destinations:city guides: seoul

You’ll never run out of ways to get to know the capital and the country. For a dose of modern history, join a regular day tour to the DMZ, the four-kilometer-wide demilitarized zone that divides South from North Korea. A full tour of the Joint Security Area at Panmunjom includes a briefing from an American soldier (shouting out a standard history that he’s had to memorize) and a walk through Freedom House, a modern building that faces the North-South line in the middle of the Joint Security Area.

You’ll see North Korean guards staring at you, and you’ll enter the small aluminum-covered building right on the line where North Korean and American officers stage occasional meetings. Your tour bus will take you to the “bridge of no return,” over which prisoners were exchanged after the signing of the truce at Panmunjom. Outside the JSA, the tour may also include a look at the “third tunnel,” one of the infiltration routes dug out by the North Koreans and later discovered and opened up by U.S. army engineers. If possible, you should also visit spacious if underused Dora Station, the last stop on the new rail line linking North to South, and ride up nearby Mount Dora to an observatory for a sweeping look over the line into North Korea.

But don’t forget the past: Half a dozen palaces are wide open for tours right in central Seoul. You can spend hours wandering through the secret garden of royalty behind the tall walls surrounding Changdeok Palace. For a lovely view of the city, go up Namsan Tower, at the top of Namsan. And for much greater views, plus invigorating exercise, consider hiking up Mount Pugak, north of the city center but still inside the city limits. It’s two or three hours to the top up any of several winding forest trails.