Home in the World

Last Updated on June 5, 2025 by Home in the World

The Demilitarised Zone, straddling North and South Korea, is a popular and highly unique excursion for travellers. We included our DMZ day trip from Seoul as day 2 of our 4-day stay in the South Korean capital. It is a very, very different world indeed – far from any flashing lights or modern urbanism. It’s impossible to think of South Korea without also considering the other side of the coin (or, in this case, the peninsula). Because if there’s a ‘South’, then there must also be a ‘North’.

The Korean Peninsula has been divided in one way or another since 1945, with the current Demarcation Line being established in 1953. And so it was that the DMZ was born – as part of the Korean Armistice Agreement between the United Nations, North Korea, and China to end the Korean War. Since then, the (perhaps rather misnomered) Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, otherwise known as North Korea, has followed a distinctly divergent path from that of its southern neighbour.

The DMZ day trip from Seoul

The DMZ is something of a buffer zone, a no-man’s land, and can be visited as a half-day or full-day trip from Seoul. While it may not be your typical bucket-list item, it was definitely something I was interested in seeing. Ours was a bus tour organised by the hotel, but there are plenty of others to be found online. Please note that you will need to bring your passport with you, and, upon entering the DMZ, armed North Korean guards did actually board the bus and do head counts – kind of intimidating but also a semi-expected part of the experience in this corner of the world.

The first stop was Imjingak Park on the banks of the Imjin River, which is crossed by the ‘Freedom Bridge’. The bridge was a former railroad that used to transport repatriated soldiers and POWs back from the North, and there is in fact a rusty, bullet-riddled locomotive from the Korean War on display here. What I found most striking – both visually and emotionally – was the wire fence draped in thousands of multi-coloured ribbons, all bearing messages and prayers of hope for unification. Most were written in Korean, and were therefore unintelligible to me, but every so often there would be one poignantly inked with the single English word: PEACE.

Stop number 2 was probably the most intense, because it took us into the Third Infiltration Tunnel, a. k. a. The Third Tunnel of Aggression, which is one of four tunnels dug under the border between the two Koreas. It starts off seemingly innocuously in a pleasant little lobby building, complete with gift shop. We were then given hard hats and told to store our cameras in lockers (photography is understandably not allowed in the tunnel itself), before the descent into the bowels of the earth began.

You walk down a long, steep ramp, the air around you getting progressively cooler and damper. Tourists are able to go as far as the third barricade. I should point out here that if you are claustrophobic or have any back/leg/foot or heart/blood-pressure problems, this may not be for you (in fact they advise you not to go in if this is the case), as the climb back up in particular is quite heavy going.

Quite a few people were puffing and panting and having to stop along the way. My glutes certainly knew about it the next day! Once back in the outside world, you can also take photos of/with the famous coloured DMZ sign, and even with some cardboard cut-outs of border guards.

Stop 3 was the Dora Observatory, which provided sweeping views of the DMZ and beyond to that enigmatic land that was so close yet so far – North Korea. Through the binoculars, I could see a giant (and I mean giant) flagpole with the blue and red North Korean flag fluttering at its top. A surreal sight indeed.

Finally, stop 4 was Dorasan Station, which used to connect the two Koreas and is now effectively just a museum and symbol of hope for future reunification, though there are also plans for it to become part of an extensive trans-Asia railway.

Inside the terminal are photos of famous meetings that have been held nearby, such as *that* handshake between Kim Jong-Un and Donald Trump, as well as signs showing Pyeongyang as the terminus. You can even print your own boarding pass showing your destination as being the North Korean capital. A little dystopian, albeit lined with shreds of hope.

A quick note also on the Joint Security Area (JSA), which is the northernmost point of the DMZ and where you can technically step ‘into’ North Korea and visit the military conference room. It was also where that aforementioned meeting between Kim Jong-Un and Donald Trump took place. You can visit this as a tourist as well, but not all tours include it. Mine unfortunately did not. So make sure you read up on your tour’s itinerary if the JSA is something you definitely want to see. Please note that additional rules and a dress code apply for the JSA.

For further reading on North Korea – either before or after your trip – I highly recommend Nothing To Envy by Barbara Demick. It will provide some additional context and insights into the daily lives of some everyday people in North Korea.

** This post, like everything else on this website, has been written entirely by me. No ChatGPT or any other AI tool has been used. It takes longer to create, but I value 100% human-generated content and I hope you do too! **

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Before you go..

I hope you found this article to be of use in helping you plan your DMZ day trip from Seoul. Don’t forget to read my blog post on things to see in Seoul. And you might also like to download my free one-page guide to Seoul, containing useful tips and important information to help you plan and enjoy your South Korea travels.

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For more Asia travel content, feel free to check out my posts from Cambodia, Japan and Taiwan, as well as my older travel memories (more narrative style than blog style) from China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia and Singapore.

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