we took a day trip to busan 🇰🇷 is it worth it?

while my friend and i were in south korea for our grad trip, we had a last-minute decision to go for a day trip to busan — here’s how it went

since it’s a day trip, we had to make sure we reached busan early, so we booked the 5.45am train to reach there at about 9am. we set our alarms for 4.30am and slept at 2am the previous night 😭

we made the (crazy) decision to WALK 30 MINS to seoul station 😵‍💫 luckily, our hotel was pretty convenient and is by the main road so it was pretty okay to walk around at 5am and we didn’t have to go through any dark alleys which was my main worry haha!

upon reaching seoul station, we waited for the train and it was so dark and quiet that it felt so eerie haha!! it was giving zombie apocalypse (frfr) we tried to get some shuteye on the way to busan but the seats were honestly quite uncomfortable for us

we reached busan at around 9am and we only had a list of places to go so we tried to be efficient with it (key word: TRIED)

📍 Museum of Contemporary Art Busan

we took a train and bus (about 1hr) but turns out it was CLOSED 😭 so we decided to walk back to the nearest train station and enjoy the view

📍 Gamcheon Culture Village

the museum is located towards the end, so the journey to here took quite a while. it was also a bit confusing but there are bus drivers telling u to board if they see you’re a tourist bahahah

side note: bus drivers in busan are honestly smth else 😭 we were holding on to the handrails for dear life

the view here is gorgeoussss 🥹 my friend and i wanted to explore to whole area so we went all the way to the top then back down to find restaurants to eat lunch at.

i suggest not doing what we did and spend a max of only 1.5hrs here cuz it’s neverendinggg.. there were also like 3 restaurants to eat at ?? and the rest were cafes

📍 Huinnyeol Culture Village

this place is seriously not talked about enough! i would suggest this over Gamcheon Culture Village any day. this is a culture village as well but it’s right by the seaside, so you get a nice breeze and enjoy the ocean view.

you can opt to walk the trail by the seaside or go up to the shops and cafes. so many little trinket shops as well to buy cute prints and trinkets for your friends or yourself!

we walked all the way to end as we wanted to check out the Coastal Tunnel. this area is a MUST VISIT! the tunnel itself is a little anticlimactic but i think it was pretty cool and super nice for photos 📷 the area around the tunnel had a nice view of the ocean and sunset 💫

we decided to leave at about 6pm but then there was production crew blocking the pathways cuz they was filming going on and we saw doyeon from weki meki!! she’s so pretty, we were so starstruck hahaha

📍 Having Moment cafe

we took a break here and got a drink each. almost all the cafes here close at 5pm except for this 😵‍💫 there’s not a lot of options here but i suggest the iced matcha latte 🍵 it was a safe option cuz the rest felt a bit questionable

if you dont want to walk the trail, this cafe will give a nice view of the ocean as well 💫 we left at 7.10pm and realised we didn’t have enough time to go to the popular Haeundae Beach with the long travel times 😭

❗️so…is a day trip to busan worth it? yes!

BUT brace yourself to come out money to take taxis to and from each location to save time. everything is very far apart so don’t waste your time taking bus everywhere like we did!

also just spend max 2hrs at one area! we kept wanting to explore the whole area but that’s definitely more of a overnight stay itinerary rather than a day trip.

i think busan is a good break from the bustling city life in seoul and id suggest doing a 2D 1N stay here if you can to make the most out of it!

i think a day trip is worth it WITH proper planning and pulling out 3-4 must-go places! it’s very tiring (everywhere is so steep) but fulfilling! plus you’ll only feel the leg fatigue the next day anyways

#busan #travel #lemon8travel #korea