As I mentioned in my Jeju city tour bus post our last stop was the Halla Arboretum. My aunt works with plants so we were all kind of excited to see the boasted 1,100 different types of plants. However when it was a 13 minute hike away from the bus stop in a heat wave only to lead to almost nothing indoors my uncle quickly turned around and headed back to the bus stop to spend the rest of the afternoon at the hotel. My aunt and I however weren’t yet ready to throw in the towel and wandered about in the heat trying to find our way to the different gardens and ending up blocked by gates and closed off sections or steep hills. It was beautiful but after visiting one building which wasn’t particularly impressive and one small green house we gave up and headed back down.
I’m sure in any time other than a heat wave it’s absolutely lovely. They’re even suppose to have rare plants…somewhere. Visiting the Halla Arboretum is free and there’s plenty of space to run and explore. I think it’d be a great place to take a family or even have a nice picnic, in good weather. On the way to and from the bus stop are several cafes, convenience stores and at least one restaurant. We stopped at one called Farms Table where I got a lemonade and we sat and cooled down before continuing to the bus stop.
There are a couple other things to do near the bus stop as well, like the Nexon Computer Museum which is only a three minute walk from the bus stop and you don’t even have to cross the street. It’s also fairly close to Loveland (a non-family friendly attraction as it’s nsfw), the Jeju Museum of Art and the Mysterious Road. (these are about a 12 minute bus ride or a five minute taxi ride away). The Jeju City Tour bus however doesn’t go that far, the Halla Arboretum is as far as it goes out of the city. After our trip to Farms Table and into a convenience store we took the bus back to our hotel, completed our check-in and then wandered around looking for dinner, deciding on gimbap to bring back to my uncle who was to tired to go anywhere.