Seonyudo island: bus 99 from Gunsan, not the old ferry

Seonyudo sits in the middle of the Gogunsan islands, a scatter of islands off Gunsan on Korea’s west coast. For most of its history it was a boat ride from Gunsan harbour. Since December 2017 it has been a bus ride, and this month the islands past the end of the road are being joined up too.

The English guides were mostly written for the boat.

Incheon Airport to Seonyudo island: three ways, October 2026

The airport bus is the simple one. The airport’s own timetable puts it under Iksan, with the stops Gunsan, Daeya and Iksan, which is why a search for a Gunsan bus at the airport can come up empty. It leaves from stop 13A-1 at Terminal 1, and the page lists 18 departure times a day from early morning to late evening, while the total printed above the same list says 3. Go by the list and read the board on the day. The ride time is not printed. For the Gunsan to Incheon Airport bus on the way home, the times from the Gunsan end are not on the airport’s page, so ask at the Gunsan terminal when you arrive.

In Gunsan, Gunsan city’s transport page gives two ways onto bus 99:

• From the intercity bus terminal, bus 7 at 54 minutes past the hour, or bus 8 or 9 at 50 past, to the Bieung port transfer stop. Bus 99 leaves there at 40 past each hour for Sinsido, Munyeodo and Seonyudo.
• From Gunsan station, buses 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17 or 19 to the Kunsan National University main gate, where the island bus leaves at 10 past each hour for Sinsido, Munyeodo, Seonyudo and Jangjado. The first is at 06:10 and the last at 20:10.

The city’s bus timetable names route 99 as running between the university gate and Seonyudo, so these are most likely one route seen from two stops. I have not matched the stop columns in that timetable, so treat the university gate as the safer place to board: it is where the route starts. The same timetable gives one free transfer within 60 minutes, on the base fare only, which covers the change onto bus 99.

Seonyudo, Gunsan, photographed in July 2019. Photo: 칼빈500, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0

Seonyudo bridge and the end of the ferry: what changed

The road came in two pieces. The first 4.39 km, from the Saemangeum seawall to Munyeodo, opened on 5 July 2016. The rest, to Seonyudo and Jangjado, opened on 28 December 2017, making 8.77 km in all. Aju Business Daily put the cost at 282 billion won, spent since 2008. Since then you can drive onto Seonyudo from the mainland.

That killed the reason for the old boat from Gunsan harbour to Seonyudo, and it is the boat most English guides still open with. Gunsan city’s transport page today lists the islands its scheduled ferry company serves, and Seonyudo is not one of them. At Seonyudo it lists a sightseeing cruise boat instead.

The second change is further out. Maldo, Myeongdo and Bangchukdo, past the end of the road, were reached by a ferry from Gunsan that took more than 120 minutes on a boat that carries 118 people. From 1 January 2025 the regional maritime office moved the route’s start to Jangjado, so the boat now leaves from the island where the road ends.

The third is this month. Four footbridges, known in Korean as 고군산섬잇길, join Maldo, Bonongdo, Myeongdo, Gwangdaedo and Bangchukdo. Kuki News gave their lengths as 308 m, 410 m, 555 m and 83 m, about 1.4 km of bridge in all. The last one was finished on 8 August, and Gunsan says the whole line opens officially on 27 October 2026, after a trial period.

One English guide, last updated on 13 October, tells readers bus 99 comes every 40 minutes. Gunsan’s page says 매시 40분, which is 40 minutes past every hour, and the city’s timetable drops some trips at weekends. Somebody who takes the English version at its word can wait an hour or more at Bieung port.

Gogunsan islands: what is on each one

Seonyudo is not quiet. Jeonbuk Ilbo, quoting the city, put last year’s visitors to the islands at about 2.7 million. What changes as you go out is how you get there: four islands by road, the rest by boat.

Seonyudo, with the bridge to Jangjado, uploaded in 2008, before the road from the mainland. Photo: Albam, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0

Sinsido is where the road from the seawall lands. Gunsan city’s parking note gives a free car park of 31 spaces there.

Munyeodo comes next and was the end of the road from July 2016 until the rest opened in December 2017.

Seonyudo is the one on the bus sign. The city calls it the third largest island in the group. Its beach, which the city’s page calls Myeongsasimni, grew where sand joined what were three islands into one, and is about 1.5 km long and 200 m wide, with shallow water a long way out. This is Seonyudo beach. At low tide the city suggests the mudflats for digging shellfish. The rocky hill above the beach is Mangjubong, named in a local story for an exiled official who climbed it every day to look towards the capital.

Waves on the sand at Seonyudo-ri, as the photographer located it. Photo: insung yoon, Unsplash License

Jangjado and Daejangdo hang off the south-west end of Seonyudo by the Jangja bridge. Jangjado is the end of the road, with the paid car park and, since 2025, the ferry terminal for the outer islands. The city’s page sends the island bus from the university gate on to Jangjado and lists the Bieung port bus as far as Seonyudo, so from Bieung port expect a short walk over the bridge.

Gwallido, Bangchukdo, Myeongdo and Maldo are the boat islands. The October timetable the city posts for the Jangjado line, as an image, has three sailings on weekdays and four at weekends. Going out, the boat calls at Gwallido, Bangchukdo and Myeongdo and reaches Maldo about 40 minutes after leaving Jangjado. Coming back, it calls only at Gwallido. It leaves each stop as soon as it arrives, and the sheet asks passengers to be waiting ten minutes early. Tickets are sold at the Jangjado office; at every other island you pay on board. The operator is Daewon, on 1644-8774.

Maldo, at the end of the line, is known for rock bent into tight folds along its shore.

The fold structure on Maldo, listed by the file’s description as Natural Monument No. 501. Photo: Cultural Heritage Administration, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Gunsan town, with its own list of things to see, is a separate day. This page stays on the islands.

A half day or a full day on Seonyudo

Gunsan’s own Seonyudo page gives the bike timings: about an hour to ride round Seonyudo and out to Daejangdo, another hour for Munyeodo, and three hours for all four islands with time to stop. Hire on the island is not on the city’s page, so treat it as something to find on arrival.

The outer-island day has a direction. The boat stops at Bangchukdo only on the way out, and on the way back it runs from Maldo straight to Gwallido and Jangjado. So get off at Bangchukdo, walk the footbridges west to Maldo, and board the return there. Walk it the other way and you finish on an island the boat home does not call at. The timetable is published as a picture each month and the sheet sends readers to the operator’s Naver Band for cancellations, so phone the Jangjado office on 063-464-4614 before you commit.

When not to go

Avoid weekends if you can. Jeonbuk Ilbo described the islands as packed at the weekend in April 2025, with no pavement in parts of Jangjado and cars reversing towards the sea in a car park with no rail or wheel stops. Gunsan’s own transport page says parking on the islands is tight.

For the outer islands, think twice about Tuesday 27 October 2026. That is the official opening of the footbridges, and the October timetable has the late-morning sailing from Jangjado that day crossed out.

What we have not checked

• The airport bus fare and ride time, and which Gunsan stop it uses. The airport page also prints a total that does not match its own list.
• Which bus 99 trips skip weekends. The city’s bus timetable marks in red the trips that do not run on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, and the scan is too small to read every one. The same scan may put bus 99 at Bieung port a few minutes before 40 past, so be at the stop by 35 past.
• Jangjado line fares. None are printed on the October timetable.
• Footbridge hours and any fee after 27 October.
• How long the footbridge walk from Bangchukdo to Maldo takes on foot, and whether it fits between an outbound and a return sailing. No source gives a walking time.
• Bike hire on Seonyudo.

If you have taken the boat from Jangjado since January, tell me what the board said. For the islands closest to the airport, start with Sindo, Sido and Modo, which lost its ferry to a bridge this summer. For somewhere inland that also has a direct bus from Terminal 1, there is Danyang, on the upper Namhan river. And for an island where the boat still runs but the famous walk does not, see Somaemuldo off Tongyeong.