Tips 👏
- The island is much bigger than it seems, rent a car is a must, however cabs & uber are easily available.
- Speed limit is very low pretty much everywhere so moving in the island is longer than usual.
- The weather is a bit unpredictable and can change quite fast so allow extra days to work around outdoor activities.
- Overall vibe is super relaxed with lots of korean coming here for their holidays.
- Black pork and local oranges are amazing.
Accommodation 🏠
We stayed at Lotte Hotel Jeju and that was amazing. Definitely on the fancy side, resort-like with great facilities, but was well located and perfect to relax while enjoying the island.
Getting there 🚲
We took an internal flight from Cheongju of 1h. Super cheap a booked within a week before our departure. We rented a car at the airport which was great to explore the island.
Food & Drink 🍜
- Black pork BBQ at Sukseongdo: Melt in the mouth local pork with delicious toppings, cooked in front of you
- Unjeongine: Modest looking korean traditional restaurant that serves an amazing cutlass fish
- jejugreemcafe: 2D draw coffee, worth a stop if on the way
- Bake Make Roast: Great western-like brunch with bagels.
- Hallabong: Omnipresent local oranges sold everywhere
Duration ⏱
We spent three full days and felt that was a bit short, especially because the island is bigger than it looks and hike can take the biggest part of the day. Four or five would be perfect!
Waterfalls and viewpoints ⛰️
We started our Jeju exploration by the south east side of the island, chasing the various waterfalls and viewpoints the island can offer. We started by Jusangjeolli Cliff to observe the wonderful hexagonal-ish lava rock formation on the sea, offering dramatic viewpoint of the island edge (warning it's quite popular!).
We then carry on driving on the costal road up to Beophwan Port for a coffee, a treat, and a little stroll on the super chill pier. We were in parallel chasing for 'sea lady', local women that go fishing for seafood by themselves in the morning and serve the freshly caught food at lunch, but didn't managed to see any. There's some 'experience' that are bookable but we were off season so no luck.
Post coffee, we made our first waterfall stop at Cheonjiyeon Waterfall, wonderful 22m waterfall in a delightful and bucolic scenery with ponds, ducks and cherry blossom trees.
We then headed to the second waterfall Seogwipo Jeongbang nearby, peculiar because landing in the sea offering great and unique landscape.
We took the opportunity to visit Seogwipo city centre to grab a street food bite, before heading further east to the Seongsan Canola Flower Field, a patch of yellow-looking plants overlooking the sea cost.
After few pictures, we made our way to our final and most unique spot, Seongsan Ilchulbong. An old volcanic mountain of ~200 meters high, offering a spectacular view on the cost, nearby city and sea from the top (count about 1h round trip).
We then made our way back to the hotel with an authentic korean food dinner on the way (including cutlass fish) at Unjeongine. A wonderful exploration & fairly chill day (lucky with the sun)!
Hallasan hike ❌
Well this one was a miss. We book our tickets month in advance to hike the tallest south korea mountain (count about 9 hours round trip), with the entrance scheduled at 8AM. However the day before the hike on our way back from the east of the island, we received bad weather warnings and decided to call it off. That was the best decision as the next day we woke up within a wind and rain storm, making any outdoor activities impossible. Simple tip here is to stay a few days on Jeju to accommodate for weather changes, we were gutted to miss it but that give us a reason to come back!
Lava caves 🪨
We decided to power-through the bad weather and to go visit Hyeopjae Cave. While the park and the caves were themselves quite nice to see, the pouring rain and wind left us soaked and tired. Any other day would have been great and it worth a visit, but that just wasn't our day!
We made our way back to the hotel to stop anything outdoor and enjoy the spa, with a stop at the jejugreemcafe, one of those '2D coffee' with cool draws perfect for pictures. Note that the coffee is located at the top floor of the Aeroespacial museum which looked really cool and interactive (perfect for a rainy day).
We got a nice brunch nearby at Bake Make Roast (great bagels and omelette), before heading to the spa and the pool to relax. We then went to the nearby fantastic must-try Korean BBQ (with local black pig) at Sukseongdo (melt in tour mouth meat and a robot deliver your food!) and some good beers at a local pub.
Hope this was helpful, you can ask us any questions on Instagram.