Namhae is such a great place to escape bustle of the city. Driving along the winding roads wasn’t my favorite thing, but I still really enjoyed the beautiful scenery even though I was a little bit nauseous! If you’re prone to motion sickness like I am, I highly recommend taking some medicine before driving around the island.

We set out to find Darangee Village because they are supposed to be some incredibly beautiful rice terraces there. I learned about the rice terraces from an article by CNN Travel called “50 Beautiful Places to Visit in Korea.” The rice terraces are number 3 on the list and the featured photo is of a group of tourists watching and helping a farmer plant the rice, with the help of a ox. Really cool, right?

We had some difficulty finding the village. Initially, The address listed on the CNN Travel article was missing some information that our navigation system required. Thankfully, there were some signs along the way.

Eventually, the signs stopped and we were left a bit clueless. We kept driving and finally found what we thought must have been the rice terraces. It was the right location, but it wasn’t exactly what we expected.

There were plenty of terraces, but a lot of them weren’t planted. It had potential, but without rice, the terraces just look kind of… rugged.

The village was situated on a really steep hill so we had to walk down through the houses to get a better look at some of the terraces that were actually planted. The houses were really cute and a lot of them had flowers painted on the roofs.

We came across a coffee shop with a great view. You can actually see the coffee shop in the background of the photo on the CNN Travel article. You will need to buy something if you want to sit back and enjoy the view from the benches outside of the coffee shop.

  While we were pretty disappointed with the beauty of the rice terraces, we did really enjoy our time there. The view is nice and there probably is a time of year where these terraces are simply stunning. With anything nature related, timing is everything and maybe we just didn’t get the timing right. The photo in the article was probably taken in early spring when the rice was first being planted and we were there in late summer. Plus, Namhae is famous for growing rice so there’s no shortage of beautiful rice fields. This next photo was taken just down the street from the Darangee Village.

If you’re wondering when the best time to visit the rice terraces, I can’t say for certain. I’ve been told (by a Korean friend) that rice is usually planted in April. It starts getting really vibrant green around June and continues to grow all summer. In the fall it turns from green to a really golden color. ** I found this blog post by a girl that booked a trip to Namhae through Adventure Korea over Buddha’s Birthday. Part of the tour included planting rice at the Darangee Village **

If you’re traveling to Namhae by car, you can plug the address below into your navigation system and it should take you to Darangee Village. Make sure you wear appropriate clothing because to get a good view, you’ll need to walk up and down a fairly steep hill.

Address: 672 Nammyeon-ro, Nam-myeon, Namhae, Gyeongsangnam-do