Gamcheon Culture Village
For our second day in Busan, we were going to visit some sites on the opposite side of the city. Busan is fairly spread out so it was over an hour’s bus ride to get there, but the bus was quiet and comfy so it was a nice journey.
Our first stop was Gamcheon culture village, which started as a densely populated village for refugees of the Korean war. As time passed, more and more of the buildings became abandoned, so an art project was started in 2009 to convert the village into a cultural hub. Now it’s steep hills and tiny alleyways are filled with colourful art projects, cafes and shops.
There is a stamp rally that covers the entire village, so we started by visiting the tourist information office to buy the stamp map and then followed the route as it wound its way through the little streets.
There was a good view point over the whole area on top of a carpark
Fun paintings and murals were all over the place. We stopped at the bakery with the cats and tried salt bread – something that is far nicer than it sounds – super buttery and almost like a croissant but softer, with a sprinkling of salt.
It took a while to complete the stamp rally and a lot of steps were involved, but it was a really good way to explore the village.
Songdo Ropeway
Once we had finished exploring Gamcheon, we took a short bus trip to Songdo and walked to a ropeway that would take us over the sea and Songo Beach to Songdo park – a woody peninsular.
Songdo Sky Park
Once at the park, we went for a walk in the forest to a couple of viewpoints overlooking the sea – it was much less humid under the trees
Busan has a lot of ‘The little prince’ related things dotted about – there were quite a view murals and sculptures in Gamcheon, and then here there were some more.
Songdo Yonggung Suspension Bridge
Songdo park also has the Yonggung suspension bridge which creates a walkway over to and around a little islet
After visiting the bridge we took the cable car back over the sea and caught a bus back to Haeundae for the evening.