Andong's Hahoe, Buyongdae and Byeongsan Seowon: Routes and Order

The three sit close together around Hahoe and do not overlap in what they offer. Hahoe Village and Byeongsan Seowon are both UNESCO World Heritage sites, and Buyongdae is the place the view over that village is taken from.

• To walk village lanes slowly, give Hahoe Village half a day. People still live there, so cars cannot enter and there is nowhere to eat inside; plan meals outside the village.
• To see the whole village as one view, add Buyongdae. There is no crossing over the river, so it means going round by Gwangdeok Bridge as a separate leg.
• To sit somewhere quiet for a long while, Byeongsan Seowon. Entry and parking are free, but by bus only three services a day come back out, so fix the return first.

With half a day, stay with Hahoe Village alone. With a full day, pair Hahoe with Buyongdae and treat Byeongsan Seowon as its own part of the day.

Buyongdae is the cliff on the far side of the river from Hahoe Village. The view of the village that every guidebook prints was taken from up there.

From the village you can see it plainly across the water. There is no way over the water. Getting there means leaving the village and crossing Gwangdeok Bridge — which is why Buyongdae cannot simply be slotted into a visit to the village.

Buyongdae publishes neither opening times nor an admission price. That means they are not written down, not that there are none.

Hahoe Village and Byeongsan Seowon are both UNESCO World Heritage sites, 3.1 km apart in a straight line. Counting the columns of the city bus 210 timetable the preservation society publishes gives this.

One route, and only the services that call at Byeongsan run three times a day. The cash fare is 1,500 won, and Andong to Hahoe takes about 50 minutes.

Note also what that column is: services out of Byeongsan. Departures into Byeongsan from Hahoe are not listed separately in this table — so what the table supports is not "three a day each way" but "three a day coming back". If the plan is an afternoon at Byeongsan Seowon, the number to work out is the return, not the outbound.

Hahoe's admission table has one more row, set by where you live. Residents of Andong and Yecheon pay 1,000 won as an adult — a fifth of 5,000 — with 500 for youth and 400 for children. Groups of 30 or more pay 4,000 / 2,000 / 1,200, and resident groups go down to 900 / 400 / 300.

There is no parking charge at Hahoe. The village is open every day of the year and opens at 09:00. Only the last admission moves with the season — 17:30 from April to September, 16:30 from October to March.

Byeongsan Seowon is 09:00–18:00 in summer and 09:00–17:00 in winter, but the seowon's own page never says which months those two are. Hahoe attaches April–September and October–March to the same distinction, so the two places use the same word and only one of them defines it. Take Hahoe's months as the guide, but check ahead if you are going at the turn of a season.

Hahoe is the one of the three that is a village people live in. What the preservation society posts under its visitor information is not a timetable but a request: that visitors understand residents cannot freely remodel so much as a kitchen in their own house.

These follow from it.

• Cars cannot enter. A barrier went up on 17 August 2021, and electric buggies were barred with it.
• There are no restaurants inside the village. You cannot get a meal inside it.
• Camping, sleeping in vehicles and cooking are all prohibited — under the River Act, not under a tourism rule.

The Hahoe Byeolsingut mask-dance performance is free, from 2 to 3 in the afternoon: Saturdays and Sundays in January and February, Tuesday through Sunday from March to December, dark on Mondays.

But the society's notice for it is headed "2025 permanent performance schedule". It is not a table updated for 2026, so anyone travelling for the performance should confirm separately that the days still hold this year.

• If you cannot make a bus back from Byeongsan, drop Byeongsan Seowon and fill the day with Hahoe and Buyongdae. The departures from Byeongsan on the preservation society's timetable are 09:30, 12:25 and 15:30, and the table shows nothing later. If you mean to use other transport, confirm it separately before setting out.
• On a Monday there is no Hahoe Byeolsingut mask-dance performance, and in January and February it runs at weekends only. The village itself is open every day of the year, so the day becomes a walk through the lanes without the performance.
• Buyongdae's opening hours and admission are not published. If you could not confirm them before leaving, finish Hahoe Village first and decide afterwards whether there is time for the detour over Gwangdeok Bridge.
• At the turn of a season, Byeongsan Seowon's page does not say which months count as summer or winter, so for a late-afternoon visit plan around the earlier winter closing.
• Hahoe's last admission is 17:30 from April to September and 16:30 from October to March. If you arrive late in the afternoon, go into the village before Byeongsan or Buyongdae.