Jeonju travel info

Jeonju is the ancestral home of the family that founded the Joseon dynasty. That's why a shrine holding the king's portrait, Gyeonggijeon, stands in the middle of town, and why hundreds of hanok crowd in next to it. The Hanok Village isn't a fenced-off museum. People live here. Turn one corner and you'll see visitors in rented hanbok, someone walking with a skewer, a resident drinking coffee at their own gate. From Omokdae hill, the red-brick Jeondong Cathedral rises out of a sea of black tile roofs.

Jeonju is also a town you come to eat in. Bibimbap with raw beef and mung-bean jelly in a brass bowl, kongnamul gukbap bubbling in an earthenware pot, and makgeolli bars where one kettle of rice wine brings a table full of side dishes are all within walking distance of each other. A common day runs soup for breakfast, bibimbap for lunch, a PNB choco pie to eat while walking the village, and makgeolli at night.

From Seoul it's under two hours by KTX, or around three by express bus. One catch: both the train station and the bus terminal are about 4 km from the Hanok Village, so you need a city bus or taxi straight away. The village itself takes half a day at an easy pace, but it's worth staying overnight to see the lanes after dark.

From Seoul (KTX)

From Busan, Gwangju and Daejeon (BUS)

From the airport (ICN)