Kaesong Things to Do

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Most of the people may think Nandemon can only found in South Korea, actually there is one in Kaesong North Korea.
In Nandemon, one of the most famous buildings is this Ancient Bell Tower. This is one of the famous bell towers in North Korea.
The bell was kept in one of the old temper in Kaesong, in 1563, the temper was burnt in fire, so they move the bell to Nandemon and built a Bell Tower.

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Coree Museum was built in Coree Era named as Songgyunguan University, the building is remain and now turns into Coree Museum, the remains indicating the way of development of Coree, the cultural assets, Buddhist image, metal craft, building model, stone art object were displaying in this building.

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Find a day, if you realize that there isn’t any spy around; try your luck to go around.
The places I would definitely visit is local village. Here is one of the villages I’ve chosen near by Kaesong city.
As you can see, the house is made of wood, with very think concrete. Very old design, oldies but goodies.
I was told that usually few families share a small piece of farm land for cultivation. The farm land that I visited was almost empty.
Perhaps in another few weeks, the leaves of potato or sweet corn will comes out?

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Some call this Grand General Hall as The Cultural Central or The Cultural Hall, but it really depends on the guide book.
There is a cultural food court inside where can fit more than 500 people.
When there are tourists visiting to this hall, they may have traffic control for the local people, that’s why we can meet no one local here.

Originally called the Taemyon Palace, this academy goes back to the 11th century. Having survived a few fires, wars (Imjin war ~1592) and reconstruction projects, it is now a museum and tribute to the past.

During its peak, it served as a Confucian academy, teaching some of the brightest minds on the Korean Peninsula. It also served as a Royal guest house.

In addition to the ~20 buildings and pagodas, there are two 500+ year old ginkgo trees and a zelkova tree reported to be more than 900 years old. All three are regarded as monuments.

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This is probably one of the most famous street scenes in North Korea and one that I remember seeing on the net a few years ago that got me wanting to visit the country (who needs tour agency's!). This 4-lane street, known as Tongil Street, runs from the Kim Il Sung statue down the hill and then up again until it meets the Reunification Highway. It is just totally devoid of traffic. Instead a few people walk across it and you can see a traffic policeman, (they don't have the traffic ladies in Kaesong like they do in Pyongyang), just standing there without any traffic to direct. The large party of people to the right of the first photo are South Korean tourists who were visiting for the day and who have just come out of the building with the blue roof, which is known as Kaesong Restaurant No. 1.

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I think virtually every town in North Korea has its own Kim Il Sung statue and Kaesong has this smaller one than the one found in Pyongyang. The statue is lit at night, (which is about the only thing that is in the city), and we could see it from our hotel.

One of the largest buildings in the city is this - the Students and Children's Palace as seen from the top of Mt. Chanam. It was opened in June 1961 on the 15th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean Children's Union and was a total floor area of 6,000 square metres.