Seoraksan was made a natural monument in 1965, five years before it became a national park, and in 1982 UNESCO made it Korea’s first Biosphere Reserve. It is the third-highest mountain in the country after Hallasan and Jirisan, and the highest in the Taebaek range that runs down Korea’s eastern spine.
The rock is what people come for: granite and gneiss weathered into spires, slabs and free-standing towers. Ulsanbawi is six granite peaks in a single ridge, roughly 4km around and 873m at its highest. Heundeulbawi, the rocking stone, is a boulder balanced so finely that one person can visibly move it and a hundred cannot push it over.
Above about 1,300m the mountain turns alpine, and the dwarf stone pine on the summit ridge is protected as a strict nature reserve — you can walk to Daecheongbong but not off the path at the top. The Korean goral, a cliff-dwelling antelope and one of Korea’s most endangered mammals, lives on the faces below.
The park covers 398 km² across four districts, and it is worth understanding the split before you book. Outer Seorak, on the Sokcho side, has the entrance, the cable car and the two short famous walks, and takes the overwhelming majority of visitors. Inner Seorak, reached from Inje and Baekdam, is quieter and wilder. South Seorak at Osaek is the steep back door to the summit.
