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The Best Weekend TempleStay including a cooking class Review

Have you ever experienced staying up in the mountains, meditating, eating delicious healthy food and just relaxing in nature? We had a wonderful TempleStay thanks to KoreaTravelEasy. This 2 Day 1-night Weekend package is quite luxurious and well worth the price, I will explain why.

In short, all of this was included:

  • They pick you up from your hotel
  • Start off with a cooking class with a monk!
  • Some free time at Bukchon Hanok Village
  • Stay in a modern but traditional style Korean room (comfortable thick mattress on the floor)
  • Walk around in cozy Temple clothes. Pants, a vest, and shoes!
  • Temple Activities such as meditation, tea time, bell striking etc!!
  • Enjoy a view of nature and still be able to see Seoul city from afar!
  • Yummy vegetarian meals included!
  • Go home with more knowledge of Buddism, Korean Temple culture and new ideas & perspectives on life.

The Temple Food Cooking Class

So apparently they change the menu every day so we were very surprised to see what we were going to make! The dish we made is called 찹쌀옹심이팥죽 –  which is Small dumplings in a red bean porridge. And we ate that together with Kimchi! It was a very fun group activity to do, we followed a recipe and instructions from the monk and we also got to eat are cooked meal for lunch together.

Free time at Bukchon Hanok Village

We stopped by Bukchon Hanok Village for a short time to take some pictures and walk around the area. These are Hanok houses – old Korean traditional houses. A lot of tourists come here to take pictures while they wear Hanbok (traditional clothing) so its quite a unique sight, just remember to be on your quiet side because it’s actually a residential area.

Arrive at the Temple – Our room and a Tour of the Temple

When we arrived at the Temple, we got to see our room and change into really comfortable temple clothes. We also got a nice tour of the temple and learned a lot about the buildings, Buddism and Korean culture. There is even a nice little hut with wide windows where you can go have some tea and read a book.

Our rooms were so neat and modern. Very nice floor heat, bathroom with toilet and shower. There were thick mattresses, sheets, blankets and pillows. So sleeping on the floor was really comfortable and warm! We could also make some tea and drink it on our balcony with a nice view of the mountains and forest.

Temple Activities

There were many fun and interesting activities. Striking the huge Bell in the evening was a really cool experience, the sound is so nice and relaxing. We also learned how to bow (the 108 prostrations) and we walked up to a mountain top to sit and meditate with a nice view. But our favorite part was probably drinking tea together with a monk who had such lovely and wise words to share. And the Tea was of course really delicious.

Bell and drum striking

Meditation on the mountain in the morning

This is one of the views during the evening

Tea time

Temple Food

We really enjoyed all the nice Korean Temple food which is also vegetarian! We were told to eat as much as we like but please make sure you don’t leave a lot of leftover food and to wash your own dishes afterward.

 

How to Book!

So to sum it all up, if you are looking for a relaxing time but also want to experience a lot of Korean Temple culture this is a really great package! It’s a little on the expensive side but considering all we got it was well worth our money. To book this trip make sure to pick the 2D1N Templestay (2 days 1 night) click here to book it!  But you could also choose the 1-day TempleStay too. This is only for weekends so if you want to stay on a weekday check this package out: WeekDay Tip it looks a bit different and doesn’t include the cooking class.

I wish you also have a nice TempleStay!

Looking for other alternatives?

This product has different TempleStay programs all over Korea, so if you want to take the bus to a specific Temple check them out here! BOOK HERE

Shre on
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