JEONJU, South Korea - The perfect day trip!
If you are stationed at Camp Humphreys, Camp Casey, Camp Walker, or Osan Air Base and you are looking for a great place to take a day trip, you need to add Jeonju to your bucket list. If you are stationed at Camp Humphreys it will take you about 2 hours to get there which makes it a very manageable trip to take for a day and not stay the night. Here is a rundown of what we did when we went as well as some other ideas you could consider if you go!
How to get there…
We drove from Camp Humphreys and it took about 2 hours total. We drove straight to the Jeonju Hanok Village which had a parking lot right in front of it we parked in and paid 10,000W for the whole day for. This made it so easy, because sometimes parking in Korea can be a headache.
We immediately started walking around the area which was great, the Hanok Village takes up the majority of the area. This is what we spent the majority of our day doing, just walking around and exploring the area. There are a lot of cafes in the village along with street vendors & stores to do some light shopping.
Cafe Ireuri
We stopped at this cafe, “Cafe Ireuri” which is where we got all of these great photos! I ordered the “cold brew latte” and Jacob got the “Jeju orange ade” and ended up spending over an hour hanging out with our shoes off sitting in the comfy hanok-style cafe area and then snapped some cute pictures. This cafe is located inside the hanok village and is super easy to find.
Gyeonggijeon Shrine &
Royal Portrait Museum
Also inside the hanok village is this area with the Gyeonggijeon Shrine and Royal Portrait Museum which only cost 3,000W per person to walk through. It is basically an area where you can explore the culture of the area and view royal portraits in the museum. We weren’t able to go into the portrait museum on this day as it was closed, but walking around the surrounding area was still fun and beautiful!
Pnb Choco Pie
We saw SO many people walking around with these orange and brown bags and we knew we had to see what the hype was about. We found it inside the hanok village as we were walking around and we got 4 of them! They were only 2,000W each and we tried one right away! A chocopie is basically a small fluffy cake with a whipped cream inside filling with a chocolate shell on the outside. It also had a jelly-like filling on the inside too! I definitely recommend trying them! I’m so glad we got extras to take home and snack on later.
Jaman Mural Village
One of the last things we did after a low-key day of walking around the Jeonju area, we made our way across a bride to the mural village which is tucked away and beautifully painted as you can see from the pictures above! Check out my YouTube video for a better view of the murals, I got a lot of great footage on video.
Hankookkwan Bibimbap
Bibimbap (비빔밥) is a very well known and loved Korean dish. Bibimbap originated in Jeonju so OF COURSE we had to get some in its birthplace! It is rice with meat and lots of different vegetables. A very traditional version of bibimbap is made with raw beef and egg, but we got the cooked version. It was delicious! Fun fact- bibimbap was the first Korean dish I had on this journey, I ate it on the flight heading to South Korea back when I first got here. It was definitely better here in Jeonju than on the airplane hah!
I haven’t ever made it before at home, but here’s a recipe that is pretty similar to the real thing if you want to try and make it at home!
Cafe Tirol
On our way home we wanted to make one more stop at this super unique cafe, Cafe Tirol! It was about 15 minutes from the Hanok Village. We didn’t want any more sugary drinks so we opted for the fancy hand drip coffee that came in our own little mini pots of coffee and the most beautiful tea floral tea cups. The thing that was iconic about this cafe is the little pool outside the cafe that has a small wooden boat in it for you to hop in and take a beautiful photo in!
