Things to Do in KoreaOne free day,
well spent

Korean mountains are famous for a reason, and Seoul is the rare capital with a national park inside its boundary — Bukhansan begins where the last apartment block ends. If ordinary hiking has begun to bore you, go north instead: Seoraksan under snow is a different proposition altogether, white ridgelines and frozen falls. Trails are signposted, and you will be overtaken by someone in their seventies wearing better boots than yours.

December to March the upper ridges hold ice. Crampons cost about ₩10,000 at the trailhead and are not optional.

Rental shops crowd the streets around Gyeongbokgung, and the arrangement is unusually generous: anyone wearing hanbok walks into all five of Seoul's grand palaces and Jongmyo Shrine free. Four hours costs less than a decent lunch, hair styling is a few thousand won more, and the shop keeps your bag while you go. Wear a vest and shorts underneath — the hanbok goes over the top, and the courtyards are hotter than they look in July.

Gyeongbokgung closes on Tuesdays. The changing of the guard runs at 10:00 and 14:00, and is the reason to arrive early rather than late.

Gwangjang opened in 1905 and has fed Jongno through occupation, war and everything after. Come to hunt rather than to shop: every stall is run by someone with a fixed idea of how their one dish should be made, and decades of competing shoulder to shoulder have sharpened all of them. Mung bean pancakes fried in front of you, mayak gimbap the size of a thumb, raw beef tartare, and a stool you share with whoever arrives next. Walk in, point, eat.

Prices are posted — check the sign before you order rather than after. A few stalls drew complaints for overcharging visitors, and the posted price is your protection.

The strip dividing the two Koreas sits an hour north of Seoul, and it is the one major sight in the country you cannot reach on your own. The Third Infiltration Tunnel, Dora Observatory and Imjingak are reached only on licensed coach tours under military coordination, with an identity check at the checkpoint into the civilian control zone. It is a strange day out — part history, part observation deck, part gift shop — and the quiet on the way back is what people remember.

The blue huts at Panmunjom (the JSA) have been closed to civilian tours since 2023. If a tour advertises the JSA, read what happens when access is refused on the day.