South Korea Guide
Gyeonggi and Gangwon
Incheon
INCHEON is an important port and Korea's third most populous city. It's also home to the country's main international airport, though few foreign travellers see anything of the city itself, with the overwhelming majority of people preferring to race straight to Seoul on a limousine bus. However, in view of its colourful recent history, it's worth at least a day-trip from the capital. This was where Korea's "Hermit Kingdom" finally crawled out of self-imposed isolation in the late nineteenth century and opened itself up to international trade, an event that was spurred on by the Japanese following similar events in their own country (the "Meiji Restoration"). The city was also the landing site for DouglasMacArthur and his troops in a manoeuvre that turned the tide of the Korean War. However, despite its obvious importance to Korea past and present, there's a palpable absence of civic pride, possibly due to the fact that Incheon is inextricably connected to the huge Seoul metropolis – the buildings simply don't stop on their long march from the capital. This may be about to change, however, as it has been chosen as the host of the 2014 Asian Games, and is busily setting about smartening itself up in preparation for the event.
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