53 attractions in South Jeolla, including Gageodo Island, Gangjin Goryeo Celadon Kiln Sites and Dasan Chodang (Jeong Yak-yong Historic Site), Gangjin.
Coast & islands
신안군
Gageodo belongs to Heuksan-myeon in Sinan County, South Jeolla, and is the southwesternmost point of Korean territory. At about 9 km² with a coastline of roughly 22 km it is small, but it is known for steep cliffs, dense forest and sea fis…
Historic sites & memorials
강진군
Daegu-myeon in Gangjin is the cradle of Goryeo celadon. Across the valleys of Yongun-ri, Gyeyul-ri, Sadang-ri and Sudong-ri lie more than 180 kiln sites where celadon and earthenware were fired throughout the Goryeo period, and few places…
Historic sites & memorials
강진군
On the slopes of Mandeoksan in Gangjin, Dasan Chodang is where the late-Joseon scholar Jeong Yak-yong (1762–1836), known as Dasan, spent more than ten years of his exile writing works such as Mongmin simseo and Gyeongse yupyo. A forest pat…
Fortresses
강진군
In the middle of the fields of Byeongyeong-myeon, Gangjin, a 1,060 m ring of stone walls encloses the Jeolla Byeongyeong Fortress. From 1417 to 1895, roughly 500 years, it was the army headquarters commanding the 53 counties and 6 garrison…
Churches & monasteries
곡성군
Taeansa lies deep in a valley of Dongnisan in Jukgok-myeon, Gokseong, and was the head temple of the Dongnisan school, one of the Nine Mountain Schools of Seon Buddhism in Unified Silla. The forest path of about 1.8 km along the stream fro…
Churches & monasteries
구례군
Saseongam is a hermitage built into a sheer rock face near the top of Osan, across the Seomjin River south of Gurye town. The red-pillared hall clinging to the cliff and the view from its terrace over the Seomjin River, the Gurye plain and…
Landmarks
구례군
Unjoru is a late-Joseon yangban house in Omi village, Toji-myeon, Gurye, at the foot of Jirisan. The whole house takes its name from its main men's quarters, Unjoru, meaning "the house where one lives hidden like a bird in the clouds". Its…
Churches & monasteries
구례군
Hwaeomsa is a major Buddhist temple on the southern slopes of Jirisan in Gurye, South Jeolla. It is said to have been founded in 544 and is the head temple of the 19th district of the Jogye Order. In the middle of the grounds stands Gakhwa…
Museums
나주시
Across the fields of Bannam-myeon in Naju rise great burial mounds of the rulers who held this land during the Three Kingdoms period. Naju National Museum stands close to these Bannam tomb clusters, and it is the place to see the huge jar-…
Museums
고흥군
At the far end of Oenarodo Island in Goheung, South Jeolla, the Naro Space Center Space Science Museum stands beside South Korea's first spaceport. On the same island from which the Naro and Nuri rockets lifted off, you can learn how rocke…
Historic sites & memorials
나주시
Naju Geumseonggwan was the gaeksa, the official guesthouse, of Joseon-era Naju. A gaeksa held tablets symbolising the king and lodged officials and envoys visiting the town, and Geumseonggwan's main hall is counted as the largest of all su…
Mountains & peaks
구례군
At the western end of Jirisan, 1,507 m Nogodan is the easiest of the range's high peaks to reach. Drive up to Seongsamjae pass at about 1,100 m and an hour or two on foot brings you onto a broad upland. It is counted with Cheonwangbong and…
National parks
완도군
Dadohaehaesang ("sea of many islands") is South Korea's largest national park, a scatter of islands and open water off the south-western tip of the peninsula in South Jeolla Province. Hundreds of islands, from Hongdo in Sinan to Geumodo an…
Gardens & parks
담양군
Tucked into a small valley behind Husan village in Damyang's Goseo-myeon, Myeongokheon is a garden from the Joseon dynasty. Old crape myrtles ring a square pond, so in midsummer pink petals drift onto the water while you look down on the s…
Gardens & parks
담양군
Walk through a bamboo grove and you reach a low earth-and-stone wall with a mountain stream flowing right underneath it. On either side of the water stand a small pavilion and a modest house. Soswaewon in Damyang is a garden laid out in th…
Historic sites & memorials
담양군
On a low rise at the foot of Jebongsan in Damyang, a small pavilion open on all sides looks out over the fields. This is Myeonangjeong, built by the mid-Joseon official Song Sun after he left office. Scholars such as Yi Hwang (Toegye) visi…
Coast & islands
목포시
Gatbawi stands on the shore of eastern Mokpo where the Yeongsan River meets the sea. The two rocks look like people wearing conical bamboo hats (gat), which gave them their name. A walkway laid over the water lets you see them up close, an…
Mountains & peaks
목포시
Rising right behind Mokpo's old town, Yudalsan is only 228 m high, but its rocky peaks stand like a folding screen, and it has long been called the "Gaegolsan of Honam", after the winter name of the Diamond Mountains. It is one of the Eigh…
Museums
목포시
The Mokpo Modern History Museum occupies two early 20th-century buildings in the former Japanese settlement at the foot of Yudalsan. Building 1 is the old Japanese Consulate in Mokpo and Building 2 the former Mokpo branch of the Oriental D…
Coast & islands
완도군
Off the south-west of Wando, Bogildo is best known as the island where the Joseon poet Yun Seon-do stopped on his way to Jeju and stayed to build a garden retreat. Yet the island as a whole has much more to offer: the Yesong-ri pebble beac…
Gardens & parks
완도군
On Bogildo, an island in the sea south of Wando, survives the garden that the Joseon poet Yun Seondo (pen name Gosan) shaped with his own hands over more than a decade. He dammed a stream to make ponds and set pavilions on the natural rock…
Gardens & parks
보성군
Rows of tea bushes climb the hillsides of Bongsan-ri in Boseong at Daehan Dawon, the largest tea plantation in Boseong and its best-known tourist estate. Past an avenue of towering cedars, whole slopes open up like green staircases, and fr…
Coast & islands
고흥군
Across a narrow channel from Nokdong Port, at the tip of the Goheung Peninsula, lies Sorokdo. Its name means "small deer island", after the shape of its coastline. The pine forests and neat gardens look peaceful, yet for more than a centur…
Coast & islands
완도군
Soando, an island in the sea south of Wando, greets arriving boats with a stone reading "Land of resistance, island of liberation". During Japanese rule it produced an unusually large number of independence activists for its size, and it i…