Friday, June 17, 2011

Deokpo Beach: Aspiring Tourist Mecca

The opening of the Geoje bridge connecting northern Geoje with Busan has brought a flurry of activity to sleepy Deokpo Beach, the village where our apartment building is located. We are anticipating a flood of tourists from Busan this summer. Several old houses have been torn down and construction has been ongoing on two five-story buildings which will probably be rental rooms and restaurants. Then just before we left for vacation at the beginning of May, work started on two mysterious platforms on the water, as well as a small building near the fishing pier. When we arrived back at the beginning of June, we saw that the platforms had become this:

A zipline over the water!

and the building now looks like this:

What would you guess this building will be, given the odd rounded framing on the outside?

If you guessed bathrooms/showers shaped like a boy and girl penguin, you're right! And your mind is a total mystery to me.

Now if only they could keep the beach, the centerpiece of all this potential tourism, from looking like a garbage barge ran aground nearby, we'd really be in business.

Fortunately for us, Deokpo does maintain some of its provincial charm despite all of this activity:

So far the only sunbathers at the beach are these onions.

3 comments:

Dad said...

We have enjoyed our visits to the "tourist mecca" of Deokpo, especially the accommodations and friendly staff at Kisan Harbor View!

danny m. said...

Hi Ellen, I'm going to Geoje this weekend and would like to find a nice, obscure beach. Do you think Deokpo fits the bill. Are there any good (clean, equipped with a/c, good view)minbaks on the beach. Thanks please reply

Ellen said...

Hi Danny,

I hope you enjoy visiting Geoje - there are some beautiful places to go here! Deokpo is certainly less crowded than, say, Haeundae Beach in Busan, but it can get crowded on the weekends during beach season. I recommend Gujora Beach, a little further south on the island. There are also some nice pebble beaches that are even less popular but are very pretty. I don't know about the quality of the minbaks here, but there are many close to the water in tiny Deokpo. Some are very new, so I expect they have a/c and are clean. The town is very small, so all of the places here should have a good view of the water.