These are not the routes you will find on the big booking sites. An island on the maritime border with the North. A border town in Gangwon-do. The lake country inland, where the cliffs come down to the water. Nineteen days crossing the country end to end. Routes like these need local knowledge, working relationships with local operators, and guides who know the roads — and that is what we have built our company around.
We are a Korean DMC. We plan and operate these trips ourselves: our own guides under contract, our own bookings, start to finish.
Travel trade
We welcome B2B enquiries from agencies and tour operators looking for a ground handler in Korea — FIT, small groups, and special-interest itineraries outside Seoul. Please write to ikoreatravel@gmail.com.
A note on the entries below: no names and no exact dates. Our travellers’ privacy comes first.
THIS NOVEMBER · IN PREPARATION
Busan, Gyeongju and Andong — 5 days
A family group of twelve, ten adults and two children, coming back to Korea with us for the second time. Private coach for the whole route from Incheon, an English-speaking guide for four of the five days, and one private house in Busan so the family can stay under one roof. Two UNESCO World Heritage sites, a morning picking tangerines in a greenhouse at Gimhae, and a free last day in Seoul.
OCTOBER – NOVEMBER 2025 · COMPLETED
The length of the country — 19 days
Three travellers from Germany, eighteen nights, coast to coast. Seoul and a day at the DMZ, then Gongju, two nights in Jeonju, Gwangju, a domestic flight to Jeju, Busan, Gyeongju, and a night at Andong Hahoe before returning to Seoul. Three- and four-star hotels with two nights in a hanok. Three of our guides worked the route in turn so that nobody drove tired, each engaged on our own contract.
This is the trip our 21-day Grand Tour of Korea grew out of.
AUTUMN 2023 · COMPLETED
Jecheon in autumn — a group trip inland
Into Chungcheongbuk-do, where almost nothing is written in English: the lake by cable car, the Oksunbong cliffs rising out of the water, a limestone cave, a country market. We wrote the group their own briefing before departure — what to bring and what the weather would do.
Baengnyeongdo — the island on the sea border
Small groups to the northernmost island in South Korea, close enough to the North that the Marine Corps guards it. Very few operators run this. We ran it more than once — the notices we posted to the people travelling are still on this site.
Yanggu, Gangwon-do — the DMZ and the dust
A three-day group trip to Yanggu, on the eastern half of the border, with the full schedule published in advance for the people travelling.
Temple food with monks, Seoul
A morning in a temple kitchen, learning how temple kimchi is made without garlic, onion or fish sauce.
Planning something like these?
Tell us roughly when you want to come, how many of you there are, and how long you have. We will come back with a day-by-day plan and a price — not a brochure.
Travellers: send us your dates
Agencies and tour operators: ikoreatravel@gmail.com — B2B enquiries by email