🎧 Yul's Korea Audio Guide
Suncheon Bay Wetland & National Garden
Narrated in English with Korean phrases by YUL of KVIBE IDOLS.
🎵 Background music: Still in That Spring (그 봄에 머물러) — KVIBE IDOLS · Listen to the full song →
Full transcript
Annyeong, yeoreobun! It's Yul. Picture a sea of golden reeds, taller than me, waving in the wind all the way to the horizon. Welcome to Suncheon Bay, one of the most beautiful wetlands in Korea.
The reed field here is the widest in Korea, about five point four square kilometers, and around it lie huge mudflats. The mud is packed with crabs, mudskippers and food for birds. In winter, rare hooded cranes, a Natural Monument of Korea, come here to spend the cold months. And in 2006, Suncheon Bay was listed as a Ramsar wetland, protected under an international treaty.
Now here's the twist. Cities usually swallow nature. Suncheon did the opposite. To protect the bay, the city decided to build a giant garden. In 2013, it hosted the Suncheon Bay International Garden Expo, which drew more than four point four million visitors. Then in 2015, the garden became Korea's very first National Garden. A garden built to guard a wetland. Smart and pretty!
In 2021, UNESCO added Getbol, Korean Tidal Flats, to the World Heritage List, and the Boseong-Suncheon tidal flats are one part of it. Daebak!
Yul's tip! Walk the wooden deck through the reeds, then climb up to Yongsan Observatory before sunset. From the top, the waterway curves through the wetland like a giant letter S, glowing orange. The reeds turn golden in autumn, so that's the best season.
Next, we're going to a city so romantic, it has its own song. Kaja!
