The Jinhae Cherry Blossom Festival is South Korea’s largest cherry blossom festival, held annually in the city of Jinhae, located to the west of Busan in Southeastern corner of South Korea. This festival typically takes place in late-March to early -April. There is no shortage of great articles that detail all the attraction points of this festival; however the foreign community seems to know nothing of Mt. Jangboksan – located immediately behind the festival ground and my all-time favorite springtime mountain in South Korea!
The festival has a bit of a reputation for being insanely busy, even on a weekday. It’s why I postponed by visit here, until my 5th year in South Korea. However, I ended up regretting that delay – not because the crowds weren’t bad, but instead because of how amazing the hike truly was!
Mt. Jangboksan is truly a unique mountain, with hundreds of cherry blossom trees planted along the ridgeline, and the rocky section dominated by purple azalea bushes. There is no other mountain in Korea with as many cherry blossoms as Jangboksan. The azaleas likewise are quite prominent, rivalling those found at the Goryeosan Azalea festival in Incheon, though not as impressive as the azaleas found at Mt. Biseulsan.
Planning the perfect Jinhae Festival Day which maximizes natural beauty and nature
- Hike Jangboksan – Picnic along the ridge!
- Walk the Dream Road
- Visit the Jinhsae Cherry Blossom festival
Before going over the three main attractions I want to remind you that parking will be a nightmare. This is an exceptionally busy festival, and it has standard subpar South Korea parking lots. If you want to attend, I recommend you (1) go by public transportation or book a tour, or (2) arrive prior to 10am or (3) stay in Jinhae. Likely no matter what you decide you will likely find staying in Busan or Jinhae the most logical decision to make. For Seoul residents its 3-4+ hours to arrive by KTX (getting to Seoul station -> KTX to Busan -> getting to Jinhae) or a 5+ hour drive. Due to its location, trying to daytrip this festival will cause you to feel rushed. I detail well priced locations in Jinhae which are in walking distance of the festival at the end of the article.
The Jinhae Cherry Blossom Festival (진해 군항제 벚꽃축제)
Having gone on a Saturday, I can say that the cherry blossom festival in Jinhae is impressive, but incredibility packed. Other reviews done by foreigners who attended on weekdays, likewise, stated that it was pretty chaotic.
Gyeonghwa Station/ 경화역 (Festival Grounds) 경남 창원시 진해구 경화동 https://naver.me/5XJ28Wp0
I attended the festival after hiking Jangboksan and walking the dream road. Both of which, in my opinion, were more classically beautiful than the festival grounds – both from a number of humans perspective and a nature vs built up environment perspective.
For a great guide of the attractions of Jinhae Cherry Blossom Festival I would recommend checking out there she goes again’s blog post on the festival – she takes great pictures and details each section quite well. It does have a lot of ads which isn’t my favorite reading format, however in terms of quality of content it’s above average. I mostly stuck to the train area while she hit every section, including the stream area, which is another major highlight. She doesn’t cover the dream road and the Jangboksan hike, which is what my article will mostly focus on.
This is a festival you are going to in order to take pictures for Instagram. I opted to include my Instagram post to show a realistic set of photos taken on my phone for what you might expect to see.
Although I managed to capture a number of human-free tree pictures, I opted to not included them because it felt like ‘lying’? The trees are incredibility impressive (much bigger than most cherry blossom trees in Korea – clearly planted earlier) and I’m glad I went, but it’s not as magical as the images online seemed to give off. The same cannot be said about the hike.
Hiking Jangboksan (장복산)
I was thrilled to have spent my birthday hiking my all-time favorite spring mountain in South Korea. It became my favorite, as it has both the azaleas famously found in Mt Biseulsan near Daegu and Mt. Goryeosan near Incheon and hundreds of cherry blossoms that typically aren’t found on mountains, rather nearly exclusively located along rivers and roads.
As can be seen in the trail map below, there are two peaks on the ridgeline – Jangboksan (장복산) and a secondary peak Deokjubong (덕주봉). It’s worth noting that there is 0 English romanization on the mountain, so it is important to memorize those Korean names, as will need to know them to read the signs.
Unlike the heavily edited and cropped photos of the festival online, the difference between my DSLR photos above and my Instagram iPhone photos of the hike below are not that different. This mountain has that sort of beauty you don’t need to fake.
The best place to start is at the Jangboksan Sculpture Park (장복산 조걱공원). You will need to plan ahead a bit, either by taxing to the park to start, or by parking here and taxing at the end. Looping back isn’t really an option, without hiking uphill quite a lot – unless you cut the hike short to make a much smaller loop.
You can do a loop from the sculpture park, as can be seen in the below government map (green route), however you will only see the cherry blossom lined section and not the Azaela rocky section.
Jangboksan Sculpture Park 경남 창원시 진해구 장복산길 56-42 https://naver.me/5S9xCkVa
Below I have included two course options. The small loop on the right with the red lined course, and the full ridge hike on the left with the yellow lined course.
Another difference between these two options is the inclusion of the dream road – labeled ‘Cherry Blossom Road’ on the full ridge hike map above. I’ll elaborate on that section below.
Regardless of which option you select: From the sculpture park, you walk along the paved road until you reach the turn off with the small temple. Once you see the temple, don’t walk up the steep hill to the temple, instead follow signs to the peak “장복산정성”. The trail to the ridge objectively isn’t great. Its steep, and the trail needs a lot of improvements. As much as it sucks, it was worth it once I got to the peak.
After the major climb, you are walking the ridge, past the main peak. This peak is on the Blackyak 100+ mountain challenge, so you can get Blackyak credit here as well as all the pretty photos.
If you opt to do the full ridge, you will continue on to the second peak and the rocky section, which transitions into cherry blossoms as your descent to the turn off point. You then can go directly to Jinhae, however I recommend you double back a way along the road (orange section on the map below).
Even on a Saturday the cherry blossom lined road was fairly empty, aside from the hikers making their way down to the festival grounds. As you can see in the above map there are no shortage of places to descend down into town along this road, but I opted to wait until the course with the convivence store turn off, which is just beyond the train section of the festival grounds.
I attended on one of the last official days of the festival, which meant the cherry blossoms were being to rain down, creating that romantic movie atmosphere.
The video below shows the cherry blossoms falling at the turn off point to downtown Jinhae, complete with chirping birds.
Jinhae’s Best Foreigner Friendly Lodging Options
One excellent thing about this area is that there are a number of hotels to pick from, all with great reviews (all 8/10 and above) at affordable prices. These prices in the picture are weekday rates, so subject to be a bit higher on a weekday – but it gives you a general idea of affordability.
Romantic weekend or want something a bit nicer? -> I would go #3 or #5, with 5 being on the water while 3 is a closer to the festival areas. While 1, 2, and 4 are all perfectly fine motel-hotels, with 2 and 4 being closer to the festival.
- HARU Hotel – Standard Korean motel/hotel. Nothing fancy, but nothing terrible.
- Charp Hotel – Standard Korean motel/hotel. Nothing fancy, but nothing terrible.
- Jinhae Intercity Hotel – nicest western style hotel on the list, with addition seating and big showers. If you want to get a nicer room, some even have a private outdoor hot tub (a rare find in Korea).
- French code Hotel – Standard Korean motel/hotel. Nothing fancy, but nothing terrible. For another $10 you can upgrade to a room with a massage chair.
- Louis Boutique Hotel – A nicer western style hotel on the water – for another $20 you can upgrade to a sea view. They have very nice suites with a hot tub and sea view for under $200 – looks like a $400 suite.
Happy Trekking!
Aurora
