Seohaerang Gil | Day 14 – 20

10 – 16 April 2025 | Course 15 – 20 (Mokpo)

Based ourselves in Mokpo for the week so we could ditch the big hiking bags and do the courses with just a day pack.

Day 14: Thursday 10 April. Mokpo is a city we like very much. We have visited twice before and decided to spend the day exploring by doing course 18, which navigates around the main parts of town and along a few trails 🌲 We complete about 20km – the weather is perfect, the scenery forever changing from a coastal walk, to the city, parks and trails, and there are cherry blossoms every direction you turn. A hike up the mountains brings us amazing views of the city and a waterfall ⛰️ We finish the day with some Nepalese curry, which is a nice change from all the bread and Korean food we’ve been ordering! 🍛

Day 15: Friday 11 April. Today we ventured to the north of Mokpo to complete two courses (no. 19/20) and stopped by our favourite bakery (Green House Bakery) and also our new favourite coffee shop (Hio Coffee). We discovered the further out of town you go the tougher buses can be to figure out. Getting there was no problem – we just caught a bus direct to Mokpo National University and start the trails from there – but getting back to the city was tougher than expected. The course took us through farmland with scenic mountain and river views, however there were a few too many growling dogs not chained up so it made the walk a bit less enjoyable. We were making our way through some farm trails when we came across a car that had driven off the main path and hanging off the road. We tried to help the driver but he needed far more man power to lift the car back onto the road, which proved quite entertaining. We ended up walking 4km back to a bus stop to get a direct bus back into town, followed by another 2km walk back to the motel. Dinner was another buffet, a place that used to be fully vegetarian but looks like it had changed to a regular buffet, probably because Koreans love their meat too much! 🥩

Day 16: Saturday 12 April. The forecast said it was going to to rain most of the day so we decide to skip the hiking and have a 힐링데이 / Healing day ☔️ Went out for an early run to while it was still dry before heading to a few of our favourite food places around town: Green House Bakery, Hio Coffee and Isaac Toast. Also thought it would be a good opportunity to reschedule tomorrow’s Korean lesson to this afternoon so we did a bit of study and had a nice lesson and chat with our 한국어 선생님 Korean teacher Jenny 🇰🇷

Day 17: Sunday 13 April. A chilly day today! 🌬️ It topped about 12°c as we made our way south of Mokpo to complete courses 16 and 17 for about 22km. We stopped by 빵숑숑 bakery first to pick up some supplies before commencing. The first course was quite nice (but super windy!), crossing 삼호대교 / Samho Bridge and hiking through parklands and along the water. The second course was a bit boring, and unfortunately we were doing an out to back to hit the compulsory three check points so we had to walk it twice 😑 Dinner wasn’t too exciting as we left it a bit late and by the time we decided to head out (9:30pm) everything was closing up, even the places that claim to be open 24 hrs were closed or closing 🤷🏻‍♀️ There is a reason why 편의점 / convenience stores exist! 🏪

Day 18: Monday 14 April. Another rainy day! ☔️ We skipped the hiking today and went for an early run down the cherry blossom lined river path, which was lovely but a bit chilly with a top of 9°c. We bought lunch from all our favourite places again, including an awesome bakery called 빵숑숑 / Ppang Shong Shong 🥐 It rained most of the day and we didn’t head out of the hotel until much later when we visited Emart Super Store. Browsed the giant sized products and bought some giant trays of food for dinner before making our way back in what felt like -2°c winds 🥶

Day 19: Tuesday 15 April. What an adventurous day! Today we did 14km along course 15, which took us along highways with almost no shoulder, barricades blocking the path, abseiling down seawalls and running across roads dodging traffic because paths suddenly came to an end 🚘 And this was all along the official hiking route. The worse thing was it was an out-and-back course so we had to do it twice. Once we got back to the city of Mokpo we made our way to the Lotte Mart outlets to remove the trauma of the day from our minds 😮‍💨

Day 20: Wednesday 16 April. We’ve really enjoyed Mokpo and managed to complete six hiking courses this past week. We make one last visit to our new favourite coffee shop Hio Coffee before catching the bus to Jindo Island, where we plan to base ourselves for the week and do some more trekking 🚍 The bus ride takes only an hour and before we know it we have checked into our next motel, where the lady gives us an upgrade to a room with a massage chair. We arrived famished and head to a Korean snack place for a late lunch 🍜 We grab some ramen, kimbap and tonkastu before heading to the local bakery. The lady working there is so lovely, giving us heaps of samples then more freebies as we leave after buying a big bagful of goodies 🥐 We spend the rest of the evening taking turns on the massage chair which will come in extremely handy after all the hiking we’ve been doing!