Our 1st Korea Rural Tourism trip is to 2 different rural places located not far away from Seoul, which is called Gyeonggi Province (Gyeonggi-do in Korean). In this trip, we are gonna experience something that's different that what we have already known about Korea, and revealing the hidden part of Korea, which is so lovely to see and experience.
Sounds exciting?
Let's Go~~
1st STOP!!
Soomy Land @ Yangpyeong (양평 수미마을)
It took us about 1hr30m (approx.) to be there from Coex, Seoul.
As soon as we arrived, a friendly and lovely Korean Lady (a.k.a Ajumma/이모) brought us to the steam bun experience place, and gave us a short briefing about the activities that we can do in Soomy Land during different seasons.
For your information, there are a variety of experience programs going on during different seasons, gonna list a few as below:
- Winter Festival - including fishing on ice, sleigh riding, etc. (normally open from mid of Dec till Feb)
- Strawberry Festival (available from end of Feb till Jun)
- Water activities, yellow soil experience, potato harvesting, Cat fish festival, etc (during Summer/Fall time)
Of course the steam bun making experience program is available for any season, but the flavor may be different~
Feel like going now right?
Let's have a peek on the activities we've done first~~
COURSE#1 STEAM BUN MAKING
Tadaa~~ we started our trip by making the steam bun. Of course, they had already prepare the dough and the red bean for us (since we visited in Sep, which is almost fall, the flavor of bun is red bean, but there will be bulgogi, which is the korean beef stew flavor maybe during winter time!!).
Have a closer look on the ingredients here~~ FYI, the red bean is grown in Soomy Land as well~
Now, another Korean Ajumma appear and gave us instruction on how to make the steam bun. Heard that she is very well known of her skill!!
After the education on how to make the steam bun, shall we start now?!?
First, take some dough, not too much as it will inflate when heated, and make it into a thinner round shape.
Then, put the red bean paste in the middle of the dough, not too much and not too little~
Lastly, try to cover the red bean paste with the same dough, and roll it to make the shape nicer and rounder. And lastly place it on a piece of paper (they will provide), and put it on the tray. DONE~~
It takes 20mins to steam the bun so let's utilize the time to do some sight seeing~
Behind the experience hall, there's a beautiful river where you can play some 'Rock Throwing Game'. I'm bad in that though... so just enjoy taking some pictures~ 
1, 2, 3..... JUMP!!!
20 mins is over~ and now, let's go back and check our steam bun!!
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How will it look like??? (Curious)
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WOOHOO~~ It turns out amazing!!! So proud of us! Notice that little pig in 3D??
Have a bigger look on my creation~ Introducing, Piggy and Elephany~~
Of course, I believe that you can make a more creative one than I do! Try this when you are there next time! (They will give you a box that you may bring back some steam bun that you have made 
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Next stop~ harvesting sweet potatoes~ Let's head toward the sweet potatoes farm~ GOGOGO~
COURSE#2 SWEET POTATOES HARVESTING
Here it is, when we arrived, we are asked to get one tools for each person (to dig the sweet potatoes), and the Korean Man (a.k.a Ajussi, 아저씨) demonstrate on 'How to dig the Sweet Potatoes' in the correct way, and also tell us the don'ts that we need to take note~
Wow~ what a biggggggg one that she dug!!!
It's not too hard to dig, but quite hard to find a big one like this!! Lucky you, girl~
My turn to dig one~ Awww, not as big as hers....
But never mind, we can dig as much as we can~~ as long as we can fit all them into the red baggy that is provided~
Strategy is also needed in order to fit as much Sweet Potatoes as possible into this red bag~
Here's our harvest~ Good Job, Ladies~
While waiting for the team, took some pictures of the nice scenery beside the sweet potatoes farm. It's the sesame farm~ Yellowish Green, and pretty~
What a beautiful creation that God has made!
COURSE#3 TRACTOR RIDE
As shown in the picture, this is the tractor that we are gonna ride on. It will take us to a tour to sightseeing some hidden places of Soomy Land. Look not so interesting? Check out the video below~
NOTE: You may need to lower down the volume... Else you may get a big surprise!
Seriously, you can't really focus on the scenery, but it's as fun as riding on a roller coaster~ Have a try if you are there
COURSE#4 KOREAN STYLE LUNCH BUFFET WITH CATFISH SOUP
After the all three courses above, we got a little hungry and we need some food! Don't worry if you forgot to have your breakfast or pack your own food, there's a canteen with nice food~ Sometimes you can even have Korean BBQ, depends on what is in the package.
Do you see the variety kind of food??
But sadly...I just can't eat too much... and this is what I took...↑↑↑
You can make you own wrap too~ like this ↓↓↓
That's all about Soomy Land. If you would like to visit, you may need to call them up for reservation. Below is the contact information and address:
주소: 경기도 양평군 단월면 곱다니길 55,
No.55, GopDaNi Road, Danwon-myeon, Yangpyeong County, Gyeonggi Province.
TEL: 031-775-5205If you are taking public transport, you may take: subway Jungang Line to YongMun Station ---> from Exit 2 walk about 318m to 용문축협 Bus station and take Bus no. 2-1 and get off at 봉상2리수미뜰 Bus station and Soomy Land is just across the street~
After lunch, it's time to move to the next destination~
2nd STOP!!
Sanmeoru Farm @ Paju (파주 산머루농원)
Our next destination is located at the west part of South Korea, basically from the previous destination, we had to travel 3hrs!!! to get there... Luckily we have a rental bus so we don't have to worry about the transportation.
And here it is, Sanmeoru Farm, which is also the wild grapes farm. Some activities that you can do here is listed below:-
- Learn about the winery making process (though we can't make the wine directly)
- Fill the wine into the bottle directly, experience the packaging process
- Winery Tunnel sightseeing
- Wild grapes jam making
- Chocolate making (only open for Korean)
- Wild grapes soap making (only open for Korean)
- Harvesting wild grapes (only during the selected season)
The programs sound fun too, no?
Outside the winery factory, there are some wall art, that we can enjoy taking picture with too~
The friendly farm owner gave us a short briefing about how they make the wine and the whole process.
Here's the place that we can experience the wine packaging process. Let's start doing now~
COURSE#1 WINE PACKAGING
First, we fill the wine into the bottle...
Then, we put the cork to the bottle...
Then, the staff there will help us to cover the bottle mouth with the packaging...
Tadaa~~ lastly, here's our custom-made label with our pictures~~ Easy, Simple, and Special :))
COURSE#2 WINERY TUNNEL SIGHTSEEING
After that, we move to visit the wine tunnel, and see how they store their wine. According to the owner, some Korean dramas has come to this place for shooting, such as Hotel King, and the Korean variety show 'We've Got Married', Naeun(Apink) and Taemin(Shinee) couple had also filmed at this tunnel~
After all sightseeing, let's move on to the DIY experience program~
There's this beautiful wild grapes arch that we need to cross to get into the experience hall. The owner said that usually there are wild grapes growing on it, but they were all eaten by other visitors and none is left while we visited. But it's still beautiful 
Here we arrived in the experience hall~ and let's start our 1st experience course~
COURSE#3 SOAP MAKING
First, we need to cut the soap into cubes...
Then, we need to heat it, so the soap cubes got melted...
While waiting for the soap cubes to melt, we have 4 cups prepared which is filled with some wild grapes juices. We need to mix it with some chemicals and aroma, before we mix it with the melted soap liquid.
After all is done, fill it into the molds...
Like this ↑↑↑, and it's ready to send to the freezer. Now we can start other experience course while waiting~
COURSE#4 CHOCOLATE MAKING
Five packs of minced cocoa is prepared for us, and we just have to heat it to get them melted.
Here are some decorations for the chocolates...
While waiting for the cocoa to melt, we can start preparing the paper to place the chocolate.
Well, as the whole chocolate making process is really simple, I don't have much pictures of it but what we need to do is just to squeeze the chocolate bag when it's melted, to each of the paper settings. Then put the decorations on it, and leave it to dry. Does it look yummy???
COURSE#5 WILD GRAPES JAM MAKING
The last course for this trip, jam making, which I have been anticipating for a long time!! As usual, the wild grape juices is prepared, and we need to start heating it, and adding sugar into it (you won't be surprise to learn how much sugar does it need to make a jam!!!). Then the rest of our job is to keep stirring while heating.
After approx. 20mins, we are ready to pour the jam into the bottles provided. All the items that we made can be brought home! How good it is~
Apart from the label, it just looks like those that we can find in supermarket...
Now, let's try some with biscuits!!
Seriously, it really tastes YUMMY!!! We can stop licking our fingers!!
While we were still tasting the jam, the soap is all done. See our creations!! ↑↑↑
It was really good that we can bring home so many stuff from this trip, all those that we made by our own.
COURSE#6 WINE TEST DRINK
Our last stop is to test drink the wine. Basically we are offered 3 different flavor, from the one with strongest alcohol to wild grape juice.
Don't forget to do a love shot with your love ones too 
If you are interested to bring some local wine, there's also a gift shop where you can bring back some good wine for your relatives and friends.
That's pretty much about our trip this time. Lastly, I would like to include some contact information about Sanmeoru Farm as below:
주소: 경기도 파주시 적성면 윗배우니길 441-25,
No.441-25, Witbaewuni Road, Jeokseong-myeon, Paju City, Gyeonggi Province.
TEL: 031-958-4558 If you are taking public transport, you may take: subway Blue Line (Line no.1) to Ui Jeong Bu Station ---> from Exit 5 walk about 465m to 의정부역.농협앞 Bus station and take Bus no. 25 and get off at 적성우체국 Bus station ---> then cross the street transfer to Bus no. 091B and get off at 배원리부대앞 Bus station ---> walk straight for about 728m to Sanmeoru Farm※P/S: Of course it would be good if you can rent a car or go in a group so you can call a rental bus to go there.
I hope you have enjoyed reading this and please leave a comment if you would like to know more information, I'd be happy to help out~ Stay tune to this blog site, as I'll be sharing other rural tourism and activities that you can do in Korea. See you next time :)
Posted by Samantha Ong http://blog.naver.com/stha_15/220492750209
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