I’ve always wanted to visit Hawaii, but every time I book a trip to America I just can’t seem to fit it in. And when thinking about the long flight just to get to Hawaii, my mind wanders to Asia. And rightly so, enter Jeju Island, or what is affectionally known as the Hawaii of Korea.

There are many reasons to visit Jeju Island, and not just because G-Dragon has designed and formerly owned cafes there. It’s no secret to my friends that I love k-pop cherry blossoms, and on my second sakura season in Asia I decided to visit Jeju island to see how it stacks up as a holiday destination. Because it was off-peak season, it was not as busy as I imagined it would get in Summer, but I know now why Jeju island is nicknamed the Hawaii of Korea.

Jeju offers up three UNESCO World Natural Heritage Sites and other wonders such as beautiful beaches, waterfalls, mountains and volcanic tuff cones. But instead of listing all the attractions one by one, I thought I would paint a picture of what a couple of days looked like for my visit to Jeju.

And for context, I had this spread over 4 days but due to unforeseen events (AKA a day of bad weather and another day where I had rolled home at 4am after drinking my body weight in Gin), I crammed some extra activities into two days, broken down below.

Day 1 – Chasing waterfalls

This day included a fair bit of driving around but it was actually a really relaxing day. We started at Cheonjeyeon waterfall, which has three tiers of falls, Seonimgyo bridge and a beautiful blue pond with interesting black rocks jutting out of it. 

Next we moved on to Daepo Jusangjeolli Cliff, a series of hexagon shaped stone pillars that meet the coastline, formed by lava from the nearby Mt Hallasan volcanic eruption. The cliffs are so interesting and make for great photos as the black ‘Jisatgae’ rocks contrast the deep teal ocean beautifully.

Our next stop was Cheonjiyeon Waterfall, another scenic path ending in a glorious waterfall meeting a pond over volcanic rocks. There’s plenty of wildlife in this area too so of course my camera roll is full of photos of ducks…and one of the waterfall itself!’

Lastly for the day we made our way to the Jeonbang waterfall. This one was quite spectacular and there is a rumour that it is the only waterfall that falls directly into the ocean in Asia. Regardless, it was a wonderful sight. It was a bit of a walk down a flight of steps to get to the waterfall, and to really get great pics you had to do some ‘dumb tourist shit’ which I was not brave enough for – given my high levels of awkwardness. Matt was up for the challenge though and I stood to the side, probably taking more photos of ducks.

Day 2 – why did I think I was fit enough for this!?

For some context, we did use the gym in the morning so I had already been for a run prior to starting the day – rookie mistake.

The day started off with a plan to hike up Mt Hallasan, an active volcano on Jeju island. It seemed so appealing from my desktop research and thankfully I had the foresight to wear my Timberland boots – to be honest I only wore them predominantly for fashion purposes but my future self-thanked me! It turns out the hike was a little more intense than what it appears online and perhaps we didn’t pick the correct path to ascend the mountain. The guide in the car park seemed to hold grave fears for us (perhaps because we weren’t wearing hiking gear) and mentioned if we hadn’t reached a certain point by midday, we were not going to make it back by the end of the day. As we started hiking up the mountain, we decided to hike for 2 hours and then descend so we could make the most of the day and see some other landmarks. It did seem a little different to what I had researched online as we only passed a few people, most of which were wearing fairly professional hiking gear barring the one lady I saw wearing a designer tulle skirt – that made me feel slightly better about the lecture the car park guide had given us.

The hike was pretty magical, there were streams, wildlife and lots of stairs. Unfortunately, the way back was not as magical and I do remember just how sore the soles of my feet were from walking on an uneven rocky path for so long so I am glad we decided to call it a day after a couple of hours. While we didn’t have the good fortune of seeing a goat, I am pleased to report I saw my first ever chipmunk, and therefore took about 50 photos of it, none of which are worth sharing.

We decided to visit Gimnyeong beach on the way to the lava tube we were going to visit. This beach looked stunning online and it didn’t disappoint in person, white powdery sand and sparkling aqua water that reminded me of the emerald coast of Sardinia. It was pretty deserted being Spring so we took a nice long walk (and I think I might have had a nap in the car while Matt bought coffee….Mt Hallasan was catching up with me!)

After a relaxing beach walk, we made our way over to Manjanggul Cave – the 12^th longest lava tube in the world believed to have formed more than 2,000,000 years ago. This wasn’t exactly my jam…it was a long, cold, wet tunnel in the dark. I happen to be afraid of the dark, you could see a little but having watched too many horror movies in my time (yes, I’m talking to you ‘the descent’) I was keen to get this over with. Couple that with the fact that again, you had to walk on uneven rocks for a very long time and they were wet and slippery so the fear of falling was high, being an ‘anxious in the dark’, awkward person. One TripAdvisor review mentions ‘the cave requires you to have a long walk with a majestic view inside the cave’. I definitely agree with the requirements and it would have probably been quite majestic for someone who favours the dark a little more.

We weren’t too far away from Seongsan Ilchulbong, commonly referred to as ‘Sunrise Peak’ and although I had planned to visit it early the next morning, we decided that we may as well give it a go. Seongsan Ilchulbong is a large tuff cone formed from a volcanic eruption (thanks again Mt Hallasan). When we arrived and found a park, the sheer size of the huge castle shaped rock was enough to make me cry. 

To sum up my activity so far, I had gone for a quick 5km run on the treadmill, completed some dodgy circuit training in my hotel room, followed by a 4 hour hike up and down a mountain, a nice relaxing beach walk, and a 2.6km round trip in a slippery cave – my legs were willing me to stop at this point. But since we were there…

The walk itself isn’t hard, this is no Mt Hallasan hike as there are very modern steps ascending the entire way up. It was just long and tiring after a big day of similar activity. There was whinging, and a brief stop which goes against my hiking/stair climbing rules, invented for my usual Sunday step exercise and the hellish walk back up the steep DMZ tunnel in Korea – that being, never ever stop. Once you stop it is harder to start again! But my legs definitely needed to stop, and this well-placed machine served as a nice reminder about the benefits of slowing down.

Once at the top the views were insane, all the whinging felt like a distant memory (to me….) and I soon focussed on taking pics of the beauty (and some dorky shots where I literally didn’t have the energy to keep my eyes open). It really was the best part of the day and I would highly recommend doing this when in Jeju Island. In fact, I had wanted to come back the next morning as originally planned but that didn’t turn out so well.

After a big day of activity, it was time to relax at our hotel, perhaps have a bath and take it easy. However, after sinking a couple of beers and some soju at our Korean BBQ dinner we decided to visit the pub next door for some craft beer. Which then ended in us deciding to visit the night club next door to the pub. And because I am a responsible adult, I decided to sink about four ‘buckets’ of gin and tonic, collecting flashing armband for each drink and partying like a teenager who was let loose with a fake ID. Here is the only photographic evidence of the night.

I do vaguely remember talking to lots of Koreans and practicing my awesome Korean skills – this resulted in lots of drunken laughter. There were also skipping ropes and indoor activities, clubs in Korea are very different from back home! But it was a fun way to end the night and if I wasn’t legless from all the activity, I sure was after a million buckets of gin and tonic…

Consequently, we didn’t end up visiting Seongsan ilchulbong the next day, instead we visited a nice café overlooking the water and did some duty-free shopping at my favourite Korean department store – Lotte Duty Free.

All in all, Jeju Island is a really fun place and I can see why so many Koreans holiday there each year. 

Other activities to do

Here are the things that didn’t make the cut due to the above-mentioned unforeseen circumstances:

• Love Land: A sex theme park, I didn’t get around to this (damn should have booked an extra day!) but Love Land certainly sounds interesting, and there are even interactive sculptures – I’ll leave it there and let you read about in on Pink Plankton’s blog….

• Maze Park: this is one of those giant mazes made out of hedges, unfortunately it did not make the cut, but I am interested in giving this a go in the future.

• Illchul Land: A serene looking cultural park with another cave, flowers and activities such as ceramics. It does look enchanting, but I think I have cave phobia now.

• Jeju Folk Village: This is one I am definitely a little bummed I missed out on; it is an old cultural village where you can learn about the history of Jeju island. Instead of this I learned the traditional act of how to down buckets of booze in a nightclub while collecting flashing armbands as a badge of honour. I will definitely visit this if I am ever back on Jeju!

• Relax at the beach or pool: Jeju island is actually a popular beach destination and most of the hotels are resort style with large pools. Our hotel, the Lotte Hotel Jeju  was overlooking seogwipo beach that we had direct access to.

Things to consider for Jeju Island

• Hire a car: If you are visiting purely for a beach and poolside holiday you can probably get away with catching a bus to your hotel but to see the full range of the islands’ beauty, I suggest hiring a car.
• Take appropriate footwear: one thing I never do is dress like a tourist (you know when you see people wearing hiking gear in the middle of Tokyo), but this is probably the one place where you will need at least comfortable shoes. There’s plenty of hiking style activities and I was glad I took my Timbs.
• Stay for longer than a few days: Again, it depends on the time of year, but if you are lucky enough to visit in the summer months than you might need to plan for both beach days and activity days.
• Geek out over G-Dragon: if you’re a fan it’s probably a must, I visited a café he used to own and it was good for coffee and cake (actually I was incredibly hungover and I inhaled some coffee and cake) but there are other GD related activities to partake in if you desire.