Contents
1. TL;DR
- ✨ Aesthetics: Boutique modern cottage
- 🏨 Room: Cosy, clean, comfortable, with a huge television
- 🧳 Facilities: Shared dining room
- 💵 Price: Value-for-money
- 📌 Location: Walking distance from most of the popular tourist spots in Jeonju
- 👨👩👦 Clientele: Mostly couples
- 💅 Perks: Complimentary welcome drink and simple breakfast
After 6 hours on a red eye flight to Seoul, it was another 3 hours via express bus to get to Jeonju. From the bus terminal, we transferred to a public bus to get to the hotel. But if you have more than two pieces of luggage, you might want to consider taking a taxi instead. This is because there’s not much room on the public bus for you to store your luggage, so it could be a nuisance to others.
Still, we finally made it to the hotel after half a day of travelling. I was feeling quite dishevelled at this point, but luckily we were able to check-in immediately (all thanks to my partner who handled everything 🤭).
2. Room review
The entryway was nothing extraordinary, but there was a small step to separate the inside and outside shoes, which was nice.
The room appeared small when we first entered, but there was enough room to lay our two check-in bags on the floor and still have space to walk around.
The room also had a little seat and a desk for guests who need to work. For normal vacationers like us, the space was super cosy for unwinding with some Netflix at night after a long day out. The neighbourhood was pretty quiet while we were there so we had no trouble sleeping, even though the main sites were just a short walk away.
Speaking of Netflix, the TV was gigantic. Absolutely the best TV we had the whole trip, but it was really a lot bigger than it needed to be.
Something of note is that the toilet and shower were in the same room. I think this is atypical of Korean hotels as the other hotel we stayed in had them in separate rooms. There was also no separation between the shower and the sink area apart from the curtain, so the floor would get wet.
The hotel did provide these really bouncy slippers to keep your feet dry. The toilet itself was the fancy one with the bidet and usual buttons. The whole bathroom was quite big, so I didn’t really have any complaints.
There was also a cute notebook on the desk with Vincent Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” on the cover. Inside, there was a long message in Korean which I couldn’t read (Yes, I could have used Google Translate, but I was in a holiday mood). I was very tempted to bring this home but I decided that I already had plenty of unused notebooks waiting for me at home. Someone else could make better use of it 😊
3. Dining room and breakfast
A bonus of the hotel was the (almost) all-day dining room where they sold drinks and some small bites during the day. We didn’t end up buying any food here, but we were allowed to eat takeaway street food or just hang out in here during its opening hours.
This is also where we enjoyed our complimentary welcome drink together with our first dinner of the trip. We opted for lemon tea (the other option was coffee) and this is when I realised that most drinks in Korea were sweet by default. I’m too used to the zero sugar/less sugar options at home, so remember to ask for no sugar if you need it!
On our second morning here, we had their free hotel breakfast before checking out and heading to our next stop. It was Nurungji (scorched rice porridge?) and side dishes of kimchi, fermented squid (I LOVE THIS), and black beans. Simple and traditional.
4. Location
Another thing we liked about the hotel was its location (Red star). We were close to all the key tourist locations in Jeonju but far enough away that it wasn’t too noisy. We were only a 5 minute walk away from the main Nambu market (Point 3) which we visited for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We were also only a 10 minute walk away from the main Hanok village (Point 1) and the Gyeonggijeon shrine (Point 2).
We took a stroll along the river (Point 5) and got a nice view of the mountains on the bridge (Point 4). We didn’t end up walking up to the Omeokdae (Point 6), but it’s a popular spot to get a better view of the whole Hanok village.
5. Why not stay in a Hanok?
A Hanok is a traditional Korean house. Jeonju is known for its Hanok village, and keeping with the theme, there are lots of Hanok stays in the area. There were Hanok stays for every budget, and there were definitely more affordable options that were similar to guest houses or hostels. However, I think it was our love for creature comforts (and private bathrooms) that compelled us to opt for a boutique hotel instead.
6. Final verdict
If you’re someone who doesn’t need to tick “Stay in a Hanok” off your bucket list, I think this hotel will provide you with a comfortable base to reach all of the tourist sites in Jeonju.
Travel Series: Korea – April 2025
In April 2025, Mr Bao and I headed to Korea! We visited Jeonju, Mokpo, and finally Seoul to explore, eat, and unwind. I hope to post more about our trip as it was such a memorable one. So watch this space.
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