everyone thinks of South Korea as futuristic
cities, traditional culture, and K-pop, but 63% 
of the whole country is covered in forest with
21 National Parks. From Central Seoul, we got on
a 2-hour bus to the city of Sokcho on the east
coast of Korea, where we'll be visiting Seoraksan

National Park. Compared to the big bustling city
of Seoul, this place is so peaceful. There is just
a few people walking around and it's beautiful.
Pastel sunset. These mountains, which we're going
to be climbing tomorrow, look huge, don't they?
I don't know if I'm going to make it up there

It looks massive. There's a little temple in
the distance. Let's go over there and check it out. I feel like most tourists don't come outside
of the big cities in South Korea, and it just feels
so peaceful being around this area. So, the actual
date we are here is actually like early October

I think it's the 11th of October, so we're hoping
tomorrow we might actually see some of the autumn
colors when we're up the mountain because
apparently it's the first place in all of
South Korea that you get the autumn colors or
the full colors. If you're from America, the sky

is looking super clear tonight, and the weather
app says that it's supposed to stay this way, so
fingers crossed we're going to have a beautiful
crystal clear sunset. [Music] Sunrise. There are so
many of these restaurants selling seafood and
like massive crabs in these very small tanks.

Honestly, it feels a little bit disturbing, but I
guess that's what they do here in the Far East.
A lot of, a lot of live animals. Look at this little
little guy. He doesn't look too happy, does he? I'm
not sure we fancy seafood tonight, but we need
some big meal right now to make sure we have

the energy for the morning we need fuel I think
we've got to get up at like 3:30 or 4:00 a.m. so probably not a lot of sleep tonight we've just
come into the Sokcho market and I think there's

going to be lots of food for us to maybe try
around here top blade steak maybe we go for this premium beef here Emilia comes with the
food oh my word how good does that beef look that looks amazing it does look
premium all right you go first should

I give it a go give it a go it's
so soft so good is it really good beef well there's really nice like sauce on it
as well and still super affordable it's like $18
for both of ours and I got the largest one and we
both got rice as well I am absolutely stuffed now

but that food was Unreal we'll try and put the
name of the little restaurant down there
because I highly highly recommend it we are back
in our room now and we are getting ready for
bed Ailia's already here it's so cold it's cold and
we're only at sea level so by the time we get out

the mountain it's probably going to be maybe 5°
in the morning we're only going to have like I I
don't know 4 hours sleep so we're going to head
to bed and we'll see you very very early good

night good morning guys it is currently 4:00 a.m.
and we're going to try and have to call this taxi
in Korean obviously we're not going to understand
anything hello uh a taxi at Dong Yong dong the
house is that booked yeah I think you did very
well there I did it here we go I think the taxi is

Here we are, alright guys. This is a little bit surprising. There is a couple of coach loads of people and the car park is pretty much full. There's so many people, I did not expect this. It is a Saturday so maybe that's why it's busy already. All right, Swanny Rock, which way is that? So there was

a crowd behind us, but it looks like they're doing the third tallest peak in Korea cuz they go the other way, um, and that is actually in this National Park. I don't think we'll be climbing that today. It's quite funny when you do Sunrise Heights cuz you walk up but you have no idea what your

surroundings are like. We can just hear R to our right. There's probably lots of beautiful views, but we just can't see anything. It's a bit eerie. Can barely see anything cuz there's a light in my eye.

The good path has ended now, and I'm pretty sure it's going to be more rough terrain. It starts off gradual and it just gets steeper and steeper and steeper until we get to the top. This hike, we'll be

climbing. I think it is about 600 m in total. We've already done some, we've already done 160, but most of it will be on these stairs. We've got ourselves a signpost. This vertical rock is one of the

most representative things to see on Seoraksan Mountain. 873 m from that sign. It sounds like it's going to be windy up there. We've got to prepare for the cold. Right now I'm actually really warm. All I've got on is like a little light t-shirt and like a long, like kind of thermal thing. Definitely

getting a lot steeper now and our head torch keeps
like cutting out the light so we kind of get pitch
Darkness for a second which is a little bit spooky
but it is getting a bit brighter in the sky oh
still about 40 minutes till sunrise and I think
we've already got about 200 meters of elevation left

than wow we've got our first proper view
and it looks absolutely beautiful incredible
it is beautiful see start of
the golden on the rocks on
the mountains over there I think
over there that the third tallest Peaks we've had to put the hoodies back on it's
started to get a bit windy like super windy just

all of a sudden it just got really windy when we
went around the corner so wrapping up ready to go
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today I think we're at the top I think we've
got there but there is so many people here
wow W high five we did it we did it oh my God
is that out the sea yeah I think that's where
the sun will rise how long have we got maybe about
10 minutes till the sun rises it looks a little

Misty wow these views are insane I can't believe
what I'm seeing right now it's so perfect and it's
so like crystal clear this morning I feel like
you can see for miles there aren't too many like
tourist foreigners here at the moment maybe they
come later in the day but this spot should be

more well known it is absolutely beautiful it is
pretty bright now the sun's been up for maybe 20
30 minutes and this area is just so so beautiful
Amelia is trying to keep warm cuz she's getting
cold doing some exercise it doesn't make sense
I've got so many layers on but I'm still cold

and I've got the hiccups for some random reason
probably just because I ate some walnuts and I
don't know nuts often give me hiccups I don't
know why can anyone explain that is anyone a
scientist or a hiccup expert there we go because
it's only early October there aren't loads of

full colors there's definitely some and you can
really see it um in the higher elevations but as soon as it drops down it goes very green but if
you were maybe two or or 3 weeks later towards the end of October I think this place would be
like full of the full autumn colors we're just

walking up to the kind of third viewpoint there
and all the people Joel's got the hiccups all the people have kind of cleared away now and
this one looks so cool look at that you can oh sorry I still got the hiccups you can really
get a perspective of how cool these rocks are

they're just so unique what's the best way
to get out hiccups please leave them in the comments we started walking down now because it
was getting so cold at the top but I have to be honest coming up and obviously walking down as
well the staircase to get up here is incredible

like probably one of the best I've ever seen
because it's got like these cushioned bits so every time you step you feel like you give a bit
so it's not like slapping your feet on concrete now here we go guys even though I said we're a
little early for the Autumn full colors we've

still got a little bit of red how beautiful
is that it's just the odd tree here and there but generally especially over the mountain in
the distance as you probably saw earlier it is definitely some autumn colors as you get probably
above a thousand meters badminton yeah why why have you

got a badminton racket train train train wow
very good that's an odd thing to carry up but apparently he's training I'm a big fan of badminton and
I was playing a lot whilst I was living in barley so that's what I was asking I was like want a
game the way down has just started to flatten

out a little bit more but look what we must have
passed in the dark look at this huge rock it is
absolutely massive I didn't even see it on the
way out neither but it also has Engravings and
like I think that's traditional like Chinese
writing wow obviously I don't know what that

says it is definitely starting to
get a little busier now it's about 8:30 so that's when the crowds start to come
but just to remember it is a Saturday it's a weekend and the autumn colors are starting
so it's probably quite a popular time to

come now we're walking down in the light
we can actually see the environment the
surroundings we were walking up in and
the mountains around here are absolutely huge they didn't look as big when we were
up that other Mountain but look at these

in the distance these are over 1,000 meters
taller than any mountain in England as
we're walking down there's this beautiful river
right through the middle of the valley and it
looks so beautiful and refreshing and I kind of
want to swim in it but I know that that will be

freezing we've just come across this beautiful
Temple and it's writing and I wanted to have a
look at this because I think the top and the last
three characters is traditional Chinese and the
bottom three characters is Korean but please
correct me if I'm wrong and basically Korean

comes from traditional Chinese cuz they kind of
use the same characters in this whole area [Music]
a so beautiful so I think this is drinking water
let's just could you translate that and make sure
we're not going to give ourselves some food
poisoning uh can we drink we drink oh with

This oh oh drink okay thank you thank you right I'll give it a taste hopefully it's good that's really good right let's fill up the water bottles so this is a Buddhist temple and it was actually made in 1647 it's

been destroyed a couple of times but they remade it and what a beautiful place to come and worship in between these mountains [Music] oh wow look at this we might be able to have a good coffee after hi two cappuccino yeah this

looks amazing they do look good I'm so ready for this so we actually had no idea how busy this National Park is like there is so many people here right now and what's the time it's about 11: a.m. so there is crowd here probably because it is a Saturday we did read online um that on

the weekday is a lot less busy look at everyone everyone going on their good old weekend walks I don't blame them because it's only about 2 hour journey from Seoul it's probably a lot of people from the city love to escape especially when it's a bit cooler in the Autumn like it is right now

we did just try to book the cable car over there that goes up the mountain but unfortunately it's fully booked for the whole day because it is just so busy so if you are going to come on the weekend book it in advance because it is so busy now we're actually going to head back on the bus

to the city of Sokcho to get back we're going to try and take the bus cuz it's going to be a lot cheaper than taking another taxi and we are back at where we're staying this is the house hostel and it's honestly a really nice place to stay around here it's a few

hours later now and we are on our first beach
in all of South Korea and it feels a little different, doesn't it? It does, it feels weird
mostly because I'm wearing trainers on the beach. Usually we're like barefoot in our swim
stuff, so we got trousers on, shoes on our feet

and we're walking really oddly trying not to get
sand in our shoes. I think I've already got some, yeah, probably. We spent most of the afternoon just
kind of relaxing, watching some Netflix, something
we don't do lots whilst we travel, so it was nice
to relax after that early and quite steep hike

but what a beautiful way to end the day, hey? It's
so beautiful and this sunset is so perfect. We've
got the mountains and the city behind us and then
the beach here. Coming to an area of South Korea
which doesn't feel quite as touristy and is just
out of the main cities feels so nice. I'm really

glad we've come here because it just gives you a
different perspective of the whole country rather
than just the big cities, as you probably assume.
The next place we're going is Busan in the south
of Korea. The next, I think it's the second
biggest city, so we'll be heading there in

our next video. I think we're just going to spend
the evening relaxing here, watching the sunset and
then hopefully having some good food after, but
anyway, thank you so much for watching and make
sure you subscribe to get more videos and see you
in the next one in Busan. See you in the next one.

The SIDE of SOUTH KOREA no one shows you - Seoraksan National Park 🇰🇷

The SIDE of SOUTH KOREA no one shows you - Seoraksan National Park 🇰🇷