Beautiful Busan

A warm welcome to South Korea

After wrapping up our time in Japan, we arrived at our next destination: Busan!

Busan ended up on our itinerary due to serendipity, and this became the watchword for our whole experience there. So much of what we loved in Busan was accidental and discovered by happenstance, from when we first put the location on our travel agenda, to nearly everything we’ll remember about our time there.

When we were researching onward travel, we discovered the fast, inexpensive ferry crossing from Fukuoka to Busan. We knew we wanted to make at least two stops in South Korea, so it seemed perfect (until our ferry got canceled, but we pivoted!)

We ended up loving Busan. We settled back into our preferred, slower-paced rhythms here, catching up on a bunch of work, exploring the city at a pace we enjoy, and enjoying Korean food, drink, and culture.

First, a little more background on the destination, from Wikipedia:

Busan is South Korea's second most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.4 million inhabitants. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economic, cultural and educational center of southeastern South Korea, with its port being Korea's busiest and the sixth-busiest in the world.

During the Korean War, Busan was one of only two cities in South Korea not captured by the North Korean army within the first three months of the war, the other being Daegu. As a result, the cities became refugee camp sites for Koreans during the war. According to the Korea Times, around 500,000 refugees were located in Busan in early 1951.

As Busan was one of the few areas in Korea that remained under the control of South Korea throughout the Korean War, for some time it served as a de facto capital of the Republic of Korea. UN troops established a defensive perimeter around the city known as the Pusan Perimeter in the summer and fall of 1950. Since then, the city has been a self-governing metropolis and has built a strong urban character.

My overwhelming experience with Korean geography was surprise at how hilly the peninsula was. For whatever reason, I was not expecting this, and Busan was a prime example: scattered pockets of urban development in the midst of tall hills covered with greenery and inlets of sea and water. It was beautiful, crowded, a bit chaotic (as our AirBnB host shared, Busan’s development and response to the migrating population in the early 1950s led to inconsistent and not always well-planned development.)

Our AirBnB was in a prime location along one of Busan’s most popular beaches, Gwangalli. This part of the city, overlooking the bay and the suspension bridge, felt very reminiscent of west coast cities like San Francisco or Portland.

One of the most impressive things (to us) about Busan was the widespread network of recreational trails. From the path along the waterfront in multiple directions, to the Haeparang Trail section we hiked one day (more on that below), Busan felt like an urban outdoor enthusiast’s delight. And while we didn’t take part in any water sports, we saw SUP, kayaks, and people out fishing every day, too.

walking, biking, and jogging paths of Busan (and one of the ubiquitous exercise equipment stations)

Because our AirBnB was well equipped with a great kitchen, we did most of our meal prep at home during our stint in Busan, and discovered our new favorite food: Korean rice cakes (also called Tteok-bokki). I’m not sure how we’d never known of these before, but they’ve since become a major staple in our diet. We usually saute them up with stir-fry, but they’re also commonly used with a variety of soups. Beau described them as “Korean gnocchi” and that feels right. Highly recommend grabbing some from your local grocery to try. (We greatly prefer the sliced type to the stick type, if you have the option.)

Our standard dinner in Korea

While in Busan, we enjoyed a few specific outings. We adopted a new-to-use technique of simply walking out the door and choosing a direction, and seeing what we could discover. Again and again, it paid off in ways we wouldn’t have imagined.

• Visiting APEC House, which was built to host the 2005 APEC Summit meeting at the tip of Dongbaek Island. (This was an accidental visit: we intended to visit the adjacent lighthouse, and then discovered this amazing building!) It’s close to popular Haeundae Beach, where we saw some incredible sand carvings being created:

• Exploring the world’s largest department store, including the improbable rooftop “theme park” featuring dinosaurs and pirate ships, and a basement-level Trevi fountain replica (another accidental discovery…)

The brown building with the curved glass exterior is the Shinsegae department store complex.

Later in our trip, I returned to the department store complex to spend a few hours at Spa Land:

Spa Land is one of Korea's most traditional spas (Jjimjilbang). It spreads over 2 massive floors and includes 22 baths and 13 saunas featuring global themes (Finnish sauna, Turkish hamam, etc.) as well as an entertainment room, several restaurants/cafes, and full-service spa/salon.

Spa Land was a fantastic: an oasis in the city. In addition to soaking and enjoying the saunas, I enjoyed a traditional body scrub from one of the Korean ladies working in the women’s side. I don’t think my body has ever been so thoroughly exfoliated. It wasn’t exactly relaxing, but it was sure an experience.

I have only a few photos from Spa Land, as the gender-segregated baths don’t allow photos (since you don’t wear swimsuits), and most every sauna had an extreme “no phones due to explosion risk” sign at their entrance. I’m sure that was overkill as many people were using their phones in the saunas, but I decided I didn’t need either the risk or the access to my phone during a few hours of relaxation.

TL: ticket to enter; TC: Photos of the various saunas and rooms; TR: Outdoor foot baths; BL: Bali themed solarium; BC: inside the Roman Room; BR: Guidance and details were posted out front of each sauna/room

Between the Japanese onsen and the spa culture of Korea (as well as previous experiences like visiting an authentic Turkish Hamam or soaking in geothermal hot springs in Iceland), I’m convinced that one of the biggest things we’re lacking in American culture is a communal bathing ritual. Fortunately, lots of options exist to experience and explore elsewhere!

Another highlight of our time in Busan was spending a few hours hiking a section of the Haeparang trail.

Various snapshots (including one of the never-ending stairs) from the Never Stop (Haeparang) trail.

We didn’t know much about this trail before starting the hike: our AirBnB guide had briefly mentioned it as a popular hike, and we’d seen the segments and paths when scouting running routes in the city. We left our AirBnB on foot and walked across the city to the trailhead; by the time we completed the loop later that day, we’d walked nearly 12 miles.

It was definitely an experience! From never-ending stairs (we sometimes felt we just kept going up, up, up, then down again, then back up, up up….) to sometimes precarious wooden walkways, suspension bridges, and breathtaking coastal views, it was just a delight. In addition to the moderate number of other hikers out on the trail, there were a large number of people fishing from the rocks, and a few spots where people could swim or enjoy a picnic.

We ended up at the Oryukdo Skywalk, where we put some slippers over our shoes and walked out over the glass floor, looking out and down to the ocean below. It was actually quite a bit more nerve-wracking than I expected, but the view was pretty great.

When we weren’t out exploring all that Busan had to offer, we indulged in some K-Drama, watching My Country: The New Age on Netflix. While I had some issues with the ending, it was a fantastic production and we really enjoyed it.

Busan felt like the perfect warm welcome to Korea (and I have one more story to share in a future post about another one of our serendipitous and memorable travel experiences here.) Our last night, we enjoyed an outing to one of the local breweries, Gorilla Brewing, before taking a subway to the Busan train station the next morning and boarding our train to Seoul.

Scenes from the seafood market near our AirBnB; the "Whale Bridge"; and Gorilla Brewing's generous tasters.

---

If you enjoy reading my stories, here are a few quick ways you can show your support:

• Hit the ❤️ at the bottom of the post

• Leave a comment telling me something in this post that resonated with you.

• Share this post or my Substack with a friend, or on Instagram (please tag me @ hollyfromthebigsky if you do!)

• Consider becoming a paid subscriber. (Curious about why I paywall my older posts? I wrote about it here.