Seoul to Busan, the scenic route.

South Korea's public transportation has been rated as the best in the world for its "efficiency, affordability, reliability and innovation". What else would you want from a public transport system?  It allows its user to travel intra and inter city cheapily and with the minimum of fuss. Even the most nervous of travelers is put at ease when confronted with easy to use schematics of the transportation system; depicting the destinations in English, Hangeul (Korean) and Hanja (Chinese).

Click here to get the full route maps and instructions

The KTX, Korea's bullet train, enables commuters to travel from Seoul (the countries capital and northern most city) to the nations second city (famous for its beautiful southern beaches) in two and a half hours and for an affordable price. On the KTX Korea's country will fly past your window at over 300km per hour. Great if you're in a rush but, dreadful for anyone who wants to truly experience this nations variety of cultures that transition from the north to south. To fully experience Korea's epic mountains, picturesque waterfalls and historic villages that run from Seoul through the heart of Korea you'll need two things: some vacation and a bike.  


If you're feeling particularly benevolant then you could turn your journey into a charity bike ride. We decided to do just that and raised some money for a North Korean charity. The 'Korean Herald' followed our story and published an article on us. Click here to see it. 

Regardless of whether you're doing it for charity, insanity or a sense of achievement... the journey is rewarding in itself and this page aims to supply you with some useful information (usually via links) to complete the ride. 


How to get from the north of South Korea to the south.  On a bicycle. 


Before leaving. 

• Plan your route, there are some routes here that you can view or download that also have written directions. Alternatively, you can plan your own route. If you do, your main objective should be to select roads that are relatively quiet and, of course, through areas of beauty. Make sure that you budget for rests and plan where you will sleep at night. On our journey, we tried to stop as often as possible at JimJilBangs (more information on JimJilBangs here) but, when there there was none around, we would settle for a motel and all sleep in the same room. All good maps of Korea will depict where there are motels, as does the map that you can find attached to this page. 
• The journey is not an arduous one. In fact, it is suitable for anyone that has an average level on fitness. If you're worried about your fitness, or if you want to spend more time to explore the locations that you will go through, then simply spread the journey out over a longer period of time. The trip took us 5 days and that was at a steady pace with the burden of alterations to our route from a typhoon that hit a day before we started. For the very ambitious out there... the journey is possible in 2 days.
• Perhaps you could organise to do the road trip for charity we did and the media were very supportive of our cause. Click here to see the article that they wrote about our journey.
• Pack sensibly. Plan for all weather conditions and make sure that you have spares to do repairs on the bikes that you will be riding. 
• Water proofs
• Pump
• Maps (or, a GPS - there are some great deals on Garmin GPS' at the moment)
• Water
• Repair kit
• Food
• Money
• Helmet
• Eye protection 

(a great blog that explains what is needed for long bike rides is this page here.)

The finish line, Busan beach.  

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Travel, move, explore, north, south, east, west, direction, world, globe, nation, state, country, backpack, backpackers, vagabond, nomadic, nomad, bike, cycle, Seoul, Busan, route, how, to, get, how to get, see, view different, culture, tradition, experience, road, path, bike path, cycle route, cycle path  

Travel, move, explore, north, south, east, west, direction, world, globe, nation, state, country, backpack, backpackers, vagabond, nomadic, nomad, bike, cycle, Seoul, Busan, route, how, to, get, how to get, see, view different, culture, tradition, experience, road, path, bike path, cycle route, cycle path  

Travel, move, explore, north, south, east, west, direction, world, globe, nation, state, country, backpack, backpackers, vagabond, nomadic, nomad, bike, cycle, Seoul, Busan, route, how, to, get, how to get, see, view different, culture, tradition, experience, road, path, bike path, cycle route, cycle path