Getting here by public transport was a breeze. From the bus stop opposite Busan Station, we took Bus 88 to Taejongdae. You can even check for bus arrival times at the digital signboards at the bus stop for estimated timing of bus arrivals – pretty cool!
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| Route for Bus 88. Busan Station is the one before YMCA. Taejongdae is the last stop. |
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| Top: The bus stop to board the Bus 88 to Taejongdae. Bottom: The shop behind the bus stop. |
The bus ride was pretty fast as the driver sped most of the way. Took only about 30 minutes to get there. The bus will drop you along a busy stretch of restaurants which is very near to the entrance of Taejongdae Park.
The park is quite huge to navigate on foot, especially the beginning uphill section, so the easiest way to get around would be to board the cutesy Danubi Train, which has many stops at the key places inside the park. A train ticket, which costs 1,500KRW per adult, will allow you to hop-on and off wherever you like.
Taejongdae is very popular with tourists and an extremely touristy place and there was a super long queue for the train. After buying a ticket at the box office, you will be given a slip of paper with your boarding number. You have to wait for your number to be called before you can get onto the train. Although it was crowded, the number system made the wait more orderly, and there wasn’t a crazy mad dash whenever an empty train rolled in. We had to wait about 30 minutes before our turn came, so we bought some snacks from the nearby convenience store and munched while we waited. We also studied the map of the place and decided on the stops that we wanted to alight at.
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| Waiting area for the Danubi Train. The LED signboard on the left-hand side indicates which numbers are supposed to board at which time. |
On the second level of the Observation Deck, there is a small photo exhibition by Hallyu star Choi Ji-woo, star of popular kdramas such as Winter Sonata and Stairway to Heaven.
A stone statue entitled Mother and Child can also be seen outside the Observation Deck and is supposed to “remind those who are about to commit suicide by jumping from Tajongdae's cliff, of their mother's unconditional love for them and will hopefully encourage them not to give up on life”.
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| Mother and Child |
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| The Tea Kettle Island (Jujeonjal) as seen from the Observation Deck |
We didn’t linger here for very long and hopped onto the next train that came rolling by. We got off at the Yeongdo Lighthouse stop next, which is located at the southeast end of the park. This is the best stop of the entire trail, so if you only have time for one stop in this entire park, this is it. From the train stop, you will need to walk down a flight of stairs for about 10 minutes before you come to the lighthouse itself.
Built more than a 100 years ago, Yeongdo Lighthouse has always provided a guiding beacon of lights to ships around Busan Port. It is one of the representative landmarks of Busan along with this huge circular red and blue artwork called “Light Beyond Limitation” by Korean artist Ji Sul Won Kyung-Lee who explains it as such:
“The overlapping of the red and blue circles shows the trace of the circle moving forward as the blue one pushes the red. The blue circle connotes the sky and the sea while the red one symbolizes the sun, camellia flower, universe, five oceans, and six continents. The bar in the middle symbolizes the light from the lighthouse, showing everlasting movement toward the universe by splitting the sky and sea. The bar also vividly expresses an ascending marine nation. Overall, this artwork represents, in the shape of a circle breaking through from inside the cliff, the totality of the relationship between nature and the model. It signifies the concept of a gateway in which people can progress together in the spirit of harmony and friendliness.”
There is a stairway that leads all the way to the base of the lighthouse where you can board a ferry to the nearby Igidae and Oryukdo Island. However, since the cruise will take over an hour, we decided to give it a miss. At the base of the lighthouse, there is also a cliff-side path on the right side that leads down to Sinseon Rock, which is named after the myth that gods and goddesses came down here to relax. It takes about 15-20 minutes to walk all the way down, but the up-close view of these pre-historic rock formations makes the exercise worthwhile. The path tends to be quite slippery, so please do be careful when you make your way down. I also read somewhere that a dinosaur footprint that dates back to the Cretaceous Period was actually found near Sinseon Rock and it is on display at the natural history gallery in the Yeongdo Lighthouse, but sadly we missed out on this!
To paraphrase the famous line, what goes down must go up. After enjoying our time at Sinseon Rock, it was time to take the stairs back up to the top of the lighthouse where we came from. I daresay it was a tough climb up and we were heaving with sweat after the climb.
Tired and hungry, we took our leave from Taejongdae after Sinseon Rock and made our way to the park entrance by hopping on the train. Thank goodness for the train. I don’t think we could have managed to walk the 2km out of there! It is a 1,500KRW well spent!
We stopped for lunch at one of the restaurants near the Taejongdae Park entrance. With the help of our Google Translate, we managed to order for ourselves bibimbap and gamjatang which were both delicious. Seems like we can never get this quality of bibimbap back home in Singapore. The vegetables used here in Korea are so fresh and nice and the gochujang just tastes totally different!
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| The restaurant that we ate at |
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| looks like pasar malam games! |
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| Street vendors set up shop near the entrance of Taejongdae Park |
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