A Winter Day in Pyeongchang at Daegwallyeong Sheep Ranch in Gangwon-do Korea

One Monday in January, I hopped on a bus to Pyeongchang to visit the Daegwallyeong Sheep Ranch (map). I visited this farm a few years ago in summer (and you can see the gorgeous greenery here) but I wanted to finally see what all the fuss was about in winter.

I took a bus from DongSeoul (동서울) at 8:00am to Heonggye (횡계) which took about 2 and a half hours. I was able to reserve my bus ticket here online to the Heonggye, but wasn’t able to book one for the way back. I had to just hope there were seats left for me on the return bus.

Luckily when we arrived at Heonggye I was able to purchase my ticket home for the 3:50pm bus and then grabbed a taxi across the street to head to the ranch.

The 10 minute drive to the ranch was absolutely gorgeous. I had never seen that much snow in a countryside setting before and it looks a lot different from the snow that falls in Seoul. It was breakthtaking.

I arrived at the ranch and slowly made my way up the white path to the entrance, walking under pine trees that were wilting under the weight of all the fallen snow.

I purchased my ticket for 7,000won and was told explictly that I was not allowed on the uppermost trail due to heavy snowfall the previous day. I walked to the main part of the ranch, heard voices from the top of the hill, and saw that literally everyone was using the trail. I decided we’d either all get in trouble together, or no one will scold us so up I went to the forbidden trail!

The view from the path was absolutely incredible and was packed with photographers with cameras that cost more than my month’s rent :’) It was a fun atmosphere with people excited about the scenery (expect for a small group of men who yelled at me for lingering too long in a space they wanted to take a shot of lol)

It was a bit steep and only a little slippery but worth the climb!

After walking around the top trail for about an hour, I headed down to the sheep who don’t graze during winter and instead relax in the barn and get fed all day :) That means the sheep dog is off duty too!

I finished off the day at the rest stop area near the entrance and got some spicy kalguksu for lunch to warm back up and then some coffee at the cafe that had a stunning view of the mountains and a very clean bathroom! Before calling a cab, I grabbed a bag of sheep bread (dough stuffed with either red bean, green bean, or cream and shaped like a sheep!) and then headed back home.