A few weeks ago, as spring was just beginning to give way to summer, I took a whirlwind trip to Jirisan National Park in the south central part of the country. As South Korea’s biggest national park, it offers some amazing scenery and spectacular views! The only unfortunate thing is that there’s no major city nearby, so getting there without a car of my own proved to be just as exhuasting as actually climbing around on the mountain (literally 12 hours of roundtrip travel and 12 hours of hiking/being out and about, all in the same span of 24 hours). But it was worth it!

My heart was particularly set on going during this time of the year because it was peak azalea season; which meant the mountains were covered in beautiful pink flowers! I also especially enjoyed this hike because our bus dropped us off at the top of a nearby mountain and, instead of starting from the bottom, we hiked along the ridge for several hours before descending. This allowed us to have the mountain more or less all to ourselves for the first part of the day, a rarity in Korea.

Enjoy the pictures below from what I now consider to be my second most memorable hike this year (the MOST memorable being Seoraksan)!