe is 40 to 50 minutes from Andong bus terminal on city bus 210, fare 1,500 won (route 246 became 210 in the 2022 reorganisation, so ignore older directions). The regular Hahoe Byeolsingut Talnori mask performance is held at the training hall inside the village at 14:00 — Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from March to December, Wednesday to Sunday in July and August, and Saturdays and Sundays in January and February. Yangdong is 35 to 40 minutes from Gyeongju intercity bus terminal on bus 203, but the buses run only about every 100 minutes, so check the time of your return before you set off. Neither place is a museum: people still live in these houses, so leave the courtyards and verandas to them.

Six of the seven take overnight temple stay guests. Buseoksa in Yeongju does not run one — the "Buseoksa" that appears on the booking site is a different temple of the same name in Seosan, Chungnam — so choose between Tongdosa in Yangsan, Bongjeongsa in Andong, Beopjusa in Boeun, Magoksa in Gongju, Seonamsa in Suncheon and Daeheungsa in Haenam. The easiest to reach by public transport is Tongdosa, an hour from Busan or Ulsan, and whether a temple runs its programme in English varies from one to the next, so ask before you book.

Admission is free or very cheap and coach parties are rare, which makes these the place to recover when the crowds at the palaces have worn you down. Dosan Seowon and Byeongsan Seowon are both in Andong, so you can fold them into a day with Hahoe Village, and sitting in the Mandaeru pavilion at Byeongsan looking out over the Nakdonggang river is the moment people remember. Official information is at k-seowon.or.kr (in English at en.k-seowon.or.kr); koreanseowon.com, which still turns up in searches, is a dead domain that now redirects somewhere else entirely.

The mounds themselves are grassy hills and look like very little with no explanation, so see the Daeseong-dong Tombs Museum or the Daegaya Museum next door first and the walk up feels like a different place altogether. The Daeseong-dong tumuli in Gimhae are the easiest to get to, on the subway from Busan or Gimhae Airport, and there is almost no shade on the hill, so give the middle of the day a miss in midsummer.

Since May 2025 the reservation zone on Hallasan has been pulled back to the summit area: Seongpanak to Jindallaebat (7.3km) and Gwaneumsa to Samgakbong (6km) need no booking, and only the final stretch to the Baengnokdam crater does (1,000 people a day from Seongpanak and 500 from Gwaneumsa, the whole of the next month released at 09:00 on the first working day, with penalties if you book and do not turn up). Manjanggul (만장굴) reopened on 30 May 2026 and is open 09:00 to 18:00 (last entry 17:00, 4,000 won for adults, closed the first Wednesday of each month); the 1km open section stays between 5 and 15 degrees, so take a jacket even in midsummer. Geomunoreum (거문오름) is by reservation only and closed on Tuesdays (064-710-8980), and the Samgakbong to Baengnokdam stretch of the Gwaneumsa trail, shut for works, reopens at 05:00 on 24 September.

The same place is open sea at one hour and mudflat at the next, so check the tide tables from the Korea Hydrographic and Oceanographic Agency before you fix a time, or you will have made the trip for nothing. For a first visit, Suncheon Bay is the safe choice, with its boardwalk through the reeds and the Yongsan viewpoint, and if you want flocks of migratory birds such as hooded cranes, come between October and March. The 48th World Heritage Committee in Busan in July 2026 added the flats of Yeosu, Goheung, Muan and Seosan, so the World Natural Heritage tidal flats now lie across nine municipalities.

A complete performance runs three or four hours, and Chunhyangga can stretch to six or eight, which is a great deal for a first encounter. Better to start with a one or two hour selection, such as the Saturday Masterpiece series at Umyeondang in the National Gugak Center in Seoul (Saturdays at 15:00, 30,000 won for A seats and 20,000 won for B). Plenty of performances carry English surtitles, and if you want the full thing, time your trip for the Jeonju International Sori Festival in summer (the 25th edition runs 12 to 16 August 2026 at the Sori Arts Center of Jeollabuk-do).

It began as a circle dance that women performed hand in hand on the nights of Chuseok and the first full moon of the year, so it is not a show running whenever you happen to turn up. It sometimes appears on the bill of the Jindo Saturday Folk Travel programme, held at the Jindo Folk Culture Center at 14:00 every Saturday alongside Jindo Ssitgimgut and the Jindo drum dance, so check the monthly programme on the Jindo County tourism site, or ring the county tourism office on 061-544-2181, before you set out.

The Seoul Kimjang Culture Festival that keeps coming up in searches has not been held since 2019, so do not trust the old listings and head for Seoul Plaza in November. For hands-on kimjang in season, look at the Gwangju Kimchi Festival (062-613-3955) or the charity kimjang events run by local councils, welfare centres and companies. Out of season, Museum Kimchikan in Insa-dong, Seoul (Tuesday to Sunday 10:00 to 18:00, 5,000 won for adults, closed Mondays) has permanent exhibits and tastings — though the kimchi-making session is not a walk-in: book on the website at least four days ahead.

The surest place to see it is the regular Hahoe Byeolsingut Talnori performance at the training hall inside Hahoe Village in Andong. Time your visit for the Andong International Mask Dance Festival (24 September to 4 October in 2026, around Andong Mask Dance Park and Hahoe Village) and you can take in mask dances from several regions in a single day. The comedy is physical and mostly at the expense of the nobility, so you will be laughing along without following a word — leave the language worries at home.

The 24 basic letters, 14 consonants and 10 vowels, will get you through 커피 (coffee) and 라면 (ramyeon), but to read the signs and menus you will actually meet — 카페 (cafe), 빵 (bread), 떡볶이 (tteokbokki) — you need the five double consonants (ㄲㄸㅃㅆㅉ) and 11 compound vowels on top, 40 letters in all, plus the rules for the final consonant. The system itself clicks in a day, so run through the 40-letter chart before you fly and within a few days you will be sounding words out. The National Hangeul Museum in Yongsan is closed until the second half of 2028 while fire damage from February 2025 is repaired and an extension is built, with only outdoor programmes running, so go instead to Sejong Story, the underground exhibition hall beneath the King Sejong statue at Gwanghwamun.

In a hanok stay you lay out a mattress and sleep on a warm floor instead of a bed. Shoes come off at the entrance, and you turn the heating up yourself on the thermostat in the room. On Bukchon-ro 11-gil in the Bukchon Hanok Village in Seoul, visitors are restricted to 10:00 until 17:00 to protect the residents, and going in for sightseeing outside those hours carries a 100,000-won fine — but guests staying in that block are exempt, so check where your lodging is when you book. Jeonju Hanok Village has 735 hanok among its 947 buildings and some 160 of them take overnight guests, so there is plenty of choice.

The policy has been in place since October 2013, so in hanbok you walk straight past the ticket office — but it only counts if you wear a jeogori jacket with a matching skirt or trousers. A jeogori over jeans, a durumagi coat on its own or a T-shirt-style modern hanbok does not qualify. The Huwon garden at Changdeokgung costs 5,000 won even in hanbok, and Jongmyo is guided-tour-only by default: you can walk it freely on Saturdays, Sundays, public holidays and the last Wednesday of the month. Rental runs 10,000 to 20,000 won for two hours and 25,000 to 40,000 won for four hours or a full day, and of the four main palaces only Gyeongbokgung closes on Tuesdays.

Kimchi and the other side dishes are usually refilled free, so "deo juseyo" — more, please — is all it takes, and since the seasoning of baechu kimchi, kkakdugi, chonggak kimchi and mul kimchi changes from region to region, comparing them is half the fun. Museum Kimchikan in Insa-dong (5,000 won for adults) opens Tuesday to Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00, with last entry at 17:30, so a late afternoon still works. It closes on Mondays and on 1 January, Seollal, Chuseok and 25 December; the audio guide comes in Korean, English, Japanese and Chinese, though the live docent talks are in Korean only and the kimchi-making session has to be booked in advance. Small supermarket packs of soy sauce, doenjang and gochujang travel home well in checked baggage.

Since the pandemic a great many have dropped late-night and overnight service and now run as saunas only, so "jjimjilbang are all 24 hours" no longer holds. If you mean to spend the whole night, check before you go that the place is open around the clock and takes sleepers; mostly it is the larger ones that still do. The bathing pools are separated by sex and used naked, while the heated rooms, the main hall and the canteen, where you wear the issued jjimjilbang clothes, are mixed — the sleeping rooms are usually separated again. Charges go on the wristband holding your locker key and you settle up on the way out, and some places still turn away visible tattoos, so it is safer to ask first.

There is no admission charge, and the local way to do it is to buy a picnic mat at the convenience store, use the instant ramyeon cooker and have fried chicken delivered. The 41.5km you often see is the length of the Hangang within Seoul, from Gangil-dong in Gangdong-gu to Gaehwa-dong in Gangseo-gu; add up the 11 park districts and it comes to about 81.9km, around 8.96㎢ in all. In summer the outdoor pools at Ttukseom and Yeouido open from mid-June to the end of August at 5,000 won for adults (3,000 won at the Gwangnaru, Jamsil, Nanji and Yanghwa water play areas), and the Seoul International Fireworks Festival is held at Yeouido on the first Saturday of October. Ttareungi, the public bike scheme, is a fine way to ride the riverside.

The last subway trains go around midnight, and after that Seoul has 14 Owl Bus night routes for 2,500 won with a transit card. The 23:00 to 06:00 window is the range the city publishes, while individual routes generally run from about midnight until three or four in the morning, so check the real times on Naver Map or KakaoMap — most of these route numbers start with N. Convenience stores came to 55,552 across the four main chains in 2024 (GS25 18,812, CU 18,458, 7-Eleven 12,152, emart24 6,130), so cash machines, parcel drop-offs and transit card top-ups are never far away, and a 24-hour gukbap place will feed you at four in the morning.

Baemin has taken foreign-issued cards and Apple Pay since May 2026, and thanks to an agreement signed with the Seoul city government on 29 July 2026 you can order without a Korean phone number; the app runs in Korean, English and several other languages. In the Hangang parks you give one of the designated delivery zones inside the park instead of an address, and the city added more of them in September 2026. Orders from foreign users in the first half of 2026 were about four times what they were a year earlier, with chicken up 281% and the clear favourite — just remember that a delivery fee and a minimum order value come on top of the price of the food.

The blossom climbs north from the south over about two weeks, so when Jinhae is in full bloom Seoul is still in bud. No passenger trains run to Jinhae — passenger service on the Jinhae line ended in 2015 — so take an intercity bus from the Seobu terminal at Sasang in Busan, or a KTX to Changwon Jungang or Masan and change to a bus there. For the Yeouido spring flower festival in Seoul, 3 to 7 April, exits 1 and 6 at National Assembly Station on subway line 9 are closest, and line 9 adds extra trains at weekends. Yeouinaru Station on line 5 is on the far side of the island and leaves you a long way round.

It does not rain for a solid month — of those 31.5 average days, rain actually falls on 17.7, so it pours and then clears, over and over. That said, the moment a heavy rain warning goes up, national park trails, valleys and island ferries are closed, so it is safer to base yourself in a city where you can switch to an indoor plan. It comes just before the summer peak, so rooms are among the cheapest of the year — just check the bad-weather cancellation terms when you book.

Opening dates differ from beach to beach. Jeju opens on 24 June and Haeundae and Songjeong on 26 June, but Gwangalli waits until 1 July, and Gyeongpo in Gangneung and Daecheon in Boryeong only open on 4 July and close again on 23 August. Peak-season rates run 1.3 to 1.8 times the usual, and weekend pensions and glamping sites can more than double, so if you want a quiet sea, aim for late June to early July or after 20 August — and go to Haeundae, Gwangalli or Jeju, which are still open then. Lifeguards and marked swimming areas only operate during the official season, so it is best not to go in once a beach has closed.

An average of 3.4 typhoons affect Korea in a year, most often in August (1.2), then July (1.0) and September (0.8) — the autumn ones in September are fewer but stronger, and tend to do the most damage. When one tracks north, the first things to stop are the flights and ferries to Jeju and Ulleungdo, so for a late-summer island trip leave a spare day before you fly home and book somewhere that allows same-day cancellation. Forecast tracks are published up to five days, 120 hours, ahead on the English site of the Korea Meteorological Administration (weather.go.kr).

A warm September and October have put the colour about nine days behind normal in 2026: the first leaves turn on Seoraksan on 3 October and the peak falls on 25 October. It moves south 20 to 25km a day, peaking in the central region between 31 October and 5 November, on Jirisan on 5 November and on Naejangsan on 11 November — so "a weekend in mid-October", picked from memory of other years, is still too early for Seoraksan. Sokcho and the Seoraksan area need booking two months out for the peak weekend of 24 and 25 October; if you have left it late, moving to the south in the second week of November, to Naejangsan or Jirisan, is far easier going.

The big resorts deep in Gangwon open first — Mona Yongpyong and Phoenix Pyeongchang on 21 November, High1 in Jeongseon on 28 November — and they close late too: Mona Yongpyong on 31 March, O2 Resort in Taebaek on 22 March, High1 in mid-March. The ones that shut in early March are the resorts near Seoul, such as Konjiam and Welli Hilli, so head for Gangwon if you are coming at the tail end of the season. The snow festivals are more than two weeks apart, Taebaeksan from 31 January to 8 February and Daegwallyeong from 13 to 22 February, and with the KTX from Seoul to Gangneung taking about 1 hour 50 minutes, even a day trip works.

Chuseok itself falls on Friday 25 September 2026, and with no substitute holiday the break runs Thursday to Sunday, 24 to 27 September. Seollal 2027 lands on Sunday 7 February, so Tuesday the 9th becomes a substitute holiday and the break is 6 to 9 February. On these few days the entire country moves to its home town: motorway journeys take two or three times as long, and KTX and express bus tickets sell out within moments of booking opening, so keep long journeys off those dates. Central Seoul and Busan, on the other hand, go quiet and rooms get cheaper, though many family-run restaurants and shops close — it is worth noting where the convenience stores and big shopping malls are in advance.

The air has been getting steadily better: the annual average for PM2.5 in 2024 was 15.6㎍/㎥, the lowest since records began, and the winter average of 20㎍/㎥ from December to March is only 45 to 50% above the 13 to 14㎍/㎥ of April to November. Bad days come and go over a day or two, so rather than writing off your plans, check the AirKorea app the evening before and swap an outdoor day for an indoor one. Yellow dust is most frequent in April, 2.5 days in an average year, and worst in the west, so pack a KF94 mask for spring hiking or a ride along the Hangang; if your lungs are sensitive, the Yeongdong coast of Gangwon or Jeju, at around 12㎍/㎥ a year, is much kinder.

How long the Airport Railroad takes depends on which terminal you land at. From Terminal 1 it is 43 minutes to Seoul Station on the express and 59 on the all-stop train; from Terminal 2, used by Korean Air, Delta, Air France, KLM and others, it is 51 and 66. The express does not take transit cards and needs a reserved-seat ticket, around 11,000 won one way for an adult, so unless you have a mountain of luggage the all-stop train or a limousine bus at 60 to 80 minutes is easier. Out in Gyeonggi, the GTX-A runs Seoul Station to Unjeong Jungang in Paju in 21 minutes (opened December 2024) and subway line 1 reaches Suwon in an hour, so keep your room in Seoul and make these day trips.

With the KTX to Gangneung, choosing your departure station is the whole game. From Seoul Station the fastest service is 1 hour 54 minutes and most take around two hours, but from Cheongnyangni it is 1 hour 26 to 1 hour 45. Sokcho still has no railway — the Chuncheon to Sokcho high-speed line is due in the second half of 2027 — so take an express bus from the East Seoul terminal, 2 hours 20 to 30 minutes; the intercity bus from the same terminal takes 3 hours 30, so make sure you pick the express. In the ski season and at the height of the summer beach season trains sell out days ahead, so it is safer to book on the Korail Talk app or at letskorail.com.

The fastest KTX-Cheongnyong covers Seoul Station to Daejeon in 52 minutes and most services take a little over an hour, which makes it the lightest journey in the country. Note that the Gyeongbu and Honam high-speed lines part company at Osong, so KTX trains to Gwangju and Mokpo do not call at Daejeon at all — fitting in a stop at Sungsimdang bakery in Daejeon only makes sense on a Busan or Dongdaegu itinerary. If you are heading for Gwangju or Mokpo instead, get off at Gongju on the Honam line and give half a day to the Baekje Historic Areas in Gongju and Buyeo, inscribed by UNESCO in 2015; Buyeo has no station of its own, so change to a bus at Gongju or Nonsan.

The fastest KTX on the Jeolla line runs Yongsan to Jeonju in 1 hour 23 to 26 minutes, though in practice many take around 1 hour 40, and there are roughly 20 a day. From Jeonju Station to the Hanok Village is about 25 minutes on city buses 119, 79, 508 or 999, or 7,000 to 8,000 won by taxi. Most hanbok rental shops take walk-ins, so there is no need to book, and the old centre of Gunsan, with its surviving early modern architecture, is about an hour away on the intercity buses that leave Jeonju terminal every 20 minutes — Gunsan Station is a full 10km from the historic quarter, so arriving by train means another change.

From Yongsan the fastest KTX takes 2 hours 15 minutes to Mokpo, 2 hours 40 to Yeosu-Expo (2 hours 55 on average, up to 3 hours 8 on a slow one) and 1 hour 36 to Gwangju-Songjeong, usually 1 hour 46 to 2 hours 4. Some Mokpo trains go by way of Seodaejeon and take over 3 hours 35, so check the journey time as you book. Yeosu is all about the night view over the water, so a night there beats a day trip, and Suncheon Bay is at its best towards sunset — travel in the morning and keep the afternoon free, but look up the last entry time, which changes with the season.

Seoul Station to Gyeongju Station, renamed from Singyeongju in 2023, is 2 hours 4 to 10 minutes by KTX, and Andong is about two hours from Cheongnyangni on the KTX-Eum, with four services a day in each direction running through to Seoul Station since 29 December 2024. Gyeongju Station is out in Geoncheon-eup rather than in town, so what happens after you get off matters more: Hwangnidan-gil and Daereungwon are 20 minutes by taxi (15,000 to 17,000 won with the combined surcharge) or 30 by city bus, and Bulguksa is 50 to 60 minutes on seat buses 700 and 711, which run only four to ten times a day, so allow for a taxi at 30 to 40 minutes or a rental car. If you are staying within central Gyeongju, plenty of people simply hire a bicycle.

The KTX-Cheongnyong, stopping only at Daejeon and Dongdaegu, is quickest at 2 hours 17 minutes; ordinary KTX services with more stops take 2 hours 40 to 3 hours, and some more than 3 hours 20. The advantage is stepping off right in the middle of the city at Busan Station, but getting from there to Haeundae means line 1 to Seomyeon and a change to line 2, 48 to 55 minutes including the walk between platforms — do not budget 40. Tongyeong and Geoje still have no railway, since the Nambu Inland line has not been built, so change to a bus at the Sasang intercity terminal in Busan or somewhere similar.

It is 1 hour 5 to 15 minutes from Gimpo and the busiest route in the world by seats offered, but capacity is down 16% on last year, so do not count on picking up a ticket on the day in high season. Flying is not the only way in: ferries run from Mokpo, Wando, Yeosu, Busan and Incheon and will carry your car, so driving on instead of renting is an option (visitors in 2025 numbered 13,846,961). On the island the buses are infrequent enough that a rental car is effectively the default, and foreign visitors need an international driving permit. Cancellations are common in the typhoon season in August and September, so leave a spare day before your flight home.

Ulleung Airport is aiming to open in the first half of 2028 (76% complete as of March 2026), so there are still no flights: take a KTX to Donghae (Mukho) or Pohang and then a boat. Mukho in Donghae is the only route left from Gangwon, at 2 hours 40 minutes; the Gangneung service ended on 31 October 2025 with no clear prospect of resuming, and Hupo in Uljin is suspended. From Pohang the Eldorado Express fast ferry sails once a day each way at 09:50, about 2 hours 50 minutes, while the overnight car ferry from Yeongilman Port takes more than six hours. Sailings are cancelled whenever the swell is up, so keep a spare day in hand — and Dokdo is a 3 hour 30 to 4 hour round trip from Ulleungdo, with about one visit in five turning back without landing because of the waves.

Convenience stores and the machines in subway stations top up with cash only, so keep some notes on you; you can also top up by transfer at a bank cash machine or through the Mobile T-money app. Changing from subway to bus costs nothing extra if you tap within 30 minutes of getting off (60 minutes between 21:00 and 07:00, up to five transfers). The short-term Climate Card (기후동행카드) pass that appears in guidebooks was discontinued in 2026, and its successor, the Climate Card Pass, is only for people registered as residents of Seoul — so as a visitor, top up a T-money card and ride with that.

On 1 September 2026 SRT was merged into KTX, so the trains leaving Suseo Station are all KTX now and booking is done entirely in the one Korail+ app. Fares came down about 10% with the merger, taking Seoul to Busan from 59,800 to 54,400 won, but weekend and holiday tickets sell out days in advance, so book as soon as your dates are settled. If you are touring several cities, compare the fares against the KORAIL PASS, which is sold to foreign visitors only.

Google Maps does not give proper walking or driving directions in Korea. Export of high-precision map data was conditionally approved in February 2026, but it may be slow to show up in the service, so it is safer to install Naver Map and KakaoMap side by side. Both have English interfaces and will tell you live bus arrival times and even which subway car to ride in for the quickest transfer. Call taxis with KakaoT, but it needs a registered payment method, so set that up before you arrive.

Both numbers work around the clock with no area code and no call charge. If you cannot manage Korean, say "Help, English please" in English. The fire service can bring in interpreters in about 20 languages and the police in about 18, on a three-way call, straight away. If you do not know where you are, read out the name of the nearest subway station or the sign on a nearby building, and for disaster alerts such as earthquakes and typhoons, the Emergency Ready App from the Ministry of the Interior and Safety gives you the information in English.

The Korea Tourism Organization runs this travel advice line 24 hours a day, every day of the year. They will help with directions, interpret on a three-way call with your accommodation, a restaurant or a taxi driver (they will not make the booking for you), and take complaints about things like being overcharged. The advice is free but the call is not, and dialling +82-2-1330 from abroad or on a roaming phone adds international charges — to spend nothing, use the online call over wi-fi in the VisitKorea app or website, or chat on KakaoTalk or LINE.

Anything sold as "unlimited" usually means throttled: you get 2GB a day or 10GB a month and then drop to 3Mbps. Budget-carrier and reseller 30-day SIMs run 30,000 to 40,000 won, official carrier tourist SIMs 50,000 to 70,000 won, and the shortest plans start from around 6,000 won for three days. A SIM with a Korean number has to be checked against your entry record, so it can only be activated after you land (long-term and postpaid plans also need an alien registration card), while a data-only eSIM needs no identity check and can be switched on the moment you step off the plane. Do note that prepaid numbers often are not registered with the carriers' identity verification service, PASS, which can block sign-ups for KakaoT or the delivery apps — so if you will need to pay or book through those, ask the seller first whether identity verification is supported.

Shops will take a card for a 1,000-won purchase, but unstaffed kiosks, vending machines and Korean online payment services often reject foreign-issued cards. Carry around 100,000 won in cash for topping up your transit card and for traditional markets and street stalls. A fair number of places do not take Amex, while Discover works well thanks to its tie-up with BC Card, and you can only withdraw cash from machines marked PLUS, Cirrus, Maestro, UnionPay or "Global ATM" — many convenience store machines are domestic-only, and foreign card transactions stop around midnight. Private exchange offices in areas such as Myeongdong give better rates but take cash only, so weigh them against ordering currency in your bank app for airport pickup, or a WOWPASS exchange kiosk.

It is installed at some 69,000 places across the country — subway stations and platforms, city buses, parks, traditional markets and tourist sites — according to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety open data; the "48,000" often quoted counts only what was newly installed between 2019 and 2022. Pick "Public WiFi Free" from the network list, tap the connect button on the notice screen, and you are online with no sign-up. This signal is not encrypted, so do your logging in and card payments on the encrypted "Public WiFi Secure" or on your own mobile data.

Without Korean health insurance you pay the full cost yourself, and a single trip to an emergency room can run into hundreds of thousands or even millions of won, which makes travel insurance all but essential. Many pharmacies close on Sundays; to find one open at night or on a holiday, use pharm114.or.kr, or the emergency medical portal e-gen.or.kr if you want it in English. Thirteen designated household medicines, painkillers and digestive aids among them, are sold in 24-hour convenience stores, but prescription drugs such as antibiotics need a doctor, and if you need to be seen in English, head for the International Healthcare Center at one of the large hospitals.

Leave money on the table and a member of staff will come after you down the street, sure you have forgotten something. You pay at the counter rather than at your table, and hotels and some upmarket restaurants add a 10% service charge that, with VAT on top, comes to as much as 21% — no need to add anything there either. Apps like KakaoT have introduced a "thank you tip" of up to 2,000 won, but it is entirely optional.

Show your passport before you pay at any shop with a "Tax Free" sign and the VAT comes off on the spot. Instant refunds are capped at under 1 million won per purchase and 5 million won for your whole stay; anything larger, or any slip issued for a standard refund, is claimed back at an airport kiosk as you leave. You have to take the goods out of the country within three months of buying them, and between the customs check and the queue at the kiosk, get to the airport about an hour early on a day you have refunds to claim.