Geumsan

Durumi Bookshop Geumsan: A Café Fighting to Keep a Town Alive

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Entrance to Durumi Bookshop on the second floor of Geumbit Market, Geumsan

After the observatory views and the fish porridge, I thought the day in Geumsan was done. But my phone showed a bookshop café on the second floor of an old market building in town, and since we had time before the drive home, I figured it was worth a look. What I found at Durumi … Read more

Geumsan Day Trip: Ginseng Fields, River Views and Fish Porridge

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Eojuk (freshwater fish porridge) served bubbling in a stone pot at Gangbyeon Garden, Geumsan

I’ve been to Geumsan more times than I can count — always for the food, always by car, always leaving with the same thought: this place doesn’t need to try hard. It’s a small farming county in the hills south of Daejeon, known across Korea as the ginseng capital (about 80% of the country’s ginseng … Read more