This trip was originally planned with Jasmine, and then Zenn, and then i ended up going with Sheryl. Haha. It’s a long story anyway but yeah, it’s hard to find travel partners willing to go on such a busy itinerary!
The plan also changed a lot! It was supposed to cover the south area as well, which includes Ulsan and Gyeongju. But because it was a public holiday, it was difficult to find buses to those places and between the planned places, it was crazy and we planned so much the week prior :< Anyways, we ended up deciding to focus on the Jeollanam province instead and leave the rest for another weekend. Haha. Amazingly though, from a 4-day planned itinerary, we finished it in 2 days and went home early.
This was our final itinerary: Yeosu -> Boseong (stop by Suncheon) -> Suncheon which we finished in 2 days! š
It’s complicated and hard for me to share our planning details but I’ll share the details of our trip as much as possible so it can provide as a useful guide for people looking for the best arrangement to complete these places in a short amount of time! Granted, we left out a lot of places we weren’t quite interested in haha.
This post is part 1, which will feature the beautiful quaint little city of Yeosu!
Our first stop was food HAHA. Bus took a lot longer than I expected, it took 7 hours-ish because of the jam and all, we departed at 810 am and reached at 3pm ish. Ā So of course the first stop was foood haha. Right opposite the bus terminal you can see plenty of korean food, they’re all in Korean though so it’ll be good if you have some knowledge on how to read Korean or general Korean food.
Soondubu Jjigae!
This was good! The down side was that we ordered two so they gave us two portions in one bowl which i’m pretty sure was discounted… haha but it was tasty and there were these nice soft snow crabs in it, which i think is some specialty of Yeosu because it’s a port?? Haha.
Also the many side dishes you see is another specialty of Yeosu apparently from the guide books, they’re well-known for their baek-ban, which means side dishes. This whole meal cost only 7000 won each~ $8-ish.
Odongdo Island
After a nice meal and almost 4PM LOL, we quickly headed to Odongo Island by taking a bus at the bus stop opposite the bus terminal. It’s bus 33 if I’m not worng but you can double check. We got lost a bit trying to find Odongdo LOL so be careful. The moment you get down from the bus terminal, cross the road and head to yourĀ right.Ā Don’t follow the crowd cuz a lot of them are heading towards the marine thingy, if you want to go Odongdo don’t follow. You should see this hotel:
You’ll know you’re on the right path. My angle is from where i got lost so don’t follow the angle haha, this building is pretty noticeable anyway. Head towards this hotel and you’ll see it.
We stopped by the tourist information center to ask for some detailed directions and well she could’nt speak much english so it might be a problem if you don’t know a little Korean. Nevertheless I’ll give as much info as I can. She was really really nice though, called the bus terminal and all that to make sure we get everything we asked for! š
Beautiful waters!
You have to pay to take the tram, it’s not a long distance though so walking is fine~
On the bridge to Odongdo!
Odongdo island!
Random farmer just chillin
And then we’re in!!
Going down to the dragon cave!
the explorer @ dragon cave
It’s really just a huge cave with a fancy name lmao.
posing demurely
selfie w the dragon
selfie with the slushie bought in the middle of odongdo
bamboooooooo
Where you watch the sunrise/set(forgot which) i think
Light house~
After that was done, we headed to Jinnamgwan! We initially slashed it from our list due to lack of time, but it turned out to be a bus transfer point – we can’t go Dolsan bridge directly from Odongdo, gotta take a bus first to Jinnamgwan and transfer ot another bus. So we stopped there and decided to visit Angel Alley, which wasĀ just across the road.
Angel Alley
Entrance to Jinnamgwan
Cross the bridge to get to Angel Alley~
Angel Alley itself wasn’t fascinating to me because it’s quite similar to Ihwa mural Village except the latter is better. But AA does offer a breathtaking view of Yeosu city.
We dropped by Jinnamgwan later on but found out we missed it just by a few minutes. It closes at 6pm… š¦
missed it!!
Dolsan Bridge
We actually had a little time to spare, nevertheless we decided to head to Dolsan Bridge first. If I’m not wrong any bus above 100 takes you to Dolsan Bridge but don’t quote me on that, best to double check with tourist info at Odongdo š Or just check the bus stop and try to match ėģ°ėźµ if you can’t read Korean! A lot of buses take you there. The bus will announce in English when they reach Dolsan because it’s a tourist spot.
When we reached the lights were already on. We were clambering to this little traditional pavilion next to the entrance of the bridge, which I assume is a place to take photos from. We were right~ there was a couple next to us who started backhugging and stuff :< i kinda think now that any place in Korea but Seoul is a place for couples’ honeymoons. Scratch that even Seoul is too.
Beautifu beautiful Dolsan~
Lighted bridges in the distance too~Ā
After that, we crossed the road and headed back down to take a bus back to the city (any bus goes, except 1 bus i think, better check again) but was confused because the bus took really long and no one was stopping at the bus stop. We ended up walking down to the city area and incidentally an ahjusshi from a dining place tried to help us. But he spoke Korean in such an accented and speey manner i was just plain confused. After he figured where we were going, he told us to take a taxi instead as it’s cheap, definitely below 5000 won, and also because bus frequencies aren’t that often there.
He then followed us to the main road and tried to help us flag a cab. As he was doing so the buses started to arrive so he RANNNNNNN TO THE NEXT BUS STOP TO STOP THE BUS god omg we were so touched :’) Like there was nothing in it for him he was really just a kind person. ALso because our experiences told us older Korean people tend to be a little more unfriendly towards foreigners due to language barriers, his willingness to help was so touching :’) him and the tourist information staff at Odongdo literally made my day and made Yeosu one of my favorite places in Korea~~
As we boarded the bus, we incidentally met these two Australian middle-aged women, one of whom was living in Singapore before she moved to Australia. We chatted a bit and found out we’re all going Suncheon that night, so we went back to the bus station together and bought our tickets and took the same bus~~~ it’s a short distance to Suncheon so there’s noĀ specific timing tickets to buy, you just buy a ticket and get on the next bus that comes.
The reason we did that was because it was bloody difficult to get accomodation in Yeosu. Like seriously, everythign was snaped up because it was a public holiday! Do take note to book early~ luckily we found a guesthouse in Suncheon so we decided to take the bus to Suncheon from Yeosu that same day. We covered the main parts of Yeosu in like half a day!! xD
Accommodation – Guesthouse Danim
Upon reaching Suncheon, we alighted at the train station since that’s where our hostel is, and grabbed some Korean food before finding our dorm. It’s directly opposite the train station which makes it super convenient!!!! It’s calledĀ Guesthouse Danim.Ā
Granted, it wasn’t the best of hostels and i didn’t like the bathroom at all but it was for a night and at 20,000 won so we weren’t complaining. When we entered we were greeted by 10 or so Koreans who started clapping and inviting us in lmao that’s culture shock right there. They asked if we’ve eaten (in Korean) and i responded and they got excited because they knew we were foreigners but apparently we could manage Korean so they invited us to sit and stuff. They had lots of alcohol but me and Sheryl gently declined because we had to wake up early the next day. They said they just met each other today and that it’s custom for Koreans to be like this in guesthouses haha. They were all about 30 years old although they looked young, but it was fun talking to them a little bit. They were really family like! But after a while it was awkward as they were talking and joking in Korean, so we decided to head back to the room first and settle down to sleep. Room was okay, two bunk beds so 4 per room. We were rooming with the two ladies we talked to previously.
The bedsheet looked suspicious so we laid out our blankets out over the bed and i was a little cold but it all turned out fine~
So that’s it for Yeosu and a little bit of Suncheon! I plan to update Suncheon and Boseong soon~ thanks for reading Ā and feel free to ask me any questions about Yeosu! ^^
darmawanders 