Hueree Park in Jeju: Tangerines, Camellias & Animals
The new year has dawned. My friend and her daughter, who came down last year, have been busy since New Year's Day. In the morning, they whipped up some tteokguk (traditional rice cake soup), then happily played board games together before suddenly getting into a squabble. Just watching them drains my energy. When my friend was having a beer after putting the baby to sleep, she said, 'Being with a kid feels like falling into a time slip,' and I'm experiencing that indirectly right now.
The little one wasn't feeling well and stayed home for a while, but once she perked up, we decided to go tangerine picking—something she'd been singing about since we arrived at the airport. If you go to Hueree Natural Park (or just Hueree for short), you can pick tangerines and see camellias, which are practically a symbol of Jeju Island. We have camellias right in front of our house, too, but I started the car for the kid who wouldn't stop singing about tangerines.
Since it was New Year's Day, I expected it to be pretty empty, but the place was so packed that the parking lot was full. Even with COVID, you could see a lot of families bringing their kids out since it's outdoors. By pure luck, a car pulled out right in front of us, so we parked quickly, but otherwise, we probably would have had to stand around waiting for quite a while.
I honestly can't tell if the admission fee for Hueree is expensive or not. However, you do have to pay an extra 5,000 won for the tangerine picking, so you need to factor that into your budget.
Once you go inside, it definitely looks like a garden that charges an entrance fee and maintains its grounds well. The paths are beautifully kept, and you can tell a lot of care has gone into every single tree. Right now, a lot of the camellias along the streets have fallen, but here, even though the buds are a bit small, several trees are proudly showing off their flowers. There are several photo zones, so women of all ages—not just preschoolers—were taking pictures with the flowers. One slight disappointment was that, since it's winter, the pink muhly had all withered and just looked like a field of reeds.
Because it's winter, the flowers outside looked a little weak, but then we spotted a greenhouse. They had planted various flowers and trees inside, and it was definitely full of life. Plus, of course, it kept me warm...
The park was much larger than I thought when we first walked in, and by the time I walked enough to work up a bit of a sweat, we reached the tangerine picking area. In Seogwipo (southern Jeju), tangerines grow so well on their own that the labor to pick them actually costs more than growing them. That's why you often see them being sold by the entire field on Karrot Market (a local neighborhood app). I couldn't understand paying money to do such hard labor, but the kids were just thrilled to pick tangerines without a care in the world. The reason I could also be thrilled watching them was that I didn't pay for myself in advance—only the kid and her dad went picking, while I got some precious time to zone out and drink coffee. Paid activities can be this great.
After the tangerine picking, you move on to an area where you can feed black pigs, goats, rabbits, and ponies. This place is also really well-managed, so there's barely any poop smell. Sure, the pigs squeal so crazily that your ears might fall off, but it's quite clean. I bought some food and handed it to the little one thinking she'd love it, but the pigs charged like they had lost their minds, the goats had weak reactions, and the ponies were too big for her to feed comfortably. So, almost all the carrots went to the rabbits. It was so cute seeing bunny-like kids feeding the bunnies.
It took quite a long time to finish looking around and head back out. I think it easily took an hour and a half to do a full lap. You might wonder why it takes so long when there isn't that much to see, but you have to stop for photos, pick tangerines, and feed the animals—it's incredibly busy. On top of that, if the kid says her legs hurt, you immediately switch to rest mode, so families going with kids should expect to spend about two hours here. There's a lot of walking and plenty of paths that are great for running around, making it a perfect place to drain kids' energy. I'd definitely recommend adding it to your itinerary if you're a family traveling with a baby.