Jun 19, 20196 min read

What did we do in Jeju Island? Where is Jeju Island anyways?

Quick fun facts about Jeju:

Jeju island is South Korea's largest island
Situated south of Korea in the Korea Strait
An area of 1,849 sq. km.
A population of approximately 700,000
About 15 million tourists visit this island every year.
The entire island is a UNESCO Heritage Site
This Island is one the New 7 Natural Wonders of the World.
It is a volcanic island formed from the outpouring of lava. This is the reason why 90% of its surface is basalt (volcanic rock).
The Jeju Island was used by many refugees as a place to stay during the Korean War.
Unlike the other provinces in South Korea that is based on Confucian patriarchal structure, the Jeju society has a small population with a matriarchal family structure, and is especially found among the haenyeo (“sea women”), who were often the heads of families, because of the controlled income on men’s labor. These women would free-dive to harvest abalones, conchs and other marine products. In the 1960’s over 20% of women on the island were free divers, providing over 60% of revenue of the island’s fishing industry.

You can find many articles/blogs on the internet on what to do in Jeju Island so instead we will walk you through on what we did on this island for 7 days in the hopes that you will find these information helpful as you plan your travel on this island.

When did we travel?

Second week of May.

Note that during this week we still did see some tourist buses but we did not find it to be overwhelming. We did not have to line up and wait to get to any attractions. The only time where we found it to be too crowded is at the O'sulloc Green Tea Museum where we went at 2pm and there were tons of tourists which is understandable as it is during the middle of the day and entrance to the museum is free so I advise to go here first thing in the morning as soon as they open up.

What was the weather like?

15-28 degrees (celsius). For the 8 days we were there, we did get some rain and sunshine. So make sure to pack a rain jacket and some layers as it does get chilly in the morning/night and especially if you are hiking Mt. Hallasan where there could still be some snow at the peak.

How did we get to this island?

We flew with Air Busan from Seoul, Korea with a Special Fare Ticket which is 29,400 won (or $33 CAD) per person including a 15kg free check-in baggage. We booked our flight two days before our departure and still managed to find a cheap flight. May is right before their peak season which is typically around June-August so if you are flying during these months we advise to book it ahead in advance as the prices could be more expensive.

How to get around Jeju Island?

We rented a car with Lotte-Rent-A-Car. There are public buses on the island but they can be unreliable. We met fellow travellers who took it and didn't have any issues but most locals we met suggested renting a car. We did since we like travelling at our own time and for the price of approximately $15 CAD a day it was worth it for two people travelling. This price also included:

Free GPS (highly recommended as googlemaps doesn't work in South Korea for driving directions). The GPS is in English but there are some places on the island that might not have the english name on the GPS so it's better to search up a location using their phone number in the GPS. This is the most efficient way to look up for directions.
Additional driver at no cost
Free polaroid camera for the duration of your rental (you just need to buy or bring the film)

Do note that you need an international driver license to drive in South Korea.

We were able to get this for $25 CAD at our local AMA office. See here for the steps on getting this from AMA.

Renting a car with Lotte

You need to first register on their website. Registering is free.

The car rental office (Jeju Autohouse) is not right at the airport but they do offer free shuttles from the airport. The shuttle runs every 8-10 minutes and the drive to their office (Jeju Autohouse) from the airport is about 5 minutes. We had a bit of an issue finding the shuttle so we had to ask the person at the desk at the "Rent-a-car" Building in the parking lot so if you do get lost just ask the person at the desk and they would be able to assist you but basically:

Exit from Gate #5
Cross the crosswalk
To the right, walk down the pass way until you reach the "Rent-a-car" Building
Look for Parking area Zone 9
Take "Lotte-Rent-A-Car Hertz"shuttle bus.

Needing extension? We extended our car rental with Lotte and found that we saved a few dollars by calling them instead of booking it online/e-mailing them. Call their car rental location in Jeju directly and not their head office since the agent we talked to from their customer service support said that we cannot extend the car and need to return it first and book another car online which we found a little absurd and inconvenient so we just called their local office in Jeju and had no issues and got it extended $3 cheaper than what was advertised online.

In summary, these are things we considered when we rented a car:

GPS is a must (unless you read Korean and can get by with Kakao Maps. Note that google maps does not provide driving directions in South Korea)
Car rental agency that provided the best deal
Gas efficient cars (gasoline is expensive on the island)

Recommended free apps for navigating around Korea (not just Jeju Island):

Kakao Bus (for use of buses)
Kaka Metro (for MRT)
Maps.me
Kakao Maps if you read
Google maps still work but only for commute directions (no walking/driving directions)

Where did we stay in Jeju Island?

There are plenty of places you can stay at Jeju Island - hotels, Airbnbs, hostels. Instead of telling you where to stay, I recommend to book it with Agoda. I find that they have more options ad have better prices than booking.com or Expedia. We found that Agoda is better for searching up accommodation in Asia but not really for any other continents. Things that we considered when we book our accommodation:

Free parking (a must if you are renting a car)
A kitchen since we do love cooking our own food some nights and also it helps us save some money.
A nice view (only recommended if you are planning on spending some time at your accommodation. The view is no use if you are going to be out all day doing activities).
Seogwipo or Jeju City (these are the two main cities on the island) since we had 8 days on the island we decided to split our accommodation between these two cities. You can drive the entire island so you can also just stay in one place but we decided to split it since we have enough days to take our time exploring the island.

What did we do in Jeju?

There are plenty of things to do in Jeju and you can even find some good blogs on what to do on the island so we will leave it to these blogs to inform you what to do but here are the things we did before we decided what to do on the island:

We went to the Jeju Welcome Center in Jeju City - the people here are very welcoming and friendly. They also speak good english here. They gave us a map of the island and tons of recommendations. So we suggest to visit this centre before you do anything else.
When we got the map, we spent about an hour mapping our route to determine the most efficient way to drive to save on gas. (Note that gas is very expensive in South Korea and even more so on the island - it's about $2 CAD per litre)

Here's our top 5:

Hike up Mt. Hallasan: South Korea's highest mountain
Walk up Seongsan Ilchulbong (Sunrise Peak): a 182m volcanic cone famous for spectacular sunrises. You can also see the Jeju Women Diver Performance here at 1:30PM or 3:00PM.
Cafe Hopping: the island has plenty of charming and cool cafes. There are tons of blogs about them. Here are the cafes that we accidnetally stumbled upon that we didnt see in any of the blogs we read that we thought would be worth visiting: Je Story Shop in Seogwipo and Fairy Jeju Stay Cafe and Pub in Hado. Here are the websites we used when we looked up cafes to go to in Jeju: visit jeju and trazy.
Beach hopping: an island plenty of beaches with white fine sand. Make sure to check out Hyeopjae beach.
Go to Magpie Brewery. It's actually a drink from Seoul but it is brewed in Jeju.

Pictures from Mt. Hallasan

Pictures from Seongsan Ilchulbong

Pictures from our beach hopping

Pictures from our cafe hopping

Must to eat in Jeju Island

Peanut ice cream
Oranges (from the photo below you can see the orange is as big as Cameron's face)
Black Pork
Banana Milk (this drink is pretty much for all of Korea and not just Jeju - but beware this drink can be addicting)

Other research information

Here are some of the links from other blogs/articles we used when we did our research on things to do on the island:

From belaroundtheworld "27 Jaw-Dropping Things to Do in Jeju Island, South Korea"
From trazy "Jeju Island Bucket list: Top 10 things to do in Jeju"
From expatolife "20+ Awesome Things To Do In Jeju Island South Korea"